Adding Mailchimp Signup to Your Blog!

Today's question comes from Maya McDonald of Charmingly Styled.

"How do I setup a Mailchimp form to my blog?"

There's several different ways to add a Mailchimp signup for to your blog. To do a pop window or include a signup form within your widget or footer and do it well requires a significant amount of code and css knowledge. Most third-party plugins, even the MailChimp plugin, often don't fit with the overall look and feel of the site. This option is the simplest way to add it to your site.

To setup mailchimp to your blog, you will need the following:
1. Mailchimp Account
2. Header Image
3. Knowledge of the fonts and colors used on your site (you can view last week's post for info on how to get this info).

1. Sign on to your mailchimp account. Go to LISTS. Select CREATE LIST on the top right corner of the browser.



2) List details: Your list name, from email, and from name are all visible to someone who signs up. For Maya's example, we used the following:

List Name: Charmingly Styled Monthly Newsletter
From Email: Charminglystyled@gmail.com
From Name: Maya McDonald
Reminder: You signed up for this newsletter at charminglystyled.com

For notifications, select how you would prefer either daily summary or one-by-one. It's all up to personal preference. Once you've entered all the information. Save

3) You will come back to your list dashboard. Select your new list.

4) Select SIGNUP FORMS. You have the option of choosing from three different forms. The easiest and most accessible form to use is the GENERAL FORM.

5) By dragging and dropping and using the DESIGN IT feature, you can customize your sign up form. This is where you enter your header. Customize how you would like your form to look. You can make edits later!

6) Copy the SIGNUP FORM URL

7) Now go to the dashboard of your site, we are going to the link in the newsletter in the navigation of your site!


BLOGGER: In your dashboard, go to LAYOUT.

If you use PAGES WIDGET for your menu bar...

1) Select EDIT in the PAGES widget box.

2) A new window will pop up, select ADD EXTERNAL LINK.

3) Another window will pop up, for page title, put the title you would like the link to have. I used "Charmingly Styled Newsletter". For the link, place the link you copied. Click Saved. The link will now be visible.

If for some reason, your designer used HTML widget area for your menu bar (like Maya's Designer), you will need to follow the same structure of the links. The structure follows this order:

<li><a href='SIGNUP FORM URL'>TITLE OF LINK</a></li>
So I replaced that info wit the URL of the form and the title.
<li><a href='http://eepurl.com/ZRReD'>NEWSLETTER</a></li>

WORDPRESS:
1) In your dashboard, select MENUS under APPEARANCE

2) Select LINKS from the toggle menu. Copy in your MAILCHIMP FORM URL and your Link Text should be how you would like the text displayed on your menu bar. Select Add to Menu.

3) The link will automatically show up on the bottom of your Menu Structure. Drag and drop it to where you would like it to be in your menu. Select SAVE MENU, the link should now be visible.

Do you have tech or design questions you would like answered? "Techie Tuesdays" is a weekly series written by Lindsay Humes of White Oak Creative. In order to make this series as beneficial to Midwest Bloggers, you can email your specific questions to Lindsay at hello@whiteoakcreative.com, and she will answer them in her weekly series.