You need your subscribers to receive a file with your Mailchimp campaign. You can’t find where to add an attachment to the email campaign. Read below or watch the video to find out how to get the file to your contacts.
Can I send a file attachment in Mailchimp?
No, you can’t send a file as an attachment, in the traditional sense, in Mailchimp. You can however send a link to recipients where they may download the file at their convenience. First off, let’s understand the issue with attachments.
When we include a file attachment in an email message we increase the size of the message. For example, if we add a PDF attachment of 2 MB in size in Outlook or Gmail and send that campaign, we are forcing the recipient to download the attachment whether they want to view the attachment or not. Files sent as attachments force the recipient to use their data to download the file, data to store the file and often slow the network of the recipient. When sending an attachment, the recipient usually has no control over the attachment downloading immediately.
When sending a file as an email attachment to a few people this may not be a major concern however imagine that you send an email marketing campaign to 100,000 subscribers. Suddenly we are forcing the large download onto a significant number of people. If we’re a government department we can expect an open rate of about 27%. That means that about 27,000 of our 100,000 contacts will open our message. We’re therefore inconveniencing 73,000 recipients (by forcing the download) of our campaign that aren’t going to even look at our message at all.
Instructions to add an attachment to a Mailchimp campaign
There is a push by email companies to decrease the size of email messages that recipients are committed to download (e.g. Gmail clipping messages more than 102KB). Senders such as Mailchimp have a great solution to enable making the ‘attachment’ files easily available to recipients whilst not forcing the download of the file as happens when attaching a file to an email message. Here is how to include your PDF, CSV, DOC. TXT or almost any other file-type as a downloadable file to your Mailchimp email campaign:
- In the Content section of the Campaign Builder, click Edit Design.
- On the Design step, click an existing text content box or drag and drop a new one into your layout.
- Create the text you want to link and highlight it.
- Click the Link icon.
- Click the Web Address drop-down menu, and choose File.
- Click Upload to choose a file from your computer.
- Choose your file, and click Open to upload it to the Content Manager.
- The URL of your uploaded file will be automatically added to the Insert or Edit Link pop-up modal.
- Click Insert.
When your recipient receives your campaign, they’ll now be able to click the text you highlighted in the instructions above to download and view your ‘attachment’.
Note: I’ve published an alternate method of adding an ‘attachment’ where you’ll be able to delete or edit the file.
The video instructions below will help adding an attachment in the new Mailchimp Campaign builder.
Thanks, that was very helpful
Very helpful!
I was sending private “subscribers-only” attachments for my magazine, and realized that Google was sniffing the gmail messages and indexing my private issues in Google Search Results. The only way around this problem is to attach the actual PDF for subscribers, but this isn’t possible with MailChimp..
When I file these instructions, it only gives me the option to upload a photo! There is no ability to upload a file! Had this procedure changed?
Hi Brian, the process hasn’t changed; you should be able to select any of the common filetypes e.g. PDF, TXT etc.
Worked perfectly…but when I viewed my test email the pdf file was presented in landscape not portrait so part of the info was cut off. How do I fix this?
Hi Carol, I came across a similar issue recently with someone who had saved a PDF from Microsoft Publisher. She saved the file as a PDF using a different means than she first had and all was ok.
Can I change the linked file? We made some modifications and now want the email that’s already been sent to link to the updated file.
No. Once the campaign has been sent it is not possible to amend the URL nor the file.
My subscribers can see the file if they open from computer but not on a phone. Is this normal or am I doing something wrong? Thanks
Try saving your file with a different program/application.
It was very helpful, Thank you, Jack (A novice at Mailchimp and e-marketing. There was always someone else to do that
Hi Gary! Do you think it’s possible to send personalised attachments, like certificates or documents to a list? Have you ever seen a challenge like this?
The way to achieve this is to include the URL for each contacts certificate in your list. Then use the merge tag (for the filed in your list that contains the URLs) as the link.
I use pages and convert to pdf. Could this be why I can’t upload the pdf? I converted to Word and then to pdf but it was all out of alignment. Any suggestions?
Hi Marsha, a tool such as https://cloudconvert.com/pages-to-pdf may work
Marsha, I looked more into this and it seems that there are a number of issues with Pages and PDF (e.g. https://discussions.apple.com/thread/8594352 : “It is not out of the realm of possibilities that Apple has yet again, modified the PDFKit and Print Operation frameworks for Mojave, and may have introduced collateral PDF imaging issues”). Perhaps try using Google Docs as the export as PDF from Google Docs works really well.
That would have been cool but I would have to pay for it. I’m too cheap for that when it should work as it is. Thanks, though!
Cloudconvert is free https://cloudconvert.com/pricing
I must have misunderstood the message I was getting. I decided to just link to a url and it’s working great. Thanks for your help!
Another good idea! Thanks. Trust Apple to fix what ain’t broke!
Thanks Gary, but when I try to upload a PDF file, it comes up as “undefined” and cannot be inserted. The file size is 10,500 KB.
Please advise, many thanks.
