How to Offer a Lead Magnet using Mailchimp on WordPress

What is a Lead Magnet?

A lead magnet, also often called a freebie download, is a resource that you offer to your website visitors in exchange for their email address. It’s a crucial tool in digital marketing that helps you grow your email list, engage with your audience, and ultimately drive conversions.

Here’s how it works: Visitors fill out a subscription form on your website, and in return, they instantly get to download the resource. In all of our themes, we place subscription forms strategically throughout the website. Here are a couple of examples:

In this article, I’m going to show you step-by-step how to set up a freebie download using the free version of Mailchimp.

What You Need

Before we get started, make sure you have:

• A Mailchimp account.
• Your freebie file ready to go (like a PDF eBook or checklist).
• Your WordPress website, of course.

Step-by-Step Guide

Step 1: Create a Signup Form on Mailchimp

Login to Mailchimp, and go to the “Audience” tab. Click on “Signup forms“.

Choose “Form builder“.

Under “Forms and response emails”, choose “Final welcome email” from the dropdown menu.

Add a checkmark on “Send a final welcome email“.

Scroll down to the part where you can edit your final welcome email. There is a part that says “Your subscription to our list has been confirmed“. Put your mouse over that part and click “Edit“.

Here you can customize your final welcome email message and include the link where your subscribers can download your freebie. With your cursor, highlight the part you want to add a link to, and click the link icon (represented by a chain in the image highlighted with a red circle below).

It will prompt you to add your link. Under “Link To,” choose “File” from the dropdown menu. Select from the available files or upload a new one, then click “Insert“.

Hit the “Save and Close” button.

Step 2: Integrate Your Mailchimp Account with WordPress Using the MC4WP Plugin

Now that you have set up your form on Mailchimp, you will next integrate your Mailchimp account with WordPress. If you haven’t, go ahead and install and activate Mailchimp for WordPress plugin on your WordPress.

Once that’s done, on your WordPress dashboard, navigate yourself to MailChimp for WP tab.

Follow the prompts and enter your API key into the available field.

Click the “Settings” tab. Under “Lists this form subscribes to” check one of your available campaigns. Mine says “SheShoppes” but yours might have different name(s).

Click “Save changes“.

Step 3: Adding the Subscription Form to the Page

To add the subscription form to your page, navigate to the page where you want the form to appear. Use the MC4WP plugin’s shortcode below and paste it into the desired location on the page.

[mc4wp_form]

Or, if you’re using Gutenberg block, you can insert the Mailchimp for WordPress Form block instead.

Save your changes to make the form visible to your visitors.

And there you have it. You can display the form inside your post or on a dedicated lead magnet page. I hope this guide has made it easier for you to offer freebie downloads or lead magnets through your WordPress site using the free version of Mailchimp. If you have the paid plan, there are additional features and methods available to enhance this process. But I think the free version is a great option if you’re just starting out.