Mailchimp

If your church already uses Mailchimp for email campaigns and prefers to keep it, Ministrium syncs members and prospects as Audience members.

Why keep using Mailchimp

Ministrium’s native email module covers most cases. But some churches prefer Mailchimp because:

They already have established templates and branding.
Communications team is trained on its UI.
They need advanced automations (multi-step drip campaigns).
Mailchimp reports go deeper on some KPIs.

Connect

Integrations → Mailchimp → Connect.
OAuth with Mailchimp.
Pick the destination Audience (you can create a new one).
Map fields:


Ministrium                 Mailchimp Merge Field
─────────────────────      ─────────────────────
member.first_name      →   FNAME
member.last_name       →   LNAME
member.preferred_name  →   PNAME (custom)
member.campus.name     →   CAMPUS (custom)
member.tags            →   TAGS (built-in)
member.created_at      →   JOINDATE (custom)

Initial sync (can take up to 30 min for 10,000 members).

Continuous sync

Any change in Ministrium propagates to Mailchimp in ≤ 5 minutes:

Change in Ministrium	Action in Mailchimp
New member	Add subscriber
Email changed	Update email + log
Tag added/removed	Tag added/removed
Email opt-out	Unsubscribed
Member deleted	Permanently deleted (GDPR)

It is one-way: Mailchimp changes do NOT flow back to Ministrium (Ministrium is the master).

Dynamic segments as tags

Each dynamic segment in Ministrium exports to Mailchimp as a tag. Example:


Segment "Active youth at Downtown"  →  Tag "ms-active-youth-downtown"

In Mailchimp, create a campaign with audience = tag. On the next sync, Ministrium recalculates and updates the tag’s members.

Opt-out conflict

If a member unsubscribes in Mailchimp directly, Mailchimp notifies us via webhook and we set email_opt_in = false in Ministrium. If they unsubscribe in Ministrium, we mark them unsubscribed in Mailchimp. Both platforms end synced.

Double-sending

If you choose Mailchimp for newsletters, disable the Ministrium email module for those same lists. Otherwise a member receives the campaign twice.

Limitations

One Audience per church (tenant). If you need multiple, open a ticket.
Images: Mailchimp has its own library; Ministrium doesn’t sync assets.
Cost: Mailchimp’s free plan gives 500 contacts. Beyond that, Mailchimp bills separately from Ministrium.
Mailchimp legacy fields: if your Audience has odd custom fields, map them one by one or ignore.

Alternative

If you prefer Ministrium’s native email module (simpler, no extra cost), jump to Email. If you need the best of both: use Ministrium for transactional and Mailchimp for newsletters.