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MailChimp Extension

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MailChimp is a simple, powerful, and effective communication tool allowing organizations to email out beautifully-designed emails to large groups and allow senders to see how many people opened their emails. The integration works to push the name and email address within a Breeze profile into MailChimp as a Subscriber. No additional profile information can be synched. 

The integration with Mailchimp is one-way, meaning that information will only flow one-way from Breeze to MailChimp. Never will people be pushed from MailChimp into Breeze. Therefore, you will want to make all of your updates to tags and people within Breeze and manage those wanting to subscribe in Breeze.

Install the MailChimp Extension

To install the MailChimp extension to your Breeze account:

  1. Navigate to  Extensions 
  2. On the Extensions Page view available extensions, click "View Details" under the MailChimp extension you would like to install. 
  3. In the upper right corner, click "Install Extension."

To connect Mailchimp API with Breeze:

  1. Navigate to the MailChimp button in the top blue bar.
    Note: If the browser is not fully maximized, this option may appear under More.
  2. Enter your Mailchimp API key
  3. Click Connect 

Sync Breeze Tags to MailChimp Audiences

If you are using the free version of MailChimp you are limited to one Audience. If you are on a paid version of MailChimp, you can sync multiple audiences. If you sync at the audience level Breeze will only update the audience and not the MailChimp tags. 

To synchronize Breeze Tag(s) with MailChimp Audiences:

  1. Navigate to Extensions > MailChimp
  2. If your Mailchimp account has been connected to Breeze you'll see a list of all of your MailChimp Audiences within Breeze. If you don't have any created, you'll need first to create create them within Mailchimp
  3. Click Link Audience to the right of the desired Mailchimp Audience name.
  4. Select the Breeze Tag(s) with which you'd like to connect to your Mailchimp Audience to. 
  5. Click Sync

This will make Breeze the source of truth for your mailing list in MailChimp. The only Subscribers in MailChimp will be from Breeze. 

  • Synching will override any contacts you have in MailChimp within this audience and will push over those in Breeze who are in the Breeze tag(s) you connected. If you have subscribers in the MailChimp audience you do not want to lose, export those out before connecting Breeze. 
  • If you add people to the Breeze tag(s) connected to your audience, they will automatically be added to the MailChimp Audience. 
  • If you remove a person from the Breeze tag(s) connected to your audience, they will not be removed from the MailChimp Audience until a sync happens. Syncs happen automatically when a new person is added to a Breeze tag connected to MailChimp, or when you opt to Force Sync on the MailChimp page in Breeze. 
  • If you update the email address of a person connected to MailChimp it will automatically update the email address for this subscriber in MailChimp. 
  • If you edit the name of a person in Breeze, after they are already in MailChimp the name of the subscriber will not be updated in MailChimp. 

Sync Breeze Tags to Mailchimp Tags

To synchronize Breeze Tag(s) with Mailchimp Tags:

  1. Navigate to Extensions > MailChimp
  2. If your Mailchimp account has been connected to Breeze you'll see a list of all of your Mailchimp Audiences and their corresponding Tags within Breeze. If you don't have any created, you'll need to first create them within Mailchimp.
  3. Click the dropdown arrow to the left of the Audience name.
  4. Click Link Tag to the right of the Mailchimp Tag name.3
  5. Select the Breeze Tag(s) with which you'd like to connect to your Mailchimp Tag(s)
  6. Click Sync
  • When you Synch to MailChimp any current subscribers in your MailChimp Tag will remain as contacts, however the MailChimp tag that was assigned to them will be removed from them in MailChimp. 
  • This will cause the people in your Breeze tag(s) that you selected to sync into your MailChimp tags creating Subscribers in MailChimp who are auto tagged with the MailChimp Tag. 
  • If you add a new person to the Breeze tag(s) it will cause the person to be added to your MailChimp tag(s). 
  • If you remove a person from the Breeze tag(s) it will cause the person to be removed from the your MailChimp tag(s). However the contact will remain in MailChimp as a Subscriber with no home (tag). To remove any subscribers in MailChimp who are not part of a MailChimp tag, you'd need to archive the subscriber in MailChimp. 
  • If you update the email address for a person in your Breeze tag(s) it will cause a new subscriber to be made in MailChimp with the new email address. The subscriber with the old email address, will have the MailChimp tag removed from their contact, but they will remain in MailChimp as a subscriber with no home (tag). 
  • If you manually add a subscriber to MailChimp and assign them to a tag in MailChimp that is connected to Breeze, when Breeze synchs to MailChimp (anytime a person is added, removed or updated) the subscriber will be removed from the Tag in MailChimp, but remain as a contact. 
  • If you edit the name of a person in Breeze, after they are already in MailChimp the name of the subscriber will not be updated in MailChimp. 

