By default, Ply sends your purchase orders and other outbound emails from a Ply address. With a Custom Email Domain, those emails go out from your own address instead, something like [email protected] or [email protected].
Two things change once it's set up:
Your suppliers see your company as the sender, not Ply.
When a supplier replies to a PO, the reply lands in your inbox.
Before you start: who needs to be involved
Setting this up takes two people, or one person with access to both systems.
The first part happens inside Ply and takes about a minute. The second part requires adding DNS records to your domain, and that has to be done wherever your domain is managed: GoDaddy, Namecheap, Cloudflare, or whoever your provider is.
Ply cannot make that change for you. Only whoever controls your domain can. In most companies that's an IT person, an external IT provider, or whoever originally set up your company email.
Our recommendation: loop that person in before you begin, rather than getting halfway through and stalling. The whole thing usually takes a few minutes of their time.
Step 1: Open the Custom Domain settings
In Ply, go to: Settings → Company & Billing → Company → Custom Domain
Step 2 - Enter the address you want to send from
In the From Email Address field, enter the address you'd like your Ply emails to come from. For example:
This needs to be an address on a domain your company owns and controls.
Click Set Up Custom Domain.
Step 3 - Add the DNS records
Ply will now show a Pending DNS Configuration status, along with three CNAME records specific to your account.
Send these records to whoever manages your DNS, along with these instructions:
Log in to your domain registrar (GoDaddy, Namecheap, Cloudflare, or whichever you use).
Go to the DNS settings for your domain.
Add each of the three CNAME records exactly as shown in Ply, with the Host and Points To values copied across.
Set TTL to 3600, or leave the provider's default.
Save the changes.
You can click any value in Ply to copy it straight to your clipboard, which avoids typos.
Copy the records exactly as they appear. Don't rename or shorten the Host values, those names are what allow receiving mail servers to verify your emails are legitimate. If they're changed, verification fails.
Step 4 - Wait for propagation
DNS changes don't take effect instantly. Propagation can take up to 48 hours, though it's often much faster.
Step 5 - Verify
Once the records have propagated, come back to Settings → Company & Billing → Company → Custom Domain and click Verify DNS Records.
When verification succeeds, your custom domain is live and your Ply emails will start sending from your own address.
Troubleshooting
Verification fails right after adding the records. This is usually just propagation. Wait a few hours and try again.
Your DNS provider says a record with that name already exists. This happens when another platform is already sending email on behalf of your domain and has claimed the same record name. Get in touch with support and we can work through it with you, it's usually solvable.
Verification succeeds but suppliers still aren't receiving emails. If your domain has a DMARC policy in place, it may be filtering mail even after the records are added. Reach out to support and we'll help you work out what's happening.
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