Note: This integration is an added feature that does not come with a standard licensing agreement. Please contact sales@x-cd.com if you would like to explore adding this to your agreement.

How the Integration Works

X-CD will begin by reproducing your contacts, groups, and email preferences/consents in MailChimp. To better understand this transfer, have a look at the table below which shows you how information from X-CD gets translated into MailChimp.

Once you've entered the required information for the transfer, the two systems will need a few hours to update MailChimp's records. Once the initial transfer is complete, X-CD will continue to notify MailChimp of any changes including new/updated contacts, conferences, consents, etc... every time the information changes in X-CD. MailChimp will also begin sending unsubscribe requests to X-CD when the user unsubscribes in MailChimp.

Setting up Your MailChimp Integration

There are three important tasks to integrating MailChimp with X-CD:

1. Retrieve API Keys
2. Create the Webhook
3. Managing Unsubscribes

Retrieve API Keys

In order to integrate X-CD with MailChimp, we need to put your MailChimp API keys in X-CD. API Keys are like digital keys which get sent from X-CD to MailChimp with a message: "This user has given us permission to interact with the Data that these keys unlock". Every time that X-CD interacts with the information from MailChimp, we send these keys to confirm that you have given us the permission to make changes to your MailChimp data.

1. First, if you haven't already, open a tab to your X-CD Dashboard. (If you have come from the API screen in the dashboard, you can skip steps 1-3)
2. From the left-side menu, click on Email Management.
3. Across the top, select the right-most tab: API Options
4. You should arrive at a screen like this:
   
   
5. Next we need to open another tab in our browser and login to MailChimp.com
6. From the MailChimp dashboard, select a clean Audience or create a new one to be the audience that will be interacting with X-CD.
7. Click on the Manage Audience dropdown on the right and click "Settings".
8. Scroll down to the bottom of the screen to see the "Unique id for audience [Name of your Audience here]". It should look like this:
   
   
9. Copy this code and place it in X-CD where it says API Key 2:
   
   
10. Go back to MailChimp and click on the little circle containing your profile picture in the bottom left corner. When the menu pops up, click on Account.
11. Under the Extras menu, click on API keys.
12. Click on Create A Key. It should look something like this: 
    
    
13. With the new key created, copy the API key and paste it back in X-CD under API Key 1.
    
14. Before you submit these API keys in X-CD, compare your screen to the following image:
    
    
15. Once you've done this, you will see a screen like the below which gives you an opportunity to customize which data is synchronized. Refer to the table at the beginning of this article to remind you what each category represents.
    
    
16. Once you've reviewed these options click "Run API Sync"

This initial sync can take a few hours but you can continue with steps 2 and 3 while this is happening.

Create the Webhook

The webhook is the way that MailChimp lets X-CD know when someone has unsubscribed from your emails. It is important that we set it up correctly to avoid infringing upon any standards of compliance for anti-spam legislation.

1. Copy the Webhook URL that has now appeared in your X-CD tab. If you're not sure where to find it, refer to steps 1-3 in "Retrieve API Keys"
2. Go back to your MailChimp tab and click Audience on the left once again.
3. Make sure you have the correct audience selected, click on Manage Audience, and then click on Settings.
4. At the bottom, above the short API key you will see Webhooks. Click on it.
5. On the Webhooks screen click on "Create New Webhook".
6. This step is really important as it may cause errors for you if it is not done correctly.
   First, paste the URL from X-CD ("Callback URL") into the Webhook URL field. Then, uncheck all of the checkboxes.
   Finally, check "Unsubscribes" from the top list and "By a subscriber" from the bottom list. It should look like this when done correctly:
   
   
7. Once that is done, you can click Update.

And just like that, MailChimp is now able to let X-CD know when a user has chosen to unsubscribe.

Managing Unsubscribes

If, overtime, you find that there are increasingly more X-CD subscribers than MailChimp Subscribers, one of two things may be occurring:
      1. The webhook may be set up incorrectly (send us a support ticket if you are unsure), or
      2. You may have members who are unsubscribing in MailChimp and then later resubscribing in X-CD.