Weekly progress email switch to MailChimp

[sojharo]

In this task, I would research on how we can send dynamic data from MailChimp or study ManDrill of MailChimp. Then, I would move weekly email MailChimp from SendGrid.

This task is action item of last marketing meeting.

[jekram]

update please

[sojharo]

I am assigning this to @bjafri5 as he is already working on email related tasks.

[jekram]

@bjafri5 What is the update here? Need to close this ASAP

[bjafri5]

Have researched on how to achieve this through MailChimp and Mandrill. Will finalize the approach with Sojharo @today

[bjafri5]

Since the only way to achieve this will be through Mandrill, which is a paid add-on of MailChimp, @sojharo has suggested to put this on hold for now, and for the time being handle transactional emails through SendGrid, and remaining emails through MailChimp, and to continue this task after he discusses with you. @jekram

Billing Plan for MailChimp: https://us12.admin.mailchimp.com/account/billing-plan/

[sojharo]

Yes, there are certain emails which need data in them coming from server. MailChimp doesn't allow us to put data in email body. On SendGrid, it allows the putting of data in email body. I think, we need to make business decision here. Should we signup for mailchimp add on which sends the email with data or stay with SendGrid for such emails and use mailchimp only for promotional emails.

[jekram]

@sojharo Is there any customer email (to users going on SendGrid) or we are using SendGrid just for internal email?

@bjafri5

[sojharo]

We send customer email as well.

[sojharo]

I am assigning this to @saniasiddiqui so that when she is back. She can help in this marketing task. @saniasiddiqui please go through comments above and let's see what we need to do to use just single email provider instead of using both sendgrid and mailchimp.

[sojharo]

I am assigning this to baqar. @bjafri5 let's pick this and see what we can do here. Problem is we are using both mailchimp and sendgrid for sending emails. In Sendgrid, we are sending emails which has dynamic data in body such as email verification link or password reset link. We are using mailchimp for sending marketing emails. Mailchimp uses templates so we can't have dynamic content in email body. Please see if we can switch every email to just mailchimp and how we can send dynamic emails.

Just come up with a plan on how we can switch completely towards mailchimp.

[jekram]

@sojharo I would like to understand how both of these are working today. Before we consolidate it. There are several places we are using email. I would like to understand for each of these - where we are storing the data. I just need education on these.

1. Sign up process and welcome email and password reset.
2. Contact us
3. Landing Page
4. Subscribe Button (this is work in progress)
5. Any place else?

Maybe the next step is to just have a working session on this before we need to take the next step.

@bjafri5 already looked at it once.

At the end of the day if we have to pick only one then I would pick the market leader as more then likely it will give as better marketing automation.

If we are using SendGrid for transactions only. What is the pain this is causing? What is the tactical workaround if we keep both?

@bjafri5 @sojharo Let's discuss this. Not today, But on Wednesday or Thursday

@ImranBinShoukat FYI

[bjafri5]

1. Sign up process and welcome email and password reset

• The sign up verification email is sent through SendGrid
• The password reset email is sent through SendGrid
• The welcome email and followup emails are sent through MailChimp

2. Contact us

• These emails are sent through our WordPress site

3. Landing Pages

• These emails are sent using MailChimp

If we are using SendGrid for transactions only. What is the pain this is causing? What is the tactical workaround if we keep both?

They both can be used as they are right now, and there isn't much of a drawback in using both of them. The main advantage to using one service is having all emails and their analytics consolidated to one account.

What would need to be done in order to completely switch to MailChimp?

MailChimp also has transactional emails, however it is a paid add-on (https://mailchimp.com/pricing/transactional-email/)

SendGrid provides 12,000 (100/day) free transactional emails per month (https://sendgrid.com/pricing/)

If we want to exclusively switch to MailChimp, we would have to purchase their transactional email add-on. After purchasing and setting it up (https://mandrill.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360047420753-Getting-Started-Guide), we would then have to replace all SendGrid email API calls to MailChimp's Transactional email API (https://mandrillapp.com/api/docs/index.nodejs.html).

@jekram @sojharo

[jekram]

@bjafri5 Excellent write up.

One more question: What is the drawback in consolidating into one and what workarounds we need to implement. There was a discussion that MailChimp cannot handle if the same customer comes from multiple channels.

@sojharo @ImranBinShoukat

[bjafri5]

I don't think there are any drawbacks with consolidating into one. With MailChimp's transactional emails add-on, we can send multiple emails to the same customer regardless of which channel they come from.

Once MailChimp transactional emails are set up , there is a WordPress plugin that should allow integration with our marketing website (https://wordpress.org/plugins/send-emails-with-mandrill/)

[sojharo]

As baqar has resigned, I am reassigning this to @saniasiddiqui as she had already researched on Mandrill of MailChimp.