How MailChimp works

After reading my guide on how to create a successful blog, you decided to open your website and in a short time you managed to get a fair number of readers. One of them advised you to create a newsletter, which allows you to subscribe and receive an email with all the news on the site on a weekly basis, but your knowledge about it is almost nil and you have no idea how to do it. If this is indeed the case, then I have the right solution for you: it’s called MailChimp.

MailChimp is a web platform dedicated to sending newsletters: it allows you to create your own newsletter using numerous free templates or creating a personalized layout and to schedule automatic sending. It also allows you to manage the email addresses of registered users and to create registration forms to be included on your website. Interesting, right? Then do not waste any more time and read the operation of this service immediately thanks to the instructions I am about to give you.

Take five minutes of free time, read the next paragraphs carefully and let me explain in detail how MailChimp works so you can create your personalized newsletter. I am sure that, in a few words, you will be able to understand how it works, schedule the sending of your emails and satisfy the requests of your readers. Let it bet?

How to sign up for MailChimp

To start using MailChimp, creating lists of users and sending newsletters, sign for an account is required. The registration process is free and requires very few minutes.

Then connect to the MailChimp site and press the Sign Up Free button at the top right, then enter your details in the fields Email, Username and Password (minimum 8 characters and containing at least one number, a special character, a lowercase letter and a capitalized) and click the Get Started button. Within a few moments you will receive an email containing an activation link: press the voice Activate account to complete the registration.

In the new open page, enter your personal data in the First name and Last name fields and press the Continue button; then enter the name and site of your business in the fields What’s the name of business? and What’s your website and press the Continue button again. Now, enter the data related to the location of your business by entering them in the fields Address, City, State/Province/Region, Postal code and Country, then press the Continue button, put the check mark next to the items Yes or No to indicate if your business sells online and press the + button next to the Facebook and Twitter logos to link your social accounts.

As a last step, choose if you want to subscribe to the MailChimp newsletter: check the Subscribe by Getting entry to receive introductory emails and understand how to use the platform and next to Subscribe to What’s in store to receive weekly e-mails. commerce and tips, then press on the Let’s go button and you’re done.

MailChimp prices

MailChimp is a service that can be used free of charge with certain limitations, such as a maximum number of newsletter subscribers and a monthly delivery limit. If your needs are not met with the free plan offered by MailChimp, you can choose one of the available subscription plans.

  • New Business: This is the free MailChimp plan dedicated to those with fewer than 2,000 subscribers and sends a maximum of 12,000 emails per month.
  • Growing Business: In addition to an unlimited number of items per month, it provides tools to view statistics and get support from the MailChimp team. It has a different monthly cost based on registered users: 10 dollars/month for a maximum number of 500 subscribers, 15 dollars/month for 1000 subscribers, 20 dollars/month for 1500 subscribers and so on.
  • Pro Marketer: Has the same rate as the Growing Business plan and provides a recurring cost of $199/month for the Pro add-on, which provides a series of services designed specifically for large companies.

If after creating a free account you want to activate a subscription plan, log in to your account and click on your name at the top right, then select the Account item and press the Upgrade account button.

Then on the item Add a payment method on the right, confirm your data by applying the check mark and click on the Save button, then choose a payment method between Credit Card and PayPal, enter the data and you’re done. Now, put the check mark next to the subscription plan of your interest and follow the procedure to complete the payment and activation of the service.

Create a list of users

A list is a collection of email addresses of users subscribed to the newsletter. On MailChimp you can create a list either by entering user data manually or by importing CSV or TXT files.

To create a new list on MailChimp, press on the Lists item in the menu at the top and click on the Create list button located at the top right. Then press again on the Create list button and enter the required data: List Name with the name of the list; Default from email address to enter the email address to be set as the sender; Default from name with the name to be displayed as sender and Remind people how the signed up to your list to insert a message that reminds users registered in the list of the reason for receiving the email in question.

Now, make sure the data in the Contact information for this list field is correct, otherwise press the Edit button to edit it, then check the checkbox next to the options you prefer the most.

  • Enable double opt-in: to implement a double confirmation system for users who subscribe to the newsletter.
  • Daily summary: to receive daily a summary of users who have signed up and deleted from the newsletter;
  • One-by-one (subscribe): to receive a notification every time a user signs up for the newsletter;
  • One-by-one (unsubscribe): to receive a notification every time a user deletes from the newsletter.

