Mailchimp Content Practices

Mailchimp Content Practices

Application skill for Mailchimp Content Style Guide (archived awesome-guidelines capsules). For repo Markdown structure (H1, fences, wrap), load markdown-writing-practices first; apply this skill to user-facing voice, UI microcopy, and inclusive language.

Core Principle

Product copy quality is clear, person-first, and scannable, plainspoken voice, active positive sentences, inclusive terms, descriptive links, and translation-safe structure.

When to Use / NOT

• Marketing pages, in-app UI strings, help center, emails, forms, error messages, blog/product copy.
• Reviewing copy for voice, inclusivity, link text, heading hierarchy, localization.

NOT when:

• Internal repo docs where only Markdown mechanics matter, markdown-writing-practices.
• API/code identifiers, stack naming skills.
• Legal contracts requiring non-Mailchimp house style, follow legal template.

Workflow

1. Voice/tone, plainspoken, active, positive (mailchimp-style-voice-tone.md).
2. Grammar/structure, hierarchy, numbers, punctuation (mailchimp-style-grammar-structure.md).
3. Inclusive people, they/them, bias-free terms (mailchimp-style-inclusive-people.md).
4. Web/a11y/i18n, headings, links, forms, translation (mailchimp-style-web-accessibility-i18n.md).
5. Verify, read aloud; heading outline; link/descriptive text scan; word-list grep for banned terms.

Red Flags

• Passive voice by default
• Jargon without brief definition
• Negative framing when positive works
• “Click here” / “Learn more” link anchors
• Directional copy (“panel on the right”)
• Skipped heading levels for styling
• Title case on body headings when sentence case required
• Buttons without verbs
• Forms asking irrelevant personal data (e.g. gender dropdown)
• Missing or decorative-only alt text on informative images
• Exclamation points in failure/error messages
• “Guys”, ninja/rockstar/wizard, master/slave, blacklist/whitelist
• Age terms (young/old/elderly) when irrelevant
• Ambiguous once/since/right in localized strings
• -ing heavy translation-bound sentences
• $25 instead of 25 USD for international content
• Keyword stuffing for SEO
• Writing in mascot/character voice
• Underline or bold+italic+caps emphasis stacks

Verification

• Read-aloud pass for awkward or passive sentences
• Heading hierarchy outline (H1→H2→H3, no skips)
• Link text audit (meaningful anchors, no linked punctuation)
• grep banned terms from word list (blacklist, guys, automagical, etc.)
• For localized strings: translation checklist (SVO, repeated parallel verbs, ambiguity scan)
• Optional: accessibility review (alt text, form labels, no direction-only instructions)

References

• awesome-guidelines/references/mailchimp-style-learning-note.md
• awesome-guidelines/references/mailchimp-style-voice-tone.md
• awesome-guidelines/references/mailchimp-style-grammar-structure.md
• awesome-guidelines/references/mailchimp-style-inclusive-people.md
• awesome-guidelines/references/mailchimp-style-web-accessibility-i18n.md

Related skills

• markdown-writing-practices, repo Markdown layout and fences
• frontend-markup-practices, semantic HTML when copy ships in templates