MailChimp Doesn't Monkey Around
June 20, 2016
MailChimp Doesn't Monkey Around
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Overall Satisfaction with MailChimp
We used mailchimp to reach out to student groups about a business that we were hoping to start. Through this email service we were able to create aesthetically pleasing outreach materials regarding our mission, ways we could help students and clients, and send reminders about informational meetings that we were planning to host. It also allowed us to see who opened the emails and who clicked through to the resources we had included which made it easier to see where people were looking for content and how effective our outreach had been.
- Formatting email templates - we were able to include embedded video, images, blocks of text, and other content by simply selecting, dragging, and dropping it into a template box.
- Providing feedback on user processes - we were able to see whether someone opened the email and/or clicked through to links to resources which we had provided in the emails.
- Record your outreach campaigns - You can create contact sheets and record when you sent templates out, so you can come up with templates for each planned point of contact and coordinate them with personalized contact listings for each group depending on when you first contact them, etc.
- There were a few formatting bugs where things wouldn't click through or we had to finagle the sizes and such, but it could have been a combination of early software tweaks and our personal learning curves.
- It would be pretty cool to see whether someone forwarded the email to other people and/or how far they scrolled into it, depending on how long the email was.
- We were able to figure out which emails were most effective and thereby derive what contact the customer groups were most interested in.
- It also helped us keep track of who we had reached out to, when we did so, and how well received the content was. This made us more efficient and helped alleviate that fear of the duplicate email stream.
- Mailchimp was/is a free service, so there was no downside. Literally no detriment.
- The easy-to-modify templates also made it easier to customize our outreach without sacrificing the fidelity of the content. We were able to make a template that looked personalized and unique, but it was also easy to manage.
- Microsoft Excel and Microsoft Outlook
I used to use Excel to keep track out my outreach based on date, client, and campaign title. It's fairly simple to do, but also requires a lot of manual upkeep and doesn't have the same comprehensive efficiency analysis of MailChimp. Outlook is, honestly, just a simple email board with no metrics or recording capability. Using Outlook to keep track of campaigns is similar to, if not the same as, using AOL or Gmail because as far as I can tell you just make folders, sort the content by date, and hope you remembered everyone on the contact sheet during the mail merge.
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