Force Sync

A sync happens with MailChimp anytime you update a persons email address in Breeze, or add people to the Breeze tags connected to the Audience. If you've updated your Breeze tag and have not seen those changes reflected in Mailchimp, you can always try the "Force Sync" option for a quicker sync:

  1. Navigate to Extensions > MailChimp

  2. Find your audience/tag and hit the dropdown arrow beside it.

  3. Select Force Sync.

You'll receive a banner notification that says "This list is being force-synced with its related tags. Synchronization normally occurs automatically but this gives you manual control if you see something out of line. Please check your list within MailChimp momentarily."

Breeze will also auto-generate a report in that banner notification, if you click on the link, of email addresses that were successfully added, deleted and failed to sync in Mailchimp.

What Emails Sync to MailChimp

In most cases, you'll see fewer names in your MailChimp mailing list than within Breeze. This is because:

  • People in Breeze with no email addresses will not synch to MailChimp
  • People who have previously unsubscribed from your MailChimp mailing list (tag) will not Sync over. When someone unsubscribes through MailChimp, Breeze will not resubscribe them in the future, even though they are still a part of the synced Breeze Tag. MailChimp will display this synched person as unsubscribed within MailChimp. This is typically the desirable behavior, giving people the ability to opt out of a mailing without you needing to remove them from the Breeze Tag too.
  • If the same email address is connected to more than one name in Breeze, it will only push to MailChimp one time, with one name. 
  • Invalid email addresses will not Sync. 
  • Emails marked as Do Not Email in Breeze will not Sync to MailChimp. 

Edit the Tags Synched to MailChimp

To unlink or change the Breeze Tag(s) connected to MailChimp:

  1. Navigate to Extensions > MailChimp
  2. Click the "Audience is Linked" button or the "Tag is Linked"
  3. Select or Deselect Breeze Tag(s)
  4. Click "Update"

To disconnect MailChimp from Breeze completely:

  1. Navigate to Extensions > MailChimp
  2. Then Click Disconnect from MailChimp in the bottom right

Disconnecting from MailChimp will not remove the Subscribers from MailChimp. 

MMERGE3 Must Be provided Error

When attempting to force sync your Breeze Tags with MailChimp Audiences, you may get an error message that states,"MMERGE3 must be provided - Please enter a value" All this error message means is that the MERGE3 field is set to "required" in MailChimp, and must be unchecked /disabled. 

  1. Login to your account on http://mailchimp.com
  2. Navigate to the Audience tab.
  3. If you have more than one audience, click the Current audience drop-down and choose the one you want to work with.
  4. Click the Manage Audience drop-down and choose Settings.
  5. On the Settings page, click Audience fields and *|MERGE|* tags.
  6. In the fields in the Default value column, type the default values for your merge tags. 
  7. Clear the checkbox "Required" for MERGE3 and click on the Save button.
  8. Now attempt to Force the sync again in Breeze. Screen_Shot_2019-08-16_at_10.00.36_AM.png

Click here for more information: https://mailchimp.com/help/set-default-merge-values/

 

Exporting Templates (Source Code) from MailChimp to use as templates in Breeze

Sometimes, MailChimp's templates can offer functionality that is desired, and church may prefer the look of it over our native Email Templates in Breeze. You can transfer a MailChimp template to Breeze and save it for future use!

Export from MailChimp

  1. Open Your MailChimp Account
  2. Go to Campaigns
  3. Choose "Email Templates" in the left menu bar
  4. Click the down arrow next to "Edit" and choose Export as HTML
  5. Confirm "Export Template"
  6. Open the downloaded HTML file in a text-editing program
  7. Copy all the code in the file

Set Up Template in Breeze

  1. Open Breeze > Go to People > Email > Click the three dots "…"
  2. Go to More > View Source Code
  3. Paste the Code copied from MailChimp
  4. Click Ok
  5. Delete <!doctype html> from the top of our email
  6. Go to Templates > Save As New Template > Name your Template > Click Ok
  7. Close Your Email Window > Refresh Your People Page Now you’ll be able to retrieve your template

Note: Our Support Team is unable to support/ troubleshoot this method as we do not support HTML coding assistance. 

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