Mailchimp is super easy to get started with and has been a popular choice for newsletters for some time. With its entry-level starting plans, excellent choice of templates and layouts, you can import a list of contacts and be sending beautiful emails in no time.
There are many so features to make use of, but just because you could doesn’t mean you should, and as with many online tools, there are some features that would be superfluous to many users.
3 things to check on your Mailchimp account now
Here are a few little things that are worth checking on your Mailchimp account which are otherwise easy to overlook, I know from experience – especially if you manage your list on a separate CRM and only use Mailchimp as a tool for sending the emails.
1. Customising your signup form
This is the form that new subscribers will see when they want to sign up to your newsletters. The basic default one that Mailchimp uses will have some basic fields and a signup message, but it’s a good idea to spend some time here to add any business branding or a logo – something that will help make it recognisable to you.
You can also choose which fields to include in your signup process (what information you’d like from your subscriber). This may be as basic as First Name and Email Address. On my form here, I ask for their email address and first name only as I don’t feel I need to collect any other personal data from my subscribers.
I also ask subscribers to self-select what Mailchimp Group they’ll be added to. They don’t know this at the point of signup, but by answering the question on my signup form, this will allocate their contact details to a group within my audience contact list – this means I can email a specific section of my list based on their interest in my business.
2. Make use of the unsubscribe confirmation email
This is a final Goodbye email that’s sent automatically when someone unsubscribes from your list. It might seem unnecessary, but people may unsubscribe accidentally. It’s an optional email in the unsubscribe process, so it’s worth checking that you are making use of this via the Audience Settings.
As well as providing reassurance that the unsubscribe has been successful, it gives you another chance to remind the subscriber why they signed up in the first place, so may help with your list retention. Like the Signup Form, this email can be changed to make it more relevant to your campaigns. Let your subscriber know what they’ll miss out on if they unsubscribe. If you manage your list externally to Mailchimp, then it’s worth making this clear on this email too.
3. Publicity Settings for your campaigns
Another setting to consider in your Audience Settings is how discoverable you’d like your campaigns to be. By default, Mailchimp allows viewers of the email to subscribe and view past campaigns when an email is viewed via ‘view in browser’ (opened via the web using a URL rather than email).
This is particularly relevant if an email is forwarded from a subscriber to a non-subscriber or if you share campaigns via social media. Would you like new viewers to have the option to subscribe and to view your previous emails?
If you manage your list externally to Mailchimp (on your own in-house CRM) or if your content is intended to only be shared directly with your audience, then changing this setting will prevent external sign-ups and also protect your content to a certain extent, however, any email sent via Mailchimp can be forwarded or shared via a URL.