MailChimp Subscribe Form Plugin via @CrowdFavorite

Decided to update my email subscription feature and in the process set out to find a more effective solution.

I had been rocking the Jetpack  plugin and using their subscription module, but it left a lot to be desired. Mainly the lack of control, or appeared lack of control over my own data (my emails). For the average site though it might be perfect, and right what the doctor ordered.

For me however I was looking for something specifically to integrate with MailChimp. I actually didn’t even know that there was a MailChimp plugin, I thought I would have to do a form myself (as I had done before), but oh how the things have changed.

Turns out that in my absence, a few months – maybe years, things continue to evolve. How awesome is that!

Turns out our friends at Crowd Favorite built a free MailChimp plugin. #hattip

The MailChimp List Subscribe Form

After creating your list in MailChimp, all you have to do is install the plugin via your WordPress administrator panel.

Perezbox - MailChimp Plugin

MailChimp Plugin in WordPress Dashboard – Yeah, no image!!!

Once you install the plugin it’ll be embedded within the Settings menu, I always hate this, but I suppose it works.

Perezbox - MailChimp Settings Configuration

MailChimp Settings Configuration Location

As if that wasn’t easy enough, the rest is even easier. You’ll be greeted with a simple log in page, where you’ll establish a connection with the MailChimp Service:

MailChimp Connection Page

MailChimp Connection Page

Once connected it’ll pull in all available lists, similar to mine below:

MailChimp Lists

MailChimp Lists

For me, all the defaults worked, with exception to how they handle affiliate links. Turns out they levae it on by default and it shows up as such when you add it to your sidebar:

MailChimp Affiliate Link

MailChimp Affiliate Link

I was a bit annoyed, but mostly because I’m a bit of a premadonna, but refusing to allow a cool feature to be ruined I pinged them via the WordPress.org Support Forums. They responded very fast, always a good sign!!

Turns out disabling the affiliate link is even easier, just disable the Monkey Rewards feature under List Option. I can live with that.

MailChimp List Option - Disable Rewards
MailChimp List Option – Disable Rewards

Once that was done, all I had to do was move the MailChimp widget into the appropriate sidebar and I was off the races.

MailChimp Widget Move to Sidebar

MailChimp Widget Move to Sidebar

Accounting for Security

While we have not finished a review of the plugin, I do have other controls in place that might affect you as well.

If you’re leveraging the Sucuri Website Firewall you might have issues when first connecting, depending on your configurations. If you get an error like the following, don’t freak out, it just means your security configurations are working.

MailChimp Connection Error - Sucuri Firewall

MailChimp Connection Error – Sucuri Firewall

No worries, this has to do with the restrictions on the Admin panel, all you have to do is navigate to [Your Domain] > Settings > Security and under Security Options disable the Admin panel restricted to only Whitelisted IP addresses.

Sucuri Website Firewall Settings

Sucuri Website Firewall Settings

Once this is disabled, takes a few seconds, try again and the connection should go through. Once the connection is established, reenable the feature and your website will be none the wiser.
Hope this helps. Enjoy!

1 Comment

  1. Jeremy on November 5, 2014 at 8:32 am

    If you’ve decided to switch to a new subscriptions system, one last step could be to export your list of Jetpack Subscribers, and import that list of emails into Mailchimp. You can them deactivate Jetpack’s Subscriptions module and thus avoid all confusion that could be caused by 2 different subscription methods on your site.

    To export a .csv file of the email addresses currently subscribed to your site via Jetpack, you can click on the download link at the bottom of your list of subscribers.

    I hope this helps, and also answers part of your concern about the lack of control over the data collected by Jetpack :)

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