Once you have setup your tree and have the results that identify your DNA matches you will want to identify how they are connected to you. Most genealogy sites have tools that will help you do this, but their tools tend to be limited as to how distant the relationships can be and depend heavily on the information each individual puts into their family trees. In order to find your connections to most of your DNA matches it will be necessary for you to know how to make those connections yourself.

1. Review your closest DNA matches
2. From your DNA homepage, click View All DNA Matches to see a list of your biological relatives who have taken the AncestryDNA test. Your matches are ranked by how much DNA you share; the higher a match is on your list, the closer your relationship is. If you don't have a close relative match yet, don't worry; your list of matches is updated continually.
3. Start with the closest match and check out their family trees. When your matches have public, linked family trees, you'll see the number of people in their tree. If their tree is green, it's public. If it's gray, they have either a private tree or no tree. A lock means the tree is private. A green leaf signifies that a common ancestor was found. If you want to see a match's private tree, ask whether they'd be willing to share it with you.
4. Contact your matches
5. From your list of DNA matches, click a name, then click Message. Introduce yourself and explain that you're looking for a member of your biological family. Your message may come as a surprise, so it's smart to be sensitive to the possible family dynamics. Ancestry’s Barefoot Genealogist has some insights about handling her own unexpected AncestryDNA matches. Not everyone checks their Ancestry messages regularly, so check back for a reply.
6. View your shared matches
7. From your list of DNA matches, click a name, then click the Shared Matches tab for a list of matches that you and that match have in common. Review the family trees of your shared matches for surnames, places, and specific people that are the same within the group. If a 1st cousin match doesn't have a tree, consider contacting them and working together to build one. If you identify an ancestor who appears in at least two of your shared matches' trees, you've found someone to research.
8. Look for common ancestors
9. When you learn the name of a possible ancestor, investigate how closely they're related to you. Use the predicted relationship to estimate the ancestor's generation in the tree you created; for example, a common ancestor with a 2nd cousin may be your great-grandparent. Enter the ancestor in a great-grandparent spot in your tree—it doesn’t matter which one. You can move them once you figure out where they fit.
10. Start descendancy research
11. When you find an ancestor, find their descendants generation by generation, identifying all the children, grandchildren, and so on, up to the present. Work forward until you reach people who could be your parent. Even vague, non-identifying information from your adoption files or from your adoptive parents can be helpful at this point. Use Ancestry trees, obituaries, and online directories to piece together the unknown line of your family. Check out our article about finding living people. 
12. Contact living family members
13. In tracing your family, you may find potential grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, siblings, and parents. Even if you don't know how you're related, contacting these people may help you fill in the gaps. Once they've heard your story and processed the information, you might gauge their interest in taking a DNA test to confirm your suspicions.
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HOW TO SEARCH A DNA MATCH part 1

1. 
   Go to the DNA tab on your Ancestry.com home page
2. Go to DNA matches
3. Decide which matches to search. Ancestry allows you to filter the matches that you search in a variety of ways, including by when of your parents they are connected to, which of your known ancestors they have in their tree, or by the locations they have listed in their tree. When doing an initial search to confirm your connection to specific surnames, I always suggest searching all matches. Although the filters can be useful, you want to see every match to begin with. Its possible that you will have matches you are not familiar with that share more recent ancestors you are not aware of.
4. 
   Ancestry will list your DNA matches in order of the number of Centimorgans and segments that you share with each individual your DNA has matched with. The larger the number of Centimorgans, the closer that person is likely related to you. Family search has dedicated and entire page, including videos that explain Centimorgans in detail https://www.familysearch.org/en/blog/centimorgan-chart-understanding-dna. For our purposes you just need to know that when beginning your tree you want to explore those with the largest number of Centimorgans who are at the top of yourDNA match list first as they will confirm your connection with your nearest ancestors. 
5. The example I’m using is my sister's daughter, who is just starting her Ancestry tree. So far she only has 3 people in her tree, herself, her mother and her unknown father. Because my DNA appears as a match at 789 Centimorgans it’s clear that she is definitely related to me, confirming her mothers side of the family is correct at least on the maternal line. She also has two matches with larger amounts of centimorgans than we share. Both are on her paternal side and at least one of them has the surname of Nelson, which is her presumed fathers name. This suggests that she is indeed his child. We will start our DNA search with these top 2 matches to confirm their connection to the Nelson family.
6. The first match on her list has a publicly linked tree with at least 66 people in it.
7.  It is estimated by Ancestry.com that Susie Tucker12 shares 1359 Centimorgans with my niece and is estimated by An entry to be a close relative such as a first cousin based on the number of Centimorgans they share. 
8. Additional possibilities for 1349 Centimorgans in common could be an aunt or even a grand or great grandparent.
9.   By clicking on their publicly linked tree we can see all of the deceased ancestors they have listed, but it will not show us the names of living people. The goal is to gather as much information as possible on extended ancestors so we can search other records to try and obtain these names. It become more likely that this match may be a sibling of my nieces GreatGrand parent, as we note than this match indicates that their parents were born in1885 and 1879 respectively. Using the 20 year average per generation assumption mentioned above, that would put their birth around 1900. My niece was born in 1994, so this would have to be a connection with someone several generations back. 
10. In this case I don’t recognize any of the surnames listed on this tree, so I make a note about it and move onto the next match. Since my niece's tree is incomplete, we will need to identify more of her fathers family to go further with this match. At this stage of your tree don’t spend a lot of time on a match not easily traced. You are here to confirm or deny suspected family connections so keep going until that is done. One addition thing we can do, is review the matches that my niece has in common with Susie Tucker12. These shared matches may give us an idea of which surname the match is connected with.
11. The next match on the list Lauryn Nelson looks more promising. My niece's paternal line should be Nelson and this match has that surname. The previous match Susie’s Tucker12 also appears to have a DNA match with Lauryn Nelson, confirming that Susie is indeed connected with the Nelsons and can be added to that family group. Family groups are useful ways to sort your DNA matches into surnames that you can use in later searches.
12. You can create and assign different colors to them so that they are easily recognized at a glance. In this case I have created a Group called NELSON to add these paternal matches to.
13. At this point both Susie Tucker12 and the match with Lauryn Nelson can be added to the NELSON group with confidence.  
14. Lauryn Nelson also has enough Centimorgans in common with my niece to likely be a first cousin according to the CENTIMORGAN chart at 1113 centimorgans. She is likely the daughter of one of my niece's fathers siblings. Her publicly linked tree has at least 31 names in it.
15.  This would mean that this match shares a grandparent with my niece and since she has all four of her grandparents listed, it’s just a matter of tying my niece to the correct ones. In this case we know she is a Nelson, so our goal is to find more information on the Columbus Nelson listed and identify his male children, one of whom is the father of this DNA match, Lauryn Nelson.
16. At the very least we now have the answer to our question as to whether the man my niece believes is her father really is. This match suggests that he is and we can now go ahead and add him to her tree with confidence. From there the Ancestry computer algorithm will search for files that will confirm his parents and siblings, including the likely father of the DNA match Lauryn Nelson.

