Please Note:
This article is specifically aimed at Merchants who have already enabled our integration with MailChimp. Please see our MailChimp Integration Basics article before proceeding.
This article will detail the required steps for adding the Birthday Discount Link to the email used in your MailChimp Customer Journey.
If you're using MailChimp's legacy Classic Automations method, then please see this article instead: MailChimp Classic Automation - adding the Birthday Discount Link to your email
Likewise, if you're wanting to add the Birthday Discount Link to a Saved MailChimp Email template that is not linked to any specific campaign, then you'll want to follow the steps in the article MailChimp (non-campaign specific) Email Template - adding the Birthday Discount Link
Locating the Birthday Discount Link merge tag within MailChimp
Each field within a MailChimp audience has a corresponding and unique merge tag. You're likely already familiar with these, but if not, they look like a snippet of text wrapped in special characters. Such as *|EXAMPLE|*.
When a merge tag is inserted within an email, the tag is replaced with the content stored in the corresponding audience field. As an audience field itself, the Birthday Discount Link also has a corresponding merge tag. Your audience merge tags can be found by clicking on the audience Settings dropdown menu and selecting Audience fields and *|MERGE|* tags:
You will notice in the screenshot below that there are two options of merge tags for most fields. We recommend using the *|BDAYLINK|* option. (Tip: You may want to copy this merge tag from here to your clipboard. Or at least keep this article open and come back to it as you follow the steps below.)
Adding the Birthday Discount Link merge tag into the email
Steps:
1. Within MailChimp, navigate to Automations > All journeys
2. Find your Customer Journey and click the View Journey button located to the right:
3. Click the Pause & Edit button to allow you to make changes to your Customer Journey:
4. You will likely see a dialog asking for confirmation to Pause the Journey Map. These steps should only take a few minutes to complete, so go ahead and click on the Pause button to continue:
5. This will take us into the Customer Journey Map view. Click on the 3 dots:
6. Choose Edit from the dropdown:
7. Click on the Edit Email Content button:
8. Does your Customer Journey email already contain a call to action (CTA) such as a Button? If not, then add one in from the content blocks. This is where we'll be pasting in the merge tag for our Birthday Discount Link:
9. There is another way to find the merge tag we need, but it's a bit tricky. Your email template will likely already contain a text content block. If so, click on the Pen icon to enter the text block edit mode:
10. Lets briefly enter into this text block to find and copy the merge tag for our Birthday Discount Link. Before we go any further though, click into some space within the text box, but away from your existing text. We're going to cut and paste the merge tag and then make sure to restore this Text box to it's previous state.
Click on the Merge Tags option dropdown and scroll down to find and select Birthday Discount link:
11. We're going to briefly copy and cut this relevant merge tag before then reverting the text block back to it's previous state. This will keep the merge tag on our clipboard that we can then paste into the Web address (URL) area of our Button:
12. Once the text box has been reverted back. Click back into the Button content block and then paste the merge tag into the Web address (URL) section:
13. Click the Save & Close button:
14. Click the Save & Return to Journey Button:
15. You might be tempted to click the Turn Back On button here to resume your Customer Journey. However, we recommend that you skip this step for a moment and follow the remaining few steps below to add a Filter to your Customer Journey.
This filter will check to make sure that the Birthday Discount Link field is populated before sending the email.
16. Click on the Filters tab below the main Trigger:
17. A Filters popup will appear. Select Contacts from a custom segment:
18. We're only going to be adding one condition for this filter, but lets change the Match condition to all anyway:
19. Click into the first box that currently displays Campaign activity and scroll all the way to the top of the dropdown to find and change this to Birthday Discount Link:
20. In the condition box next to this, choose Is not blank from the dropdrown:
21. Click to Save the Filter:
22. Now, finally, Let's click the Turn Back On button:
And that's it! You have now added the Birthday Discount Link to your Customer Journey email. Your Birthday Club members can now look forward to a special birthday discount from you.
Read more about what exactly happens when that button is clicked, in our Generate Discount Page article.
Need any help?
If you would like any advice or support setting this up, please don't hesitate to get in touch.