As I work as a Mailchimp consultant and trainer I get a good overview of how people use Mailchimp. There are a few issues that cause many email marketers problem. Fortunately these issues are simple to avoid if you know what to look for.
Below are the three most common issues that I encounter with users of Mailchimp.
Multiple Lists
Using a single list (as opposed to multiple lists) will absolutely make your email marketing quicker and more effective. Best practice is to have a single Mailchimp list and then to use segments to target your email campaigns to relevant audiences.
If you use multiple Mailchimp lists then you almost certainly will be fine merging the multiple lists into a single list. Out of the hundreds of organisations and people that I’ve worked with, only a tiny fraction haven’t found a way to use a single list which is then ‘divided’ by segments.
There are many reason that it’s preferable to use a single list in Mailchimp with the main reasons being:
- People unsubscribe at the list ‘level’ in Mailchimp. If they are in multiple lists and they unsubscribe then it is probable that you’ll keep sending them campaigns (as they’re in a second list). Sending email marketing to a person that has unsubscribed contravenes the Australian Spam Act.
- You pay for the number of email addresses in your account. If people are in multiple lists then you may well be paying more for your Mailchimp subscription than you need to.
- A campaign can be sent to a list or a segment (or group). If you need to send a campaign to all subscribers and you have multiple lists you’ll need to send multiple campaigns.
- Your reporting will become fragmented by having multiple lists. Reporting is a the list and campaign levels in Mailchimp.
Images in Text Blocks
Mailchimp users mentioning that images aren’t aligning as expected is a very common complaint. Every time that I’ve encountered this issue, the Mailchimp user has added an image to a text block when designing their campaign.
By simply using image content blocks for images and text content blocks for text alone, the image alignment problem will magically disappear.
Too much text
Friends don’t let friends have lots of text in an email campaign! I recall reading awhile back how, when designing a website, it’s important to halve the text, then halve it again and then halve the text amount again. The same principle usually applies to email campaigns.
There are exceptions to this ‘less is more’ principle regarding text in campaigns; for example a product recall notice may benefit from having significant explanatory text. For the vast majority of campaigns however there shouldn’t be more than a few lines of text.
Keep in mind that your target audience may differ from you in terms of demographics. Create your campaign for your recipients needs, wants and expectations and not your needs and wants. The majority of email recipients want messages that are short and to the point and don’t want to read reams of text. More people than ever are reading email on mobile devices; let’s not frustrate our subscribers by making then scroll through mountains of text!
How do I resubscribe a person who is currently unsubscribed?
@kimi, if a person has unsubscribed then you’ll be able to send them a reconfirmation email however you won’t be able to resubscribe them yourself.
My last two campaigns are showing ‘bougus’ clicks on hyperlinks (I know because it shows me clicking on a story that I did not). All my data are useless. Any experience with this? Mailchimp was no assistance.
I haven’t heard of this before. Mailchimp will definitely be the only ones able to assist.
Hello there, we have been trying to send a test email for several days without any success. It keeps appearing the next message:
“There are some issues which might impact your ability to send. Learn more about your account status</a"
Can you guys please help me? I've tried everything and it is supposed to be running smoothly.
Daniel, check that your credit card details on file with Mailchimp are correct as this may be the issue.
Thanks Gary, I’ve checked and everything is in order now but still won’t send. 🙁
@daniel, I’ll send you an email
After working properly for years, the Facebook box at the bottom of the campaign edit page now says the Facebook feature is not currently available, even though the account is successfully integrated with Facebook. Any idea what is going on there? Thanks in advance.
@Pat, I’m aware that there is an issue with this at present. Mailchimp are working on resolving the issue.
https://twitter.com/MailchimpStatus/status/1017075750988632065
Gary: A small firm is making its foray in to mailing their monthly newsletter to its customersand related persons. They want to know alternative to mailchimp which are equally good but costs less. The strategy is to get started and evaluate after every quarter before deciding to go full-on with more budget to spend on mailing list.
Your advice please!
