Executive Brief — Service Provider¶

Part of the Domain Connect Knowledge Base · Product Edition: Service Providers

The 60-Second Pitch¶

The last step before our product delivers value is connecting the customer's domain — and it happens in a registrar control panel we don't control. About half of users fail manual DNS setup. That costs us activations, support time, and documentation we keep rewriting for every registrar.

Domain Connect is an open standard, in production since 2016 and now on the IETF Standards Track, that replaces this step with a "Connect automatically" button. The customer approves at their DNS provider and comes back with DNS configured exactly right. GoDaddy, IONOS, Cloudflare and ~17 other DNS providers support it; Microsoft 365, Google Workspace and Shopify are among 408 services already using it.

The integration is small, the manual path stays as fallback, and we can measure the lift directly. I'm asking for Phase 0 to measure our addressable share, then Phase 1 to build it and roll out at our top DNS providers.

One-Page Brief¶

Problem. Connecting a domain requires customers to enter DNS records by hand at their registrar. ~50% fail (Microsoft 365 data). Failures cost activations, generate support tickets and require registrar-specific documentation that goes stale.

Proposal. Integrate Domain Connect: publish a template for our service, sign requests, detect support during onboarding and offer one-click setup where available.

Why now.

294 DNS providers, covering ~42% of scanned domains, already support it [replace with our measured share]
1,436 service providers — including our peers — already have templates; customers increasingly expect one-click setup
IETF standardization (DCONN WG, Oct 2025) means one integration with a long future
The manual path stays, so risk is contained and the lift is measurable

Investment. Small engineering build for the synchronous flow, using open-source client libraries; partner effort to get the template deployed at key DNS providers. [Insert engineering sizing from Phase 0.]

Expected outcomes. [Insert figures from the business-case worksheet.]

Higher completion of the domain step for customers on supporting providers
Shorter time from signup to working domain
Fewer DNS-related support tickets; less registrar-specific documentation

Risks and controls. Coverage is partial — measured up front, with manual fallback. Template changes are costly — designed for stability from day one. Signing key — stored and rotated like other production secrets. We never handle customer DNS credentials.

Decision requested. Approve Phase 0 (addressable share, baseline, sizing) and Phase 1 (template and integration), with Phase 2 rollout to DNS providers driven by measured results.

Tailoring the Message¶

Audience	Lead with	Bring
CEO	Activation and retention; peers already use it	The 60-second pitch, the numbers table, Service Provider CEO story
Engineering	Small, well-defined integration; libraries and example service	Scope of Work, Getting Started, Service Provider developer story
Security	No customer credentials; signed requests; key management	Security Model, Risks & Objections
Support	Fewer "my email doesn't work" tickets; less documentation	Service Provider support story
Product / growth team	Funnel lift with a built-in comparison group	Service Provider PM story, Business Case
Finance	Worksheet with our own data; measure before scaling	Business Case

Your First Steps After Approval¶

Run the _domainconnect lookup on a sample of customer domains to measure addressable share
Try the customer experience yourself at exampleservice.domainconnect.org with a domain at a supporting DNS provider
Pick your template pattern in 15 — Template Use Cases and find a similar existing template in the repository
Hand engineering Getting Started: Service Provider and the Implementers Edition
Join the community at domainconnect.org/getting-started and start the conversation with your top DNS providers early

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