Mailchimp Automation (drip-marketing) is incredibly useful and many of my clients see fantastic results. Setting up ongoing campaigns is simple enough however there are two things that many people find a bit confusing in regards to the email messages not being sent.
Imported Contacts not getting Emails
By default, if you setup a Welcome Campaign (i.e. when the workflow is triggered by a new subscriber added to a list), contacts imported into your list won’t be added to the queue. The way to resolve this issue is as follows:
- Click Pause & Edit next to your first workflow email.
- Next to Trigger: Immediately after subscribers join your list click edit trigger.
- Add a check next to Trigger when subscribers are imported.
- Click Update Trigger.
- Resume sending of your first email message in your workflow.
Subscribers, whether imported or added via another means will now be added to the workflow.
Some people not getting the campaigns
Subscribers already in your list won’t get your welcome emails. Only contacts added to your list after you start your Automation will be added to the workflow.
Here is a quick way to add people that are already in you list to your ongoing email series:
- Export your list.
- Delete all contact from your list.
- Follow the steps above to enable sending to imported contacts.
- Start your automation.
- Import your subscribers (from the export in step 1 above) into your list.
As the Date added of your imported contacts is now after the start of your workflow, the subscribers will be sent the emails in your ongoing series.
That’s how easy it is to solve two of the most common issues with Mailchimp Automation emails not being sent to some subscribers.
I just started having trouble receiving messages from Mailchimp in Outlook. They aren’t even going into the Junk folder…just…nothing. The funny thing is, I receive the TEST messages, but when the campaign sends it doesn’t come through. My husband is also subscribed to this list (it’s for a school fundraiser) and he isn’t getting these messages to his Outlook either. Any ideas?
What’s likely happening is that the spam filter/s is/are rejecting the messages before being delivered to you. Authenticate your domain and all should be good.
STill unable to send automated messages to any group. It’s set to send to anyone joining or imported to the list, but there are still 0 people being listed in the queue.
Thanks for the article: can I create an automation based on the activity of a regular campaign sent previously?
Yes. You can base the automation based on when a campaign was opened or not opened or when a campaign was clicked or not clicked etc.
Thanks for the article. I have created an automated “welcome” email for new subscribers to my list. However, I do not want that email to be send to those subscribers who are already in the list (they have already received a manual welcome message before). What happens if I set up my automated email? Is it sent to everyone who is already in the list or only to those whom I will add afterwards? Many thanks.
Lena,
The welcome email should only send to subscribers added after the automation is started. To be certain, I always like to segment the email to only send to people added after the date you start the automation i.e. manually add a segment so that the email doesn’t send to people added before the date you start the automation.
Hi Gary, thanks. I’ve tested an automated email for a test list and it worked well. However, now I would like to go one step further and create two automated emails for two different language segments (Dutch and English). Additionally, I’ve created tags for both languages. The automated messages now have the following conditions: Language is Dutch OR contact is tagged Dutch (or English, respectively). When I add new contacts to the list (including tag and language), they do not receive the automatic email though. Even if I add a check next to “trigger when subscribers are imported.” Do you know what goes wrong? Thank you, Lena
Hi Lena,
From what you describe, your campaign should be sending based on your conditions. The mistake most often made is the AND condition is used (as opposed to the OR condition) which makes the campaign not send; you haven’t made this mistake so your messages should be sending. Have you contacted Mailchimp to get their input?
hi im curious when I go to pause and edit I do not see trigger any where. can you please help :(. welcome emails send through my landing page. but welcome emails do NOT thru my website even though it says connected & the contacts still get added on mailchimp thru my website. thank you so much
Thanks so much this has been incredibly useful, I have struggled to set this up for most of the day!
Hi Gary,
We like to resend our content to any ‘non-open’ records the day after the original email is sent. Im looking at setting up an automation workflow and wondered how this works in an automation setting.
Is the email automatically resent to any non-opnes after a certain period of time or will I need to set these up manually?
Thanks
Geoff
Hi Geoff, it will be simpler to create a regular campaign (as opposed to an Automation). Your segment conditions will be:
CAMPAIGN ACTIVITY was sent [campaign name] and CAMPAIGN ACTIVITY did not open [campaign name]
Hi Gary,
Mailchimp says more than half my emails on my campaign list are invalid, but I doubt that. Any thoughts?
Thanks,
Guita
Hi Guita, there are numerous services online where you may check if your contact email addresses are still valid e.g. https://www.briteverify.com/
Dear Gary, I’m pretty stressed because I just found out that my email sequence is not longer being sent
I haven’t changed anyting and it’s not paused either
People are added to my list but not getting the sequence
And yes, I have authenticated but the email sequence is NOT being sent at all
Another stressor….can you help?
