How to integrate Mailchimp with SSRS

Learn how to quickly and efficiently connect Mailchimp with SSRS for smooth data access.

Read and write Mailchimp data effortlessly. Integrate, manage, and automate campaigns, lists, members, and reports — almost no coding required. You can do it all using the high-performance Mailchimp ODBC Driver for SSRS (often referred to as the Mailchimp Connector). We'll walk you through the entire setup.

Ready to dive in? Download the product to jump right in, or follow the step-by-step guide below to see how it works.

Mailchimp ODBC Driver Powering this integration

High performance
Bidirectional
Low-code / No-code
Easy to use

Built on the ZappySys API Driver, the Mailchimp ODBC Driver is a high-performance, low-code / no-code solution. It enables you to connect to Mailchimp data without any coding right in your SQL Server, or any ODBC/JDBC application. Part of the ODBC PowerPack.

Documentation

Video Tutorial

This video covers the following topics and more, so please watch carefully. After watching the video, follow the steps outlined in this article:

How to download and install the required PowerPack for Mailchimp integration in SSRS
How to configure the connection for Mailchimp
Features of the ZappySys API Driver (Authentication / Query Language / Examples / Driver UI)
How to use the Mailchimp in SSRS

Create data source in ZappySys Data Gateway

In this section we will create a data source for Mailchimp in the Data Gateway. Let's follow these steps to accomplish that:

Download and install ODBC PowerPack (if you haven't already).
Search for gateway in the Windows Start Menu and open ZappySys Data Gateway Configuration:
Go to the Users tab and follow these steps to add a Data Gateway user:
- Click the Add button
- In the Login field enter a username, e.g., john
- Then enter a Password
- Check the Is Administrator checkbox
- Click OK to save
Now we are ready to add a data source:
- Click the Add button
- Give the Data source a name (have it handy for later)
- Then select Native - ZappySys API Driver
- Finally, click OK
MailchimpDSN

ZappySys API Driver
When the Configuration window appears give your data source a name if you haven't done that already, then select "Mailchimp" from the list of Popular Connectors. If "Mailchimp" is not present in the list, then click "Search Online" and download it. Then set the path to the location where you downloaded it. Finally, click Continue >> to proceed with configuring the DSN:

MailchimpDSN

Mailchimp

Now it's time to configure the Connection Manager. Select Authentication Type, e.g. Token Authentication. Then select API Base URL (in most cases, the default one is the right one). More info is available in the Authentication section.

OAuth

Mailchimp authentication

To get the credentials you need in order to set up your OAuth workflow, you'll first need to register your application with Mailchimp:

Login into your Mailchimp account, click on your Profile Icon, and hit Account & billing:
Navigate to the Registered Apps page in your Mailchimp account:
Click Register An App button:
Fill-in the Register An App form and click Create button:
NOTE: For Redirect URI use Redirect URI (also called "Redirect URL" or "Callback URL") given by your IT administrator or just use https://zappysys.com/oauth, if you don't have one.
After successfully registering your application, you'll see the Client ID and Client Secret, record these values and store them securely:
Record your Mailchimp data center, since we will need it later. The data center is located in your browser's address bar URL. If the URL is https://us21.admin.mailchimp.com/account/api, then your data center is us21.
Now go to SSIS package or ODBC data source OAuth authentication configuration.
Proceed by entering the data center into the Data Center field that was recorded in the previous step.
Then enter the Client ID value into the Client ID field that you recorded in the previous step.
Enter the Client Secret value into the Client Secret field that was recorded in the previous step.
Click Generate Token. If proper authentication occurs, you will see a confirmation notice. If you get an error, click Yes on the dialog box and then a large browser window will launch. Then log into your Mailchimp account and approve the use of the application.
Finally, hit the Test Connection button at the bottom of the window to verify proper connectivity with your Mailchimp account.
If the connection test succeeds, select OK.
Done! Now you can use Mailchimp Connector!

API Connection Manager configuration

Just perform these simple steps to finish authentication configuration:

Set Authentication Type to OAuth [OAuth]
Optional step. Modify API Base URL if needed (in most cases default will work).
Fill in all the required parameters and set optional parameters if needed.
Press Generate Token button to generate the tokens.
Finally, hit OK button:

MailchimpDSN

Mailchimp

OAuth [OAuth]

https://[$DataCenter$].api.mailchimp.com

Required Parameters
Data Center	Fill-in the parameter...
Client Id	Fill-in the parameter...
Client Secret	Fill-in the parameter...
Default List Id	Fill-in the parameter...
Optional Parameters
RetryMode	RetryWhenStatusCodeMatch
RetryStatusCodeList	429
RetryCountMax	5
RetryMultiplyWaitTime	True

ApiKey Auth

Mailchimp authentication

The simplest way to authenticate a request to the Mailchimp Marketing API is by using an API key (If you require access to Mailchimp on behalf of other Mailchimp users, you'll want to set up OAuth authentication instead)::

