If you’re looking for a simple tutorial to connect your Thrive Leads forms with MailChimp using API connection, I created this tutorial just for you.
Over the last month or so, I’ve had countless emails from users of Thrive Leads asking if I could create a tutorial on how to set up MailChimp email marketing with Thrive Leads software.
Well, here it is.
At some point, I will create a video tutorial to go with this post. For now, though, you’ll have to make do with the instructions below.
OK, so actually connecting your Thrive Leads with MailChimp is so darn easy.
Here’s what we’re going to cover during the setup process:
I’m not going to cover things like setting up a MailChimp account or creating a list in MailChimp. I’m going to assume you already have these set up or know how to do it.
Nor am I going to show you how to use Thrive Leads. If you want to see how I use Thrive Leads to build my email list, check out my video tutorial. It’s a few years old now, but nothing much has changed.
Let’s begin with a quick overview of each tool. If you want to skip all of this and get straight to the tutorial, then scroll below.
Recommended post: How To Build An Email List For Your Blog (Complete Beginners Guide)
MailChimp is the email marketing service provider that I use and recommend for building and managing your email list.
MailChimp is very popular and offers a host of great services, including many options and features for building your email list.
Why do I use MailChimp?
Because they’re affordable and have been around for a very long time, so they have a good reputation.
Thrive Leads is a powerful all-in-one email opt-in form builder and list building plugin for WordPress.
The software comes with a host of predesigned opt-in form templates, A/B split testing tools, analytical and conversion metric tools, and much more.
As a user of Thrive Leads for over 3 years now, in my opinion, it is the most complete opt-in form tool that every blogger or entrepreneur should have in their toolbox.
OK, so now let’s finally set up MailChimp with Thrive Leads, for real!
Let me share with you exactly how I have these setup for my website here at Magnet4Blogging.
It’s straightforward because most of the settings and configurations are actually made in Thrive Leads and not MailChimp.
Although I add some small customization to MailChimp’s opt-in forms, I prefer to use my own custom-built forms using the Thrive Leads canvas.
The only pages I customize in the MailChimp forms are the ones highlighted in the image below. The ones ‘grayed-out’ I don’t touch at all. See the image below.
So – These pages include:
The reason the ‘signup thank you page’ and the ‘confirmation thank you page’ are both grayed out in the image above is because I’ve already created these inside my WordPress site using another plugin called Thrive Architect (Custom thank you page).
Why have I done this?
Because I prefer to create custom ‘thank you landing-pages’ on my website instead of sending new subscribers ‘offsite’ to a default ‘thank you page’ like the one on MailChimp.
This helps me to achieve several things –
Moreover, with a custom ‘thank you page,’ I can add my own custom branding, content, links, and any relevant special offers I think my new subscribers might be interested in.
Once I have all of these pages set up correctly, I take the next step to configuring Thrive Leads with MailChimp using API connection.
Let’s take a look.
Right, Just follow the steps below.
First, log into your MailChimp account.
Then navigate to the top right-hand corner of the screen, click on the little face-down arrow, and you’ll see a list of options.
You’ll see Profile in the drop-down menu. Click on this. See the image below.
Now under the Extras drop-down menu, you’ll see API keys. Click on this tab. See the images below.
Once you’re on the API Keys page, you’ll need to create a new API key.
When creating your API key, make sure to change the label name so you know what the API key is used for.
For instance, you could just name it ‘Thrive Leads’ to keep things simple. See the image below.
Once you’ve created your new API key, you’ll need to add it to your Thrive Leads software.
To do this, simply copy the API Key (long numbers and letters), then log back into your WordPress dashboard and go to Thrive Dashboard > Manage API Connections > Add New Connection > select MailChimp under Email Marketing, then paste the code into the box provided. See the image below.
Hit Connect, and with a bit of luck, you should have completed the API connection for Thrive Leads and MailChimp.
You can always test the connection from the Active Connections dashboard.
All you need to do is connect your custom Thrive Leads opt-in forms to your email list in MailChimp using API connection.
This is the easy part, by the way.
Go to Thrive Leads (Affiliate link) and then edit one of your opt-in forms as you would normally. See below.
On the opt-in form editor page, click on the actual opt-in form email field to edit it. See the image below.
You will see the Lead Generation Option bar pop up. Now click on the button that says Connect to Service. See the image below.
You can now create a new connection for your form. Hit the button Create a new Connection. See the image above.
You have the option to either connect with HTML or with API. Select API as your preferred type of connection. Then click on Go to the next step. See the image above.
OK, so now choose from your list of existing API connections – Since we’ve already done the setup for MailChimp in Step 2, we can simply select MailChimp if it’s not already selected, and the name of your mailing list.
You can also choose Grouping, and I would just ensure that you have Doube-opt-in enabled as well.
Once you’re done, simply hit Save. See image above.
That’s it! You’ve successfully set up MailChimp with Thrive Leads. Your visitors will be able to use your opt-in forms immediately and get onto your email list.
I would highly recommend that you test your form using your own email address to see if the connection was successful.
If you get stuck with any of the steps above, please don’t hesitate to contact me. I’m here to assist you in any way I can.
