Calix : Here's Why Your Broadband Business Needs Our New Integration With Mailchimp for Better Marketing

I thought my first official marketing job at a Fortune 500 company would be like 'Mad Men.' I envisioned spending my days writing fun, catchy taglines for ads. Instead, I was saddled with the tedious task of updating extensive and sometimes messy customer contact lists in spreadsheets. This meant standardizing all the key elements: everything from capitalizing first and last names all the way to making sure the country or city listed was valid (you'd be surprised how often customers list Hogwarts as their hometown). From there, the contact lists were uploaded into various marketing automation platforms where someone would use that customer data to send emails or texts. Did the process work? Technically, yes. But it was as slow and maddening as getting that last drop of ketchup out of the bottle.

As I worked, I also realized data in spreadsheets quickly lost relevancy and timeliness. What if the customer's views had changed or they forgot they opted-into communications with our company-or worse what if they opted-out just minutes before I completed the process? And then what if I processed the data incorrectly? What if I ruined a contact's information or uploaded an audience spreadsheet to the wrong marketing automation platform? The data latency combined with the potential for human error could end up doing us more harm than good.

As a broadband service-provider (BSP) marketer, you likely recognize these marketing challenges. Data is everywhere, but finding efficient ways to make that data actionable, while maintaining its relevancy, is critical to success. These challenges can seem especially insurmountable for smaller teams with limited marketing budget and resources.

What is Mailchimp and Why Should Broadband Marketers Care About It?

I'm happy to report that Calix is now making it easy for you to automate your marketing efforts and escape spreadsheet hell for good with our new Mailchimp integration with Calix Marketing Cloud. As you may know, Mailchimp is the all-in-one marketing automation platform that empowers small businesses with digital products and solutions. So, it only made sense to integrate Mailchimp with Calix Marketing Cloud -the only marketing and data platform purpose-built for the broadband service providers to enable BSPs to launch automated campaigns and glean insights on campaign performance.

Three Ways Marketing Cloud and Mailchimp Will Benefit Your Teams and Your Business

1. Maximize resources and minimize headaches.

With the Calix Marketing Cloud integration to Mailchimp, you'll no longer need to export an audience out of one system into a spreadsheet, cleanse and standardize the data, and then manually upload it into a marketing automation platform. Within just a few minutes, the integration is configured and ready to go! Quickly share audience segments created in Marketing Cloud with Mailchimp. In just a few clicks, your audiences in Mailchimp are ready to be emailed. Deploy your email and watch in Calix Marketing Cloud as email campaign performance data (opens, clicks, bounces, etc.) automatically rolls in giving you the time to sit back, relax, have a drink-and most importantly worry less. And yes, those messy spreadsheets and contact lists will miss you, but your headaches won't.

2. Eliminate human error and get a perfect 10 in data accuracy.

Look, nobody is perfect (except maybe U.S. Olympian gymnast Simone Biles and her impeccable floor routine). All jokes aside, human errors and mistakes are unavoidable and will happen especially when it comes to cleansing and standardizing data. Now that you can share Marketing Cloud audiences and segments directly with Mailchimp, you eliminate human error altogether. No more issues with copying and pasting an incorrect email address to a contact, messing up a phone number by removing a few digits, or losing out on communication with a new customer because you mistakenly added an extra 's' to 'Arkansass.' With this integration you can rest assured that your robust behavioral customer data is highly accurate.

3. Save time and go back to the future.

As a marketer, your time-and your teams' time-is your most precious resource. Once your time has been used, it's gone and you are never getting it back. (Unless of course you have a DeLorean time machine and, in that case, you should really consider a different career.) But really, as a marketer your time is better spent on strategic initiatives that boost ROI, reduce churn, and build loyalty rather than being knee-deep in a spreadsheet. By being forward-thinking, you can help evolve from a simple service provider into a more of an 'experiences provider' that leverages an innovative omnichannel marketing approach. This integration with Mailchimp is just the first step in that mission and will help you get there. Now, with the power of email marketing you'll connect deeper with your customers and deliver more timely, relevant offers and services. Maximizing your time has never been easier. So, why look back when you can look forward?

The new integration with Mailchimp is the first of many planned integrations-with social media heavyweight Facebook coming soon. All these integrations represent a tectonic shift for broadband service providers and their marketing teams. And by combining the best-in-class behavioral data from Calix Marketing Cloud and the power of email marketing automation from Mailchimp, BSPs simplify their marketing, excite subscribers, and establish a firm foundation to grow their value. Oh yeah, and that whole thing about never having to do a manual data contact list export and upload again-that's nice, too!

To help you get up to speed on all things marketing-including Mailchimp best practices and strategies-be sure to sign up and receive updates for Calix Marketing Academy which is launching soon!