Having a professional online presence is crucial for any brand, business, or creator in today’s digital landscape. Squarespace, known for its sleek website-building tools, also allows users to register or connect domains. One incredibly useful, but often misunderstood, feature is domain masking. This guide will help you understand what domain masking is, how to set it up with Squarespace, and when you should (or shouldn’t) use it. By the end of this article, you’ll be able to make an informed decision about whether domain masking makes sense for your website needs.
TLDR
Domain masking allows you to point multiple domains to a single Squarespace site without revealing the destination URL. It’s useful for branding, marketing, and maintaining a professional appearance. However, it can come with SEO and user experience downsides if not configured properly. This guide walks you through what masking is, its benefits and risks, and how to implement it correctly using Squarespace and third-party domain registrars.
What is Domain Masking?
Domain masking involves forwarding a domain to another but keeping the original domain name visible in the browser address bar. For example, if you forward www.mybrand.com to your Squarespace site mybrand.squarespace.com with masking, visitors will only see www.mybrand.com in their browser’s address bar, even though the content is being loaded from the Squarespace URL.
This technique can be helpful in scenarios where you:
- Want to maintain consistent branding across multiple domains
- Are promoting a temporary campaign website
- Have a legacy domain receiving traffic but want it to show your new site
However, domain masking has its limitations, especially when it comes to SEO, analytics tracking, and browser behavior.
Why Use Domain Masking With Squarespace?
Squarespace lets you build attractive sites easily, but its domain settings can be restrictive if you’re managing multiple domains outside of Squarespace’s own registrar. Here’s where domain masking can be a temporary workaround.
- Brand consistency: If you’re running multiple campaigns or want each product in your lineup to have its own domain but not its own full website, masking can serve as a quick solution.
- Cost-efficiency: Instead of building and maintaining multiple websites, you can direct traffic from various domains to a single Squarespace site.
- Client-friendly masking: For agencies managing sites on behalf of clients using white-label branding, masking domains lets you keep your Squarespace backend hidden.
Domain Masking vs. Domain Forwarding
It’s important to understand the difference between masking and usual domain forwarding:
- Domain Forwarding (without masking): Redirects users to another domain and updates the browser’s address bar to reflect the new URL.
- Domain Masking (with masking): Redirects users while keeping the original domain URL in the address bar.
The major drawback of masking is that search engines may not index your content correctly, and JavaScript-heavy content may not work as expected. Therefore, it’s essential to weigh the pros and cons.
How to Set Up Domain Masking With Squarespace
Squarespace does not directly support domain masking from its own dashboard, especially for domains not registered with them. To mask a domain, you’ll typically need a third-party domain registrar like GoDaddy, Namecheap, or Google Domains. Here’s a step-by-step process using a general domain registrar:
- Log into your domain registrar dashboard.
- Locate the settings for DNS Management or Domain Forwarding.
- Select the domain you want to mask and choose Forwarding with Masking.
- Enter the full URL of your live Squarespace site, usually something like https://yourcustomdomain.squarespace.com.
- Optionally, update the meta tags: Title, Description, and Keywords (Note: These are basic and don’t override Squarespace’s SEO settings).
- Save the changes and wait for propagation, which can take a few hours.
Keep in mind, not all registrars support meta tags or advanced masking features. Also, some mobile browsers and search engines might bypass the masking.
Alternative Squarespace-Compatible Options
If you’re serious about SEO, performance, and user experience, consider the options below instead of masking:
1. Using Squarespace’s Built-In Domain Linking
If your domains are registered with Squarepace, or properly linked via DNS settings, Squarespace allows you to set up multiple domains and choose a primary one. Squarespace will then perform 301 redirects — great for SEO.
2. Setting Up a Landing Page
If you have multiple domains meant for different audiences, set them up as individual landing pages on your Squarespace site and forward each custom domain (without masking) to its respective page. This lets you deliver tailored content and still preserve SEO best practices.
3. Subdomains for Thematic Content
Use subdomains like blog.mybrand.com or shop.mybrand.com and point them to distinct pages within your Squarespace site. This works great with proper DNS configuration and doesn’t require masking.
When to Avoid Domain Masking
Domain masking may seem like a quick fix, but here’s why you should proceed with caution:
- SEO Impact: Search engines may not index your masked content properly. Google bots may see the masked site as a low-ranked iframe.
- Performance & Errors: CSS styles, JavaScript function, and form submissions might not work correctly inside a masked frame.
- Analytics Confusion: Tracking real visitor sources becomes difficult because analytics may not attribute traffic properly.
- User Trust Issues: Savvy users may notice issues with the page layout or links and trust the site less due to the inconsistencies between URL and page content.
Best Practices for Squarespace and Masked Domains
If you decide to use masking despite the limitations, here are some tips to optimize the experience:
- Limit usage to short campaigns or temporary projects where SEO and advanced tracking aren’t priorities.
- Test all devices and browsers to ensure that the site displays and functions properly under masking conditions.
- Set up proper metadata on the domain registrar, although this is no substitute for Squarespace’s native SEO capabilities.
- Plan future migration so you eventually switch to native domain linking or create a proper 301 forwarding setup.
Conclusion
Domain masking can be a handy trick in specific situations, but it shouldn’t be your first choice for long-term solutions — especially when using a sophisticated platform like Squarespace. With its elegant design features and built-in domain tools, you can achieve most branding and functional goals without masking.
If you do need to mask a domain temporarily for a campaign or client demo, do it cautiously and understand the limitations that come with it. Whenever possible, use Squarespace-vetted solutions such as proper domain linking, subdomain redirects, or temporary landing pages to ensure a seamless and professional experience for your visitors.
Ultimately, your brand deserves transparency, optimal performance, and great SEO visibility — and domain masking is only a small part of that bigger puzzle.