HOW TO SEARCH A DNA MATCH PART 2

1. Choose the match you would like to explore
2. If it is not there, and it may not be if you are looking for an ancestor greater than 5 generations out, go to their linked tree and click expand to see if it’s there.
3. If you still don’t see the surname you’re looking for, click on view full tree. This will take you directly into their Ancestry tree. Click on tree search in the top right hand corner of this page.
4. Enter the surname and any that they have in their tree will come up
5.  Bring up the profile of that person
6. On a seperate page pull up your tree and search to see if that person is in it already. 
7.  If not, go back to their tree and search the name to see if you can locate a parent for them.
8.  If there is another tree that lists a parent for them, pull it up for more details
9. Check your tree to see if their parent or grandparents are already in your tree. If they are, go to the tools tab on the page of the tree where you found them
10. Add the information found in the new ( unrelated) tree to the information already in your tree 
11. Once you have the name you know is in your matches tree, also in your tree, you can begin connecting their tree to yours.
12. Use a MATCH TRACKING SHEET to list the information from the located name to the name of your DNA Match

USING THE DNA MATCH TRACKER

The DNA match tracker is a tool that useful for following the trees of your DNA matches so the information can be easily entered into your tree. It’s also useful to determine the most recent common ancestors of multiple matches that will confirm the branch of a family you likely descend from. Print out multiple copies of the form based on the number of matches you plan to trace.

1. After confirming that a match is connected to you, using the previous match tracing instructions, complete the information at the top of the form. A. DNA OF (the persons DNA matches you are tracing, as it may not be yours) B. MATCH NAME (The listed username of the match) C. The date and time you start tracing the match D. How many Centimorgans and segments of DNA you share with the match, E. The Generation Ancestry suggests you may be related at and the side of the family they are likely connected to maternal or paternal F. and the surname you are trying to match them with.
2. All of this information will be useful for you to keep track of your work and locate the match again if you need to come back to it in the future
3. The first thing to do is determine which side of their family tree you are matched with so you don’t need to copy their entire tree
4. This is done by going back to the name common name you found in your previous search and locating it in their tree. In our example we know that Puretha Dodson is the ancestor that they descend from and that her Grandfather Lambeth Dodson is the common connection you already had in your tree.
5. We also know that she married John Stamps, so the first name we look for in your matches tree on the DNA match page is STAMPS to see which of her children is their ancestor. 
6. In this case we find that Delaney Stamps is listed on their fathers side with the WEST surname, thus this is the side we want to trace. 
7. We begin by listing their father on the DNA MATCH TRACKER and continue until we come to Delaney Stamps and her connection to Purentha. 
8. Delaney is connected to the SMITH surname by marriage to John Smith b. 1792. Smith is connected to the Lovell surname by marriage of Rachel Smith to Robert Lovell so when we come to the LOVELL name, we start tracing that line instead of WEST.
9. You can now go back to your tree and enter the details regarding Purenthea Dodson all the way to your DNA match.  
10. Be sure to note on your tracking sheet the birth and death dates, and the maiden names of females in parenthesis. This will help as you transfer the information into your tree.
11. Once you have all of the information in your tree, including the user name of your DNA match, you can connect them to your tree, enter the correct relationship connection, add them to a surname group, and make a note of your most recent common ancestor.  

YOU CAN ALSO MAKE A DNA MATCH TRACKER ON A SPREADSHEET AND DO IT ALL ONLINE.