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Connecting Mailchimp lets you import the templates already saved in your account, and push AlpacaRelay designs back out as saved templates you can pick when building a campaign.
New to integrations? The overview explains the import and export flows that are the same for every provider. This page covers what’s specific to Mailchimp.

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What you need

  • A Mailchimp account you can sign in to. Any paid or free plan works.
  • Permission to authorize apps on that account.
There’s no API key to create and nothing to paste. Mailchimp uses OAuth, so you approve access by signing in.

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Connect Mailchimp

1

Open Connected apps

Go to Settings → Connected apps, then click Connect app.
2

Choose Mailchimp

A Mailchimp sign-in window opens.
3

Sign in and allow access

Sign in with the Mailchimp account you want to use, then approve the request.Mailchimp’s OAuth doesn’t offer per-permission checkboxes, so you won’t see a scope list — approving grants access to the account you signed in as.
4

Check the badge

Mailchimp appears in your connected apps with a Connected badge and your Mailchimp account name next to it.
If you manage several Mailchimp accounts, the account name on the badge is how you confirm you connected the right one. Sign out of Mailchimp in that browser first if you keep picking up the wrong account.
Mailchimp hosts each account in a specific data center. AlpacaRelay resolves yours automatically during the connection — there’s no region to choose.

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Export a design to Mailchimp

Save the email, then open Send to app from the editor’s name dropdown or the ⋯ menu on an email card, and click Create template on the Mailchimp row. The design is pushed as a saved template, so it shows up with your other templates when you start a campaign in Mailchimp and choose to build from a saved template. Re-sync updates that same template in place. The template ID doesn’t change, so a campaign already built from it picks up the new design.
A Mailchimp campaign that has already been sent is a snapshot — re-syncing the template won’t retroactively change it. Re-sync affects the template, and therefore anything you build from it afterwards.

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Import a template from Mailchimp

Click Import when creating an email, choose Mailchimp under Integrations, and pick a template. Mailchimp organizes templates into views, and you can switch between them in the picker:
  • Your templates — templates saved in your account, including any AlpacaRelay has exported
  • Mailchimp’s base and gallery templates — the built-in starting points
  • Folders — any folders you’ve created for your own templates
Templates that Mailchimp doesn’t expose editable HTML for are greyed out, with the reason on hover. Mailchimp shows a thumbnail for most templates, so the picker previews them.
Templates built with Mailchimp’s drag-and-drop editor often can’t be imported cleanly, because the editor stores a block structure rather than plain HTML. Classic and custom-coded templates import reliably.
Mailchimp merge tags such as *|FNAME|* come across as literal text. AlpacaRelay doesn’t interpret them, so they stay intact and still work when Mailchimp sends the email.

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Troubleshooting

Access was removed on Mailchimp’s side — usually because someone revoked the authorized app under the account’s integrations, or the account was closed. Click Reconnect and sign in again.
Disconnect it, sign out of Mailchimp in your browser, then connect again. Any email-to-template links from the old account are pointing at templates the new account doesn’t have — unlink them and create fresh templates.
Mailchimp’s drag-and-drop templates don’t always translate to standalone HTML. Try importing the template’s classic or coded equivalent, or export the HTML from Mailchimp and use Paste code instead.