Thanks so much
Hi Rachel, the best is to either engage Mailchimp support to book some time with me (https://organicweb.com.au/mailchimp-services/consulting-2/)
I have 2 LP (1 to download a free e-book and other for quotation) and both send welcome e-mail with a quotation or e-book. The think is that the same e-mail address cant receive those 2 e-mails (e-book and quotation). Probably because I used on both case a welcome message. What is the best way so solve and immediately and automatically after they fill up the form receive those emails?
Hi Gary, great stuff! Maybe you can help with my question:
I created an automation for newly tagged contacts. The automation is something like this:
Mail 1: Offer a free download
6 days later: Mail 2 – Alternative offer to contacts that did not open mail 1
7 days later: Mail 3 – invitation to setup a call
My question is: when a contact DOES openen mail 1, and thus will not receive the alternative offer, will this contact receive Mail 3? Because the trigger is ‘7 days after mail 2’, but not every contact will get mail 2.
Hope it is clear what I mean and you can help. Thank you!
Hi Jeroen, No the recipient won’t receive email 3. If you want those that open Mail 1 to Receive Mail 3 then the best will be to setup another automation with the trigger being, e.g., “when anyone opens Mail 1, send them this email …”
Hi Gary, okay that’s what I thought, thanks you for confirming this. Looks like I got some work to do 🙂
Hi Gary,
is it possible to send more than one Welcome Message to the same e-mail address?
As I can see, Welcome Message is sent only once to the same address, but I need it to be sent more than once. I tried to unsubcribe contact after sending the first Welcome Message, but after resubscription Welcome Message isn’t sent.
Thank you!
Hi Fedor, there are two options;
I hope this helps.
Hi Gary, hoping you can provide some clarity, I’ve spent about 12 hours plus at this point….
Are 2 separate opt ins, to the same list possible? Ive set up Joining Groups as the trigger, but to no affect. Expanded question below.
I’m using Elementor Pro which has a “Form Builders” to create opt in forms. I have 2 different Opt In forms on my website that serve the same audience. Meaning, someone like you may opt in for one, and maybe then decided you would also like the other gift, so you opt in on that form as well.
I have mail chimp set to trigger automation emails based on that “Group” being joined. I show in the dashboard that email as added subscriber, but only the first opt in forms automation is being triggered. Not the second.
Any advice is appreciated.
P.S. At this point I’ve subscribed and unsubscribed testing this so many times it appears Mailchimp is no longer sending anything to this test email.
Any help is appreciate, and I hope that was clear. Thank you.
Hi Luke,
I’m not familiar with Elementor Pro and therefore don’t know how the opt-in process of Elementor Pro works. If I understand correctly, here is how I would achieve your requirements:
Hi Gary, I’m having trouble with an automated campaign. I set up a short series of emails for Black Friday and used tagging as a trigger. I then went and tagged all the contacts that this campaign was for (700), but at first only 6 were added to the list. I repeated it a couple of times and ended up with 9 subscribers in the workflow. I’m really having trouble figuring this out. It seems completely random to me.
Can you help?
Thanks in advance!
Hi Mischa,
Were the contacts added to the workflow new subscribers only i.e. the contacts weren’t already subscribed when you started the Automation?
Hi Gary,
Every time if there’s a new event, I will create an new automation campaign to send a confirmation email to those people who registered for the event. and the trigger is “immediately after a subscriber’s audience field changes to new EVENT Date.”
I would like to ask – will the automation get triggered if an existing subscriber’s audience field changed to new EVENT Date ?
Thanks,
BR, Chris.
Hi Chris, yes existing subscribers will get it.
Hi Gary
MAILCHIMP DOES NOT SEND CONFIRMATION MESSAGE WITH THE ELEMENTOR FORM
For 2 years I was using the pre-made signup forms from mailchimp, to collect email addresses on my website. I set it to double opt in and installed a ”confirmation mail” and ”final welcome mail” where my freebie was placed. Now this worked well for me 2 years.
3 days ago I decided to create another signup form, using the elementor pro form builder this time. I created the form and integrated it with my mailchimp via API. But now: When people subscribe to my email list through that signup form, it says: The form was sent succesfully. The subscriber is added automatically to my Email List without getting any ”confirmation and final welcome mail”. Well this is crucial to me, since im sending the freebie through that way.
Is there anything I didnt properly understand? Maybe it isnt even possible to send those confirmation and thank you mails automatically, when im using the elementor form? Im glad about any help!
Samuel,
I’m not familiar with the Elementor form however it seems like Elementor is set to not send confirmation that the person signed up. There may be a setting in the form which you can change so that the final email is sent.
Failing that you could create a welcome Customer Journey in Mailchimp where the email sends to all new subscribers. That will work for you.