Hi Olga, please try reducing the size of the PDF file to see if that is the issue.
Thank you. I could not use my Pages>PDF today so used Google Docs >PDF and that worked great…thank you. Yes, must be something new with Apple’s latest Mohave update….I’ll let them know.
Thank you! Much appreciated.
Thanks so much!
No problem Karen.
Do you need to have a paid plan with MailChimp to upload files other than images? Mailchimp gives me an error that a pdf is not a file type that is accepted.
Hi Caitlin, no you don’t need a paid plan to upload PDF files. When saving a file as PDF there are certain software that don’t save PDF files ‘properly’. Perhaps try to save your file in PDF filetype using different software.
Greatest tip ever! Thank you!
Hi there!
My problem is that I do this step perfectly, but it doesn’t automatically download.
It actually opens it in a new tab.
I am sending this out to those who might not be able to figure this out and are used to the file being attached.
Is there a way to force an automatic download when you click the link?
I do have an external URL for this file as well, but it does the same thing.
Thanks!
J K, the setting to open another window/tab will be a setting on your device or email reader. This is not something that can be managed through Mailchimp.
Thank you so much! Very clear instructions. Just what I needed when I was about to pull my hair out!
Glad it helped Julia 🙂
What is the maximum file size please?
10MB 🙂
Super helpful! Thank you!
Very helpful
Thank you
That was SO helpful and straight forward. Thankyou
Glad it helped Jill 🙂
Hi Gary,
Is it possible to include URLs for the certificates automatically? I need to send 1000 personalised certificates. Is there a solution within mailchimp?
Hi Yefim, If you have the URL for each contact in a field in your Audience then you can easily include the URL for each person as a merge tag. You will however need to add the unique certificate URL for each contact into Mailchimp.
Adding the unique certificate URL into a spreadsheet file can be done only manually for each contact. Is it correct? Is there a way to simplify this process for 1000-2000 contacts?
@Yefim, take a look at Zapier.com as they will assist in integrating external systems into Mailchimp.
Hi …..Cant find the content section or the edit design tab ? Any thouights?
Check your permissions as this is usually the cause.
Hi there! I’ve got multiple PDF files created by multiple methods (Word 2016 – saved as PDF, Excel – saved as PDF, Word Printed TO a PDF, Publisher saved/printed to PDF) and NONE will upload into the content manager of Mailchimp – all return to say the PDF is unsupported. Can you explain in more detail the PDF formatting requirements which work/don’t work? My files are ALL below 1MB, most 400k, some are simply text, no tables, no graphics.. others with graphics/images… but still none will upload. I wish MailChimp would expand their Attachment Instructions Help Page to clearly define the parameters if they’re being so highly restrictive! Or Gary… maybe you can be the master Guru for us all? PLEASE HELP!!
I will attempt to upload to Google Docs, then Save as PDF, or print to PDF to see if that works.. but why not the MS Office, Save command? Something so basic?
Hi Katt, from what you describe all should be ok. How are you uploading to Mailchimp i.e. are you dragging and dropping into the content manager or are you using the “upload” button? Also is this just with one browser or all browsers (Firefox, Chrome …)?
I did a few tests (saved from Photoshop to PDF in using various PDF setting, from Word to PDF, Google Docs to PDf etc. and don’t have any issues with uploading to Mailchimp. Weird!
My pdf when opened from my computer shows working hyperlinks in the file. But the file subscribers receive after clicking the link in the email doesn’t show any links in the body of the pdf.
Any help?
Saving as PDF seems to be a very ‘hit and miss’ affair. Perhaps try saving as a PDF file from a different application and see if that helps.
Hello, I love the instructions but, I do not get a Web Address drop-down menu after clicking the Link button. The box that pops open gives me the opportunity to type a UR address. Any suggestions.
Hi Linda. Please see https://youtu.be/BJzoY-03fWU for the solution.
Thanks for the tutorial! I’m trying to give subscribers an audio file. I’ve uploaded the file successfully into the content studio and created a link for it in the email. However, when I click on the link in the test email it just takes me to a webpage with a media player. I can’t see any way to download the file from there… When I click on the editor for that block it looks like it changed the link to go to a webpage instead of a file. I tried resetting it to file, but after doing other edits and checking it looks like it reset itself to webpage. Very confusing…
The internet browser (Firefox, Chrome etc.) decides whether to automatically download an audio file or not. There is nothing you can do as the sender to change the settings in the browser. It’s probably best to add some text to your email campaign advising to alternate click when viewing the audio file then downloading.
Thanks for getting back to me so quickly! I should have thought of the browser issue… I tested it on Safari, Firefox and Chrome, and Chrome was the only one which had a place to download the file (without the alternate clicking). I’ll add instructions to the email:)
Hi Gary I am trying to insert three photos and one PDF into an email. It will only take one or do I have to put the four items into one file/link? Help please! Melanie
Hi Melanie, if you’re trying to provide all four files as downloads then each individual file will need to be added as a unique downloadable link i.e. you’ll have four links that recipients need to click.