Automate User Email Unsubscriptions

This article goes over how to use Zapier to automate email unsubscriptions for a third-party Email Service Provider (i.e. ESP).

Overview

If your students want to unsubscribe themselves from any marketing emails you send through Teachable, they can do so by:

1. Enabling the Do not receive marketing emails checkbox in their user profile.
2. Clicking an unsubscribe link located at the bottom of any marketing emails you send through Teachable.

In some cases, school owners may be using an ESP to supplement their mailing list. However, the unsubscribe methods listed above will not automatically remove that user's email address from the ESP without further steps through Zapier.

Zapier is an easy way to connect and automate tasks between your Teachable school and many other applications, such as your Email Service Provider (ESP). Zapier has both free and paid plans. The free plan allows up to 100 actions per month, which in this case means up to 100 unsubscriptions per month.

Automating Email Unsubscriptions

For the purposes of demonstration, we'll be demonstrating how to setup automated unsubscriptions for a ConvertKit account. However, please note that the method demonstrated below should work for most ESPs as well.

To automate email unsubscriptions, follow the steps below:

1. Log in to Zapier.
2. Click the Make a Zap button.
3. On the Choose a Trigger App page, use the search bar to find Teachable.
   
4. On the Select Teachable Trigger page, click the show less common options link, and then select Student Unsubscribes From Marketing Emails.
   
5. On the Select Teachable Account page, click the Connect an Account button, and input your Teachable school information (email, password, and URL) in the window that appears.
6. On the Pull in Samples page, follow the directions to get sample data. If it fails, you can skip this step. 
7. In the lefthand navigation menu, click Set up this Step, then Choose App in the Action section.
8. On the Choose a Trigger App page, use the search bar to find ConvertKit. (If you are using a different ESP—such as Active Campaign or AWeber—use the search bar to find the ESP that you are using)
   
   
9. On the Select ConvertKit Action page, click the show less common options link, and then select Unsubscribe Email.
10. On the Select ConvertKit Account page, click the Connect an Account button, and input your ConvertKit information in the window that appears.
11. On the Set up ConvertKit Subscriber page, click the Email address dropdown, and select Object Email.
    
12. On the Send Test Subscriber page, click Send Test to ConvertKit to see if your Zap is functional. Please note that if you do not have any preexisting unsubscribes, or the sample email does not exist in your MailChimp list, this test will fail. In that case, click Skip this step.
13. Click Finish, and then toggle on your Zap on the next page.