Why You Should Not Use the Mailchimp Preferences Center

I’ve been made aware of an issue with the Mailchimp Preferences Center: Subscribers have to type their email address when updating preferences. If subscribers don’t retype their email address, they are, by default, ‘unsubscribed’ from any groups on the Preferences Center. Worst of all is there is no message advising that contacts need to retype their email address.

The workaround/fix is to unpublish the Preferences Center. The subscriber will see the old preferences page by disabling the Preferences Centre, which works perfectly. To test and resolve:

1. Click the ‘update profile’ link at the bottom of any past Mailchimp email campaign you’ve sent. Assuming you haven’t yet disabled the Preferences Center …
2. Update your profile without typing in your email address and click the button to update your profile. You’ll be taken to an error page.
3. Unpublish the Preferences Center. 
4. Click the ‘update profile’ link at the bottom of any past Mailchimp email campaign you’ve sent. You’ll now be at the ‘old’ preferences page.
5. Update your profile and click the button to update your profile.