Seeking: Contractor for Airtable/Mailchimp Automations for Film Nonprofit Contacts

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Hi!

We’re a values-driven nonprofit documentary production company looking for a Make.com expert to help us automate API syncs between Airtable and Mailchimp. We also need someone to help us figure out how to get the most out of Make, and be clear about its limitations.

We had previously worked with a contractor, but his specialty was in fully custom API automation, and he ultimately wasn’t able to set up the syncs we needed. Our Communications Manager has some experience with the platform. We have detailed notes about everything we’ve implemented and the errors we experienced before.

We want our Airtable to reflect the most up-to-date information about our contact database, including new subscribers or changes in subscription status that come in from Mailchimp and Squarespace. Any changes in other information will originate in Airtable and then should be synced back to Mailchimp.

Please reach out to [email protected] with your relevant work experience, qualifications hourly rate, and other important information.

Tasks:

  • ONE TIME Run (Reset Baseline): All Airtable records updated with the current newsletter subscription status from Mailchimp
  • EVERGREEN/ONGOING Automations– updates happen as they come in
    • Mailchimp → Airtable: Newsletter subscription status
    • Airtable → Mailchimp: First Name & Last Name; Email; Newsletter subscription status; Mailchimp Tags (Interest area); City / State / Country; Phone Number
  • If this work goes well, there are additional things we want to explore, including setting up automations between Squarespace, Stripe and Airtable.

Looking for:

  • Individual contractor who works quickly and efficiently
  • Direct, timely and honest communication about what is and is not possible via Make’s system
  • Established professional experience in data processing/engineering, API automation
  • Fluency in Make.com as well as overall knowledge of automation and APIs
  • Familiarity with Mailchimp, Airtable, Squarespace, basic coding
  • Knowledge about the nonprofit arts/entertainment/media industry is a bonus!
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Hi @multitudefilms ,

Mailchimp identifies contacts by an MD5 hash of their lowercased email address, not a simple ID, so a lot of custom-built Airtable-Mailchimp syncs break silently: someone updates an email, the hash changes, and instead of updating the existing contact it creates a new one, or an update silently fails to match anything. That’s the kind of thing a fully-custom-API specialist can miss if they haven’t hit it before, and it’s my first guess at what went wrong with the previous build, worth checking your error notes against that specifically.

I’m a certified Make.com expert with genuine hands-on Mailchimp and Airtable API experience. Samples: Make.com - Google Drive and a look at how I build on Make: Sign in | Make HQ

On the actual sync: one-time baseline reset pulling current subscription status from Mailchimp into every Airtable record, then ongoing one-way sync of subscription status from Mailchimp to Airtable, and a separate one-way sync of name, email, tags, location, and phone from Airtable to Mailchimp, keeping those two directions distinct so they don’t fight each other.

$30/hour. Happy to also flag honestly where Make’s native modules hit a real limit versus where a workaround is genuinely fine, rather than defaulting to “just add a custom module” the way the last build may have.

Website: https://www.pathfinderautomationsolutions.com
Upwork: https://www.upwork.com/freelancers/~01446d60f782215efa

Taiwo
[email protected]

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The MD5 point above is right and worth acting on. One more thing decides whether this build stays stable, and it is the reason bidirectional syncs usually fail on the second month rather than the first.

Your scope is actually well designed: subscription status flows Mailchimp to Airtable, and name, email, tags, location and phone flow Airtable to Mailchimp. Keeping each field one-directional is the correct instinct and it prevents most conflicts. The gap is that Mailchimp fires its webhooks on changes your own automation makes, not only on changes a subscriber makes. So an Airtable to Mailchimp write triggers the Mailchimp webhook, which writes back into Airtable, which can trip your Airtable automation again. On a quiet list you never see it. On the day you run the one-time baseline reset across every record, you get a burst of echo updates and it looks like the sync has gone haywire.

