Customize the email address that automated system messages come from for your community members. You can add multiple sender email addresses for your community, and communities can also allow individual clubs to manage their own sender email addresses. This improves email deliverability and helps members recognize emails from your brand or club.
Set up your Email Sender address
Sign into your dashboard and into the Domain Name System (DNS) management platform you use for your website or domain
In the Gradual Dashboard
Go to Settings—>System Settings and select 'Edit' under the 'Sender Email' field
Enter the new email address you want to use
Note: This does not need to be a real, existing email address, but the domain or end of the email must be yours as it allows Gradual to send emails on behalf of your domain.
3. Click 'Next' and it will automatically generate the CNAME and TXT records that you need to copy and paste to add to your DNS management tool
In the DNS management platform
Paste the Host/Name field records and Target/Value field records as a new CNAME record.
Consult your DNS management tool support documentation for specific instructions on how to add CNAME records to your DNS management or hosting platform
Note: Add the records in the DNS settings for the domain Gradual names above the table — your registered domain, which is not always the domain in the sender address. For a sender on a subdomain such as community.example.com, the records belong in the DNS zone for example.com.
Copy the Host/Name and Target/Value fields exactly as the table shows them, without trimming anything off either end. The full record name shown under each row is there to check your work, not to paste.
If the sender's subdomain is its own DNS zone at your provider, leave the subdomain out of the Host/Name.
2. You also need to add a DMARC record for sending. You can find the steps to setup the DMARC records in this article.
In the Gradual Dashboard
Once you've added these to your domain settings, select 'I've added these records' in the bottom left of the pop up and then select the 'Verify' button in the bottom right.
Note: A green check mark will appear when the records have been verified
2. Select 'Change Sender Email' button in the bottom right and the email address will be changed, and all emails from Gradual to your members will come from that address moving forward
If you need to change the email address at any point, you will follow these steps using the new email address. Here is a video walking you through how to set up the custom email sender address:
💡 Pro Tip: To aid in the deliverability of Google Calendar invites for Gradual events, ensure that this Sender Email address matches the one used for the Google Calendar integration.
Editing an existing sender address updates it in your draft emails, including emails in workflows. Setting a new default sender does not change emails that already exist — only emails created afterwards use the new default.
Allow clubs to customize sender email
Community Admins can allow clubs to manage their own sender email addresses.
To turn this on:
Go to Clubs > Club Settings
In the Club Autonomy section, turn on Allow clubs to customize sender email
When this setting is on, club admins can manage sender email addresses from the club’s Settings page.
When this setting is off, clubs will use the community’s default sender email for club emails.
Manage sender email addresses for a club
When club-level sender customization is enabled, Club Admins and Community Admins can manage sender email addresses from the club’s Settings page: club dashboard > Club Settings.
In this section, they can:
view the club’s current default sender
add a new sender email
edit an existing sender
set a verified sender as the default
delete a sender
reset the club back to the community default sender
Each club can add up to 20 sender email addresses
If a club has no verified sender email, Gradual will use the community’s default sender for club emails.
If a club’s sender email is no longer verified, it cannot be used as the club’s default sender. In that case, Gradual will send club emails from the community’s default sender until the club sender is verified again.
Delete a sender email address
On the sender’s row, open the actions menu and select Delete.
Before the address is deleted, Gradual checks whether anything is still using it — either as the Sender Email or as the Reply-To address. A sender used only as a Reply-To address still counts.
When deletion is blocked
A sender cannot be deleted while it is in use by:
a custom email that is Scheduled or Sending
an Active workflow
an event email for an event that has not yet ended, or that ended within the last 30 days
Gradual shows a Cannot delete this sender dialog headed It’s currently in use by the following active items, and lists what is using the address. Each item is labelled with its type, for example Event: Monthly product demo. If more items are using the address than the dialog lists, it ends with a count of the rest, such as and 1 more — so the list is not always the full picture.
The dialog has only an OK button, so nothing is deleted. Remove or reassign the items using the address, then delete the sender.
Emails that have already been sent never block a deletion and are not listed.
When deletion goes ahead with a warning
If the sender is used only by draft emails, or by workflows that are in Draft or Stopped, Gradual lists those items and asks you to confirm. Those items fall back to your default sender: community emails to the community default sender, and club emails to that club’s default sender.
You will be asked to confirm twice — once to confirm you want to delete the sender, and again to confirm the fallback. This is expected.
Deleting a club’s sender
The same checks apply to sender addresses managed at club level. A club email whose sender is deleted falls back to that club’s default sender, or to the community default sender if the club has none.