@Ajay, I’m really not familiar with Mailchimp’s competitors pricing. Email Marketing should be about looking at the return on investment so make sure that any service chosen makes it easy and reliable to send high converting email marketing.
Hello,
we have been trying send email to our list, but after sending email, there is an issues about “term of service violation”. How to resolve this issues ? and what makes this issues happen to our account ?
Thank you
Hi Sri,
Please see https://mailchimp.com/help/why-accounts-get-suspended/
Thank you Gary
Hi Gary – I have received an email from a customer today that shows that a piece of communication from May was sent out again today, which worries me because I can not see any of that activity on Mailchimp. Problem being is this email was not on the mailing list in May.
I have searched Mailchimps help and can not see a subject that covers this instance. I am worried about what is being broadcast to my list of people.
While trying to figure all of that out I noticed that we have a reasonable amount of activity in the US and other countries. We are a small Sydney based business that only markets to current customers so, this is also a worry for me.
Hi Sarah,
Mailchimp Re-sending Campaign
I haven’t seen this before and it is extremely unlikely that Mailchimp is automatically sending campaigns without user intervention. Things to check include the headers on the email that was recently sent and check that an Automation email wasn’t received by the recipient.
Overseas Activity
Where are you seeing the overseas activity? If you’re seeing it in the location section of the reports then, rest assured, the data are not correct. For example I usually show up as being in the U.S.A. (I’m usually in Australia) because my email server (Google) is in the U.S.A.
Re-Sending Campaigns
I called my customer and he said he received it today. It’s very peculiar.
Im just wondering how to figure out why this has happened. It is my only feedback so far. Perhaps it’s a one off.
Overseas activity
I thought it might be something like that.
Thanks so much for your prompt reply.
I’ve been having alignment issues with my campaigns for a few months now. I completely restructured the newsletter to be single column with separate content blocks for images and text, however in the mobile preview you still have to scroll right to be able to see the full images and text. All images are formatted to 564 px wide. Any other ideas about what I can try?
Emma, did you use a Mailchimp layout to create the original single column layout or did you create it outside of Mailchimp?
Hi Gary,
I have the same trouble like Daniel
I paid 150$ for manage 25000 customer and cannot send any email to our customer because your issues.
If your system cannot support us, pay back our money.
Hi Gary, I am facing a challenge in mail chimp. I have run a campaign and the test mail is successful but when I logged in next day it is showing compliance issue. can you please help me out with this issue.
What is the allowed character set in the Mailchimp Text Block? I can’t seem to enter a tab character in the text. Is this the case?
Hi Lynne, great question. I really don’t know. Probably best to ask Mailchimp themselves.
The pull down on the right side of my Chimp message does not show can you tell me how to get it back?
Hi Jensine. Please try a different Internet Browser to see if that helps.
There is a problem with sending this campaign. Please check the delivery checklist and try again.
I cannot send my campaign and keep on getting this message eventhough U have ticks on my checklist, been trying to figure it out for hours and have tried everything, PS using a free acoount and my google email
Hey Jake! Did you manage how to resolve the problem with this message:
“There is a problem with sending this campaign. Please check the delivery checklist and try again.”
I have the same problem as your had.
Hi there the text in the top part of my text block is sitting on top of itself – all scrunched up! One cannot read it.
How do I undo this?
Hi Di,
This issue is often caused by pasting Microsoft Word content into a text block. The best thing to do is delete the text block and add text to the new text block.
Hi there – I have created a new lead magnet free download and have current subscribers trying to sign up for it. They’re getting an error because they’re already subscribed – is there any way around this? I don’t really want to ask them to unsub and resub every time I create a new download. Thanks!
Hi Andrea, How are people signing up i.e. what type of form are you using for them to sign up?
Is there a way to insert a pdf into the middle of your Mailchimp campaign without messing up the format of the whole campaign? The pdf contains image, text, a QR code and 2 hyperlinks.
Hi Wendy, an email is HTML and PDF isn’t this it isn’t possible to embed the content of a PDF file in an email. A PDF may be added as an attachment.