A customer wrote in this suggestion:

“We have so many people that join through different ways…It would be nice to have one email just for those who join through facebook/website and another that we could send to bulk email uploads that come from events.”

We recently added the ability to segment your list by signup source, which now makes this possible. Basically, you need to turn off MailChimp’s welcome emails, and use Autoresponders that are segmented by signup source instead…

Turn off MailChimp’s Welcome Emails

When people opt-in for your MailChimp lists, we automatically send a welcome email. It’s kind of a basic transactional email. You can customize it w/offers and stuff, but you can’t really target it in any special way, nor do we provide reports.

So we’re going to use MailChimp’s autoresponders instead. First, turn off the welcome email for your list. Log in to MailChimp, click the “Lists” tab, and then click into your list. Go to the List’s settings, and then “List Name & Defaults:”

 

Next, uncheck the “Send Welcome Email” box:

Note: You may also want to turn off the final goodbye email that we send when someone unsubscribes. That was once a best practice, but lately more and more people complain about them (maybe because their mobile inboxes are so swamped). For all new accounts, that goodbye email is turned off. For older accounts, we left it on (some people include exit surveys in their goodbye emails). 

Also, you could just keep the welcome email. It gets sent automatically, and in its default state, is just a generic confirmation that you’ve received their request to opt in to your list. Then, set up a more personalized autoresponder to send a day or two afterwards.

 

Setup Welcome Autoresponder

So now we have to go and set up our autoresponder welcome email:

 

First, you’ll set up your rules. I’ve set mine to go one day after sign up:

 

Next, you design the email that gets sent. This step is just like any other campaign that you’d design in MailChimp:

 

Segment By Signup Source

This is the important part. When you’re designing your email, the first step will be to define who it gets sent to. You’ll want to send it to a segment of your list, based on the signup source. Some examples:

Facebook Source

If you’ve set up our Facebook integration, this’ll send a welcome email to those who signed up from Facebook. One idea from our social team is to go back and look for the most popular photos and videos on your own Facebook page. Look for content your fans Liked or Commented on the most. Include that content in this welcome email. 

 

Chimpadeedoo

We’ve got an iPad app called Chimpadeedoo that store owners can place near their cash registers. You can send a welcome email to people who signed up at the store:

 

WordPress

For people who signed up via your blog:

 

MailChimp API Integrations

For people you imported via API:

 

Here’s a list of all the signup sources we track:

 

 

Also see:

• In Chimpadeedoo 2, we added the ability to create a hidden field, where you can pass location information (local store, event, tradeshow, etc) from the iPad to your list for future segmentation (thanks for signing up at the __ event in Atlanta).
• How we’re measuring Autoresponder performance at MailChimp