After completing the creation of the list and set the options that you find most useful, click on the Save button to save the list you have created. At this point, click on the Add contacts item and click on the Add a subscriber option to manually add users to the newly created list. Then enter the user’s data in the fields Email address, First name, Last name and put the check mark next to the item This person gave me permission to email them to confirm that the user in question has given you permission to be subscribed to the newsletter and therefore it is not necessary to send a confirmation email. To add the user to the list, press the Subscribe button and you’re done.

Alternatively, you can choose a mass import by pressing on the Add contacts and Import contacts items, after which you place a check mark next to one of the available options.

  • CSV or tab-delimited text file: to import a list of users from a CSV or TXT file;
  • Copy/paste from file: allows you to import a list by copying data from an XLS or XLSX file and pasting it into a special field;
  • Integrated service: to import a list of users through services such as Google Drive, Google Contacts, Eventbrite, Capsules, Zendesk, Costant contact and many others.

Made your choice, press the Next button and follow the instructions shown on the screen to complete the import. For example, if you have chosen the import from CSV file press the Browse button to select the file on your computer, then press the Next button and you’re done.

If it is the first newsletter you are creating and you do not yet have registered users, after creating the list you must enter an entry form on your site. Then press the Lists button at the top of the main screen of your MailChimp account, then find the list you have created, click on the down arrow icon on the right and select the Signup forms option.

Now, select one of the registration forms available between Embedded forms and Subscriber pop-ups, apply the graphic style you prefer, insert the fields to view and copy the HTML code that you see under Copy/paste into your site and paste it on the page of your site where you want to view the newsletter subscription form.

To view and manage the created lists and registered users, press the Lists button at the top of the main screen of your MailChimp account, then press the Create list button again to create new lists or click on the list you want to manage to view users subscribers. To delete a list, instead, put the check mark next to its name and click on the Delete button, type the Delete message in the Type Delete to confirm field and press the Delete button again.

How to create and send a newsletter

After creating the lists, you just have to create your campaign on MailChimp and schedule it to be sent. Then click on Campaigns present at the top left and click on the Create campaigns button, then select the Create an email option, enter the name of your newsletter in the Campaign name field and press the Begin button.

Now, click on the item Add recipients and select the list created a short while ago via the drop-down menu under List, then choose if you want to send the newsletter to all subscribers ( All subscribers on the list ), to a specific group of users ( Group or new segment ). Alternatively you can choose to send the newsletter to active users ( Active subscribers ), to those less active ( inactive subscribers ), to male users only ( Male ) or to female users only ( Female ), with the possibility to choose many other options.

Continue with the creation of your campaign by pressing on the item Add from, make sure that the name and email address displayed are correct and click on the Save button. Then press the Add subject option, enter the subject of the email in the Subject field and type a preview text (maximum 150 characters) in the Preview text field.

In conclusion, press the button Design Email to choose the template to be applied to your newsletter: press the Layout tab to choose basic templates, press the item Themes to browse a rich catalog of templates with a more attractive graphics or press on the Saved option templates to choose a template you have previously created. Make your choice, select the template and press the Next button.

In the new page open, you can build your own newsletter: in the left part you can preview the layout you are editing, while the right side of the page content (available content ) that you can enter in the email, such as Text (text ), Image (images), Button (buttons), Video, Social Share (options for sharing on social networks), Code (code) etc. Moreover, by pressing on the Design option you can customize the graphic appearance of the chosen layout, changing its colors, the font of the text and setting a style for mobile devices.

You can also apply changes by intervening in the preview of the newsletter, selecting the individual blocks that compose it. Then click on the block of your interest and press the icon of the nine dots on the left to move the block, otherwise you can click on the pencil icon to modify its contents or on the button to duplicate the block. If you can delete individual blocks, you can click on the trash icon and you’re done.

Once the customization of your template is complete, press the Save & Close button to return to the campaign creation screen and you are ready to send your first newsletter. To view the final result in the preview, press the Send a Test Email button, otherwise press the Send and Send now to send the newsletter immediately or the Schedule option to schedule the sending.

In the latter case, enter the sending date in the Delivery date field, set the time by selecting it from the drop-down menu under the Delivery time item and click on the Schedule campaign button to set the scheduled sending. It was not difficult, was it?

Leave a Comment