A few weeks ago I had a tweet from someone I know asking if there’s a way to unsend a Mailchimp campaign. Evidently there had been an incorrect name used in their campaign, making the event about someone else. Whoops. Typos are the worst. So, I emailed to check in and see if I could help. I had 3 recommendations…

1. Depending on the response from people I’d say you can send out another email apologizing/correcting the issue. BUT if you didn’t get much response to it then I’d say leave it – you’re only drawing attention to it. 
2. You can always do a social media face palm correction. That way people see you caught the error, BUT it doesn’t go out to everyone in a second email.
3. Get a second set of eyes – this is why I always make sure my clients approve their newsletter before I schedule it. That way multiple people are looking at it. 

The good news is that only a couple of folks responded to the email noting the error, and they were all very kind and gracious about it. People: This is almost always the case! Your employee or client or good friend may say “dude, that’s not the right person.” But RARELY does someone get up in arms. Even when they’re hiding behind a computer. I promise. 

Then two weeks ago I had a client issue where I screwed up the merge tag so instead of “Hi Norm,” it said “Hi <insert name here>” GOLD STAR ME. And that’s an error that you wouldn’t necessarily catch in a test email. AND the link I had used wasn’t working correctly. So in that case we sent out a resend noting the incorrect link.

Once you hit the send button your email is out in the universe and in everyones inbox. You can’t take it back. Sometimes you should send out a correction email. Sometimes you have to remember you’re human (as my client said “we’re still badass women”) and the occasional typo isn’t why that client is going to hire or fire you. I promise.

Recently a client reached out asking for some help with adding their current client base into their newsletter. They wanted to ask them to subscribe instead of automatically adding them to the list, which I understand. In some industries this is the right way to handle it (thanks HIPPA!)

I checked in with Mailchimp on some logistics and confirmed that Mailchimp is OK with you automatically adding your clients to your list, which is great. BUT sometimes you still want to politely invite them to join your list – or as I often suggest, let them know that your feelings won’t be hurt if they unsubscribe because you automatically added them in.

Here’s 4 suggestions I made…

1. Send an email to all clients from your email directly – not through Mailchimp. This means batching it into 100 emails at a time and BCCing them – unless your client management system will let you send emails through their system.
   • I’d keep the email simple – “We have a monthly newsletter we’d love to have you signup for to stay in touch and get updates and additional resources to supplement your work with us.”
2. Create a basic landing page in Mailchimp for them to sign up with. You can even create a tag to properly tag them as clients when you build the page.
3. In your initial forms when you have a new client, I would suggest you add in a “subscribe to our newsletter” checkbox and then you can add people in from there moving forward instead of having to send an email afterwards.
4. Add a subscribe form to your email signatures – it could pitch an optin offer if you have one or just a “stay up to date” kind of blurb. Short and simple.

Here’s what we ended up doing…

We’re going to setup an automated email so whenever new clients are added into the account they will get a welcome email that thanks them for being a patient and letting them know they’re going to receive the monthly newsletter but they’re welcome to unsubscribe at any time if it’s not for them.

Welcoming your clients to your newsletter is a nice thing to do, especially if your newsletter is newer than your client list. Remember that Mailchimp is okay with you automatically adding in clients. Giving them a quick heads up is just good business etiquette!