Login into your Mailchimp account, click on your Profile Icon, and hit Account & billing:
Navigate to the API keys page in your Mailchimp account:
In the Your API keys section of the page, click Create A Key button:
Give your new key a descriptive name that will remind you which application it's used for:
Copy the API key immediately and store it in a secure location (you won't be able to see or copy the key once you finish generating it):
Record your Mailchimp data center, since we will need it later. The data center is located in your browser's address bar URL. If the URL is https://us21.admin.mailchimp.com/account/api, then your data center is us21.
Now go to SSIS package or ODBC data source ApiKey Auth authentication configuration.
Proceed by entering the data center into the Data Center field that was recorded in the previous step.
Then enter the API key into the Api Key field that you copied earlier.
Finally, click the Test Connection button at the bottom of the window to verify proper connectivity with your Mailchimp account.
Done! Now you can use Mailchimp Connector!

API Connection Manager configuration

Just perform these simple steps to finish authentication configuration:

Set Authentication Type to ApiKey Auth [Http]
Optional step. Modify API Base URL if needed (in most cases default will work).
Fill in all the required parameters and set optional parameters if needed.
Finally, hit OK button:

MailchimpDSN

Mailchimp

ApiKey Auth [Http]

https://[$DataCenter$].api.mailchimp.com

Required Parameters
Api Key	Fill-in the parameter...
Default List Id	Fill-in the parameter...
Optional Parameters
Data Center
RetryMode	RetryWhenStatusCodeMatch
RetryStatusCodeList	429
RetryCountMax	5
RetryMultiplyWaitTime	True

Once the data source connection has been configured, it's time to configure the SQL query. Select the Preview tab and then click Query Builder button to configure the SQL query:

ZappySys API Driver - Mailchimp

Read and write Mailchimp data effortlessly. Integrate, manage, and automate campaigns, lists, members, and reports — almost no coding required.

MailchimpDSN
Start by selecting the Table or Endpoint you are interested in and then configure the parameters. This will generate a query that we will use in SSRS to retrieve data from Mailchimp. Hit OK button to use this query in the next step.
```
SELECT * FROM Campaigns
```
Some parameters configured in this window will be passed to the Mailchimp API, e.g. filtering parameters. It means that filtering will be done on the server side (instead of the client side), enabling you to get only the meaningful data much faster.
Now hit Preview Data button to preview the data using the generated SQL query. If you are satisfied with the result, use this query in SSRS:
ZappySys API Driver - Mailchimp

Read and write Mailchimp data effortlessly. Integrate, manage, and automate campaigns, lists, members, and reports — almost no coding required.

MailchimpDSN
```
SELECT * FROM Campaigns
```
You can also access data quickly from the tables dropdown by selecting <Select table>.

A WHERE clause, LIMIT keyword will be performed on the client side, meaning that the whole result set will be retrieved from the Mailchimp API first, and only then the filtering will be applied to the data. If possible, it is recommended to use parameters in Query Builder to filter the data on the server side (in Mailchimp servers).
Click OK to finish creating the data source.
Once done, go to the Network Settings tab and Add a firewall rule for inbound traffic:
- This will initially allow all inbound traffic.
- Click Edit IP filters to restrict access to specific IP addresses or ranges.
Crucial Step: After creating or modifying the data source, you must:
- Click the Save button to persist your changes.
- Hit Yes when prompted to restart the Data Gateway service.
This ensures all changes are properly applied:

Skipping this step may cause the new settings to fail, preventing you from connecting to the data source.

Read data in SSRS from ZappySys Data Gateway

Open Visual Studio and create a new SSRS project.
Then add a new Shared Data Source (you can create a non-shared data source inside report too):
Continue with creating the Shared Data Source. Select Microsoft SQL Server as Type and hit Build button to proceed further:
Once a window opens, configure it similarly. Configure "MailchimpDSN" as database name. Finally, hit Test Connection and OK:

MailchimpDSN
Another window opens, and it should look similarly to this one below which ends the creation of a Data Source:

DataSource=localhost,5000;Initial Catalog=MailchimpDSN
Now it's time to create a Dataset. If you don't have a report created, in one of the wizard's steps it will look like this:

SELECT * FROM Campaigns
Finally, once you complete the report, similar results will show up:

Passing Parameters to SSRS Report / Filter data

If you want to parameterize your report, then refer to this article

Supported Mailchimp Connector actions

Got a specific use case in mind? We've mapped out exactly how to perform a variety of essential Mailchimp operations directly in SSRS, so you don't have to figure out the setup from scratch. Check out the step-by-step guides below:

Conclusion

In this article we showed you how to connect to Mailchimp in SSRS and integrate data without writing complex code — all of this was powered by Mailchimp ODBC Driver.

Download ODBC PowerPack now or ping us via chat if you have any questions or are looking for a specific feature (you can also reach out to us by submitting a ticket):

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