Creating A Campaign

You've got your list ready to go, so it's time to create your first campaign. From your Dashboard or Campaigns tab, click the Create A Campaign button. Choose the type of campaign you'd like to create. For this guide, we'll be working with the Regular Ol' Campaign. Select the list to which you'll be sending this campaign. To send to a segment of a list, click Send to Segment, and add your conditions. Then proceed to the Setup step. You'll have the options to name your campaign, set up a subject line, from name reply-to email and personalize your "To:" field with *|MERGETAGS|*. You'll also find your options for tracking, authentication, analytics tracking, and social sharing.

Now that you're ready to start working on your content, click Design at the bottom of the page when you're finished.

Campaign content
Select a template type to begin designing your content. If you set up and save your own templates, they'll live under My Templates. If you're providing your own code, choose the Code Your Own or Import options. We're going to use the Drag & Drop Editor.

Once you choose your template, you'll remain in the Design step of the campaign-builder process. You'll add content and images in the content editor in this step. Click show style editor to set your design and style options.

Choose a template
Once you've selected the Drag & Drop Editor, choose one of the available template layouts or select a previously created campaign to get started. We offer the following basic layouts:
  • 1 Column Layout
  • 1:2 Column Layout
  • 2 Column Layout
  • 2:1 Column Layout
  • Left Sidebar Layout
  • Right Sidebar Layout
When viewing your previously created Drag & Drop campaigns, use the heart icon to save it as a favorite. From that point, when choosing a layout from your list of campaigns you'll be able to select from your list of favorites as well as our layouts and your previous campaigns.

Add your content
Drag and drop content blocks into your layout to customize the look and feel of your campaign. There are several different content blocks you can mix and match to create a completely unique look for your email:
  • Text
  • Boxed Text
  • Image Group
  • Image Card
  • Image
  • Divider
  • Bottom Caption
  • Left Caption
  • Right Caption
  • Social Follow
  • Social Share
  • Button
  • Footer

If you're creating an RSS-Driven Campaign you'll also see the option for content blocks that allow you to add an RSS Header and RSS Items to your campaign.

You can edit and style the content for specific content blocks using the Content, Style, and Settings tabs in the block editor.

Keyboard shortcuts
We've added some handy keyboard shortcuts to make editing your content
even easier:
ESC Save and close editor, hide preview.
  • CTRL + 1 Toggle Preview mode.
  • CTRL + 2 Send a test email.
  • CTRL + 3 Push to MailChimp Mobile.
  • CTRL + ? Show/Hide hotkeys cheatsheet.
Text editor shortcuts
Use the ⌘ (Mac) or Ctrl (Windows) key on your keyboard for editor-specific
shortcuts.
  • ⌘ + Z Undo
  • ⌘ + Y Redo
  • ⌘ + L Add Link
  • ⌘ + B Bold selected text
  • ⌘ + U Underline selected text
  • ⌘ + I Italicize selected text
In each content block you can add and format text, upload images, link to files, and further tailor the layout for maximum flexibility and personalization using the editor toolbar.
After you've added the content, the blocks can be dragged vertically or horizontally within the template to mix up the layout and the design. Click the arrows in the upper left-hand corner to drag the block up, down, or sideways as needed.

Customize the design
The Design tab is also where you style the campaign with colors and other details to make your campaign stand out to readers.
The Page, Header, Body, Columns, and Footer options allow you to adjust colors, borders, text options, and links for the different sections of your campaign. Once you're satisfied with the styles you've picked, click Save to apply your changes.
Mobile Styles take the design you created and optimize the layout for mobile devices. You can use the mobile options to tweak font styles and improve the mobile experience of your campaign.

Preview and test your campaign
You can take a quick peek at your campaign-in-progress by hovering over the Preview & Test button at the top of the page and selecting Enter Preview Mode. In this view click on the View Live Merge Info button to see your Merge Tags in action. Once you're finished checking out your web preview you can return to the editor by clicking the X in the top of the screen, selecting Exit Preview Mode from the Preview & Test button, or using the escape key on your keyboard.

We recommend sending yourself some test emails in addition to viewing the web preview. The Send a Test Email option under the Preview & Test drop down is the easiest way to initiate a test email. Web based previews provide a solid overview of what a campaign will look like, but individual email clientquirks are best found through test emails.
You can also test Merge Tags by sending your campaign to a test list. When you send tests using the Send a Test Email option, the Merge Tags aren't fully live because we're not pulling any data from your list. When you send to a live list (even if it's a test live list) we can activate the Merge Tags.
Vist MailChimp's Knowledge Base for more tips on adding and editing content.

Previous page
« Creating And Importing A List

Next page
Avoiding Spam Filters »