Problems activating domain aliases on Google Apps

Problems activating domain aliases on Google Apps

So as most of you know, I have a domain problem, it’s a Godaddy caused addiction really. I don’t consider it a problem, but some of you might.

Anyways, that problem, led me to another problem. I was trying to add a Domain Alias to my Google Apps account, which I use for the email system on the primary websites that I manage. The problem I ran into though was I had a domain name that google was telling me I needed to Activate.

In order to activate the domain alias, I needed to verify the domain. The problem was, I verified the domain, multiple times, using multiple methods, and no matter what I did I still couldn’t activate the domain name. I even went so far as to add another domain alias to my account to see if I could get that one working. Same problem, I could verify it, and it showed up in the history as verified, but if I tried to activate it wouldn’t do anything.

After searching around on the internet for an hour or so I finally stumbled across a forum post that helped point me in the right direction. Basically, the problem was due to google’s multiple account login. I was signed in to both my Gmail account, and my Christoc.com email account, and for some reason that hosed things.

I had to go in and sign out of both accounts. Then login again with my Christoc.com account, click on Manage Domain, then I was able to go through the verification process. Voila, everything is working again!

Initially I did searches for all sorts of things. I assumed I was running into a domain alias limitation on Google Apps, meaning you could only have so many domain aliases attached to an account. That wasn’t the case, though I am sure there has to be a limit in there somewhere. I’m using the free Google Apps accounts, not the business account at this point.

Recent Comments

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Thanks! This was a lot of help
Posted By: M. W. on Aug 2011
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Thanks for the tip of multiple logins! I'd found another post that said it had something to do with the Next Gen Dashboard, but that didn't fix the issue, this did!
Posted By: Mike W on Oct 2011
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I had the exact same problem, and used the exact same solution ;). Well, of course for different domain names. What it most specifically appeared to be related to was that I was logged into Webmaster Tools with one account, and into Apps management with another account. For those struggling with activation as well: Keep an eye on the top right corner of your screen, and make sure that in every step of the domain verification process it says the same email address/username.
Posted By: Wouter Vliet on Oct 2011
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Thank you so much, logging out and logging in did the trick and, now it tells me the domain is verified.

Posted By: Siebe Brouwer on Jan 2021

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Chris Hammond

Chris Hammond is a father, husband, leader, software developer, photographer and car guy. Chris focuses on the latest in technology including artificial intelligence (AI) and has spent decades becoming an expert in ASP.NET and DotNetNuke (DNN) development. You will find a variety of posts relating to those topics here on the website. For more information check out the about Chris Hammond page.

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