The fix is small if you build it in now and painful to retrofit: before writing, compare the incoming value to what is already stored and stop if they match, and stamp each record with which side last changed it. That single check turns the echo into a no-op instead of a loop, and it also gives you an honest audit of where any given value came from.

Two other things worth deciding before anyone builds. Squarespace is in your list as a third source, and it needs to be explicit whether it writes into Airtable or into Mailchimp, because that choice decides where a duplicate can be created. And the baseline reset should run against a copy first, since it is the one operation that touches every record at once.

On how I work, so you can judge fit quickly: I do not bill hourly, which I realise is different from what you asked for. I scope the work in writing and quote one fixed number, so the risk of an unclear integration sits with me rather than showing up on your invoice, and a build of this shape starts at 3,000 USD. Everything runs in writing rather than on calls, it is built in your own Airtable and Mailchimp accounts, and you keep all of it.

I should be straightforward that this is a new service line for me, so I have no client case studies to show you and the builds on my own site use synthetic data. If that matters more than the reasoning above, I would rather you know now. Happy to look at your notes from the previous build and tell you what actually went wrong, at no cost, whether or not you hire me.

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Hi @multitudefilms ,

I’d be happy to help with this.

I work with Make.com, Airtable, Mailchimp, APIs and data synchronization workflows, including two-way workflows where changes originate from different systems.

A few questions I’d be interested in understanding:

• Is Airtable intended to remain the primary source of truth for contact information, with Mailchimp mainly handling subscription status and campaign data?

• Are the existing Make scenarios still available, including the previous errors and implementation notes?

• For the ongoing sync, do you need changes to be reflected immediately, or would scheduled synchronization be sufficient?

I’ll also send an email with my relevant experience and details.

Best,
Folafoluwa

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Hi @multitudefilms,

I tried sending my proposal to [email protected], but the address bounced, so I’m posting it here.

The highest-risk part is not the baseline update itself, but defining which system owns each field and which subscription-status transitions are allowed. Your brief has Mailchimp and Squarespace feeding subscription status into Airtable, but also lists subscription status under Airtable → Mailchimp. Without explicit direction rules and loop prevention, the flows can overwrite newer changes, trigger each other, or reverse a legitimate unsubscribe.

My first slice would be:

  • Review the existing Make.com scenarios, implementation notes, and recorded errors.

  • Map the source of truth and permitted direction for every field.

  • Run a read-only reconciliation between Airtable and Mailchimp before changing any records.

  • Determine where native Make.com modules are sufficient and where a direct API request is safer.

Done = a discrepancy report, approved field and status mapping, and a safe baseline execution plan.

I would then implement the complete system:

  • One-time Mailchimp → Airtable baseline synchronization.

  • Separate evergreen flows for subscription status and contact data.

  • Reliable contact matching, including changed email addresses.

  • Update-or-create logic, validation, deduplication, and loop prevention.

  • Error logging, retries, and recoverable failed runs.

  • Tests for new subscribers, unsubscribes, changed emails, repeated updates, missing fields, and partial batch failures.

  • Clear handover documentation for your Communications Manager.

I built a commercial Guesty/Hostaway → HubSpot synchronization system with field mapping, validation, deduplication, conflict handling, scheduled execution, retries, and batch-failure recovery:

My proof is not a platform badge; it is the systems I have built and the engineering decisions visible in them. The case study above shows the actual architecture, failure handling, and operational safeguards behind my work.

This is the same class of data synchronization problem, and I can take responsibility for it from diagnosis through implementation, testing, and handover. I work across Make.com, APIs, webhooks, and custom backends, and I’ll be direct about Make’s limitations instead of forcing every requirement into the platform.

My rate is $30/hour.

Portfolio: https://www.ezenevic.com/

— Edvin Zenevič

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Thank you and received! We will be reaching out next week after reviewing the responses. We’ll be in touch! Thank you to all those who reached out when the email did not work. That issue has been fixed!

@Pathfinder_Automate @Edvin