I was reading among my favorite e-mail newsletters when I scrolled to the bottom of the e-mail and saw the beehiiv logo for the first time. I clicked on it and instantly began destroying. Beehiiv Email Capture…
Being a full time creator is difficult. I’m often getting pitched different tools and solutions that do not appear to be worth my time.
I guess I was psychological since I invested the last 6 months trying out different e-mail and e-newsletter systems to assist build my e-newsletter. And to be fair, there are some excellent choices for composing e-newsletters. Yet I couldn’t locate one that made me give a precise “yes”.
The concern with several existing e-newsletter platforms is that they do not feel creator-centered. I desire an e-newsletter system that lets me completely personalize my newsletter layouts, makes it incredibly very easy to create and send out e-mails, and offers me devices that help me evaluate metrics and obtain more customers.
I think I’ve finally found the appropriate tool.
However, I know beehiiv may not be for everyone. So let’s dive deep and see if it’s really right for you.
What is beehiiv?
beehiiv is an all-in-one platform for e-newsletters. It’s a creator-friendly newsletter system that makes it easy to design, create, send, advertise, monetize, and track the ROI of your newsletter.
Produced by former employees at the popular newsletter firm Morning Brew, beehiiv intends to assist developers launch and monetize their very own e-newsletter– taking lots of development concepts from taking Morning Brew to over 4M clients.
In this article, I’m mosting likely to discuss my individual experience with beehiiv, the things I love (and hate) about it, all of it’s features, and why I made a decision to ultimately opt for it as my e-newsletter platform of selection.
My individual experience with beehiiv
A couple of months ago, I mistakenly stumbled across beehiiv. The amusing story is that I have actually been on the lookout for a modern newsletter system for fairly a long time now. I have actually hesitated hard when it pertained to lastly releasing my newsletter.
First, I attempted Mailchimp. After that, a couple of various other indie platforms. Then, Substack. And finally, I ended up making use of beehiiv.
I make sure lots of newsletter creators look up to preferred e-newsletters with countless clients– I recognize I do. The Morning Brew e-newsletter is one I respected a whole lot. They have wonderful web content, tons of subscribers, and a clever referral program that enables them to get back at extra subscribers.
So, I went on a quest to figure out just how these large e-newsletters set up their logistics. What platform do they utilize? How do they track the ROI of their e-newsletters? How do they get more clients? How do they develop an e-newsletter design that stays on-brand?
When I found beehiiv for the first time, it seemed to respond to all of my inquiries. I thought to myself, “damn the people that developed this device truly comprehend e-newsletter creation and development.” I examined who these makers of beehiiv were.
So I mosted likely to LinkedIn, and saw that the founders were several of the very first marketing and growth staff members at Morning Brew– my mind exploded.
I understood this was going to be a various newsletter system. One that’s focused on creator growth.
Because, any creator recognizes, you require growth to be able to earn a living off of an e-newsletter. And finding the best newsletter stack (that scales) commonly means making use of multiple various devices to aid accomplish one goal– one platform for your newsletter, one platform to generate income from, and one system to establish references. It can get pricey.
So when I figured out beehiiv did all of these points in one platform, and it was free to begin using, it was a no-brainer to give it a try.
beehiiv vs Substack
You might be asking, “isn’t there currently a system for writers called Substack?”.
Yes, indeed there is. Substack is a terrific system used by thousands of independent writers. With Substack you obtain your very own site and use the system as your all-in-one option for sending out e-mails (while producing an archive of previous concerns).
What collections beehiiv apart is it’s commitment to growth. beehiiv permits you do to all the things Substack can do, with the benefit of much better analytics, more design flexibilty, and a referral program to urge your existing clients to obtain the word out.
beehiiv additionally provides you a web site comparable to Substack. Yet, if you have your own site currently, you can additionally make use of beehiiv’s sign-up installs (that’s what I make use of) to send your internet site subscribers directly to your beehiiv email list. On the very same token, you can integrate beehiiv with a device like Revue to enable individuals to register for your newsletter straight from Twitter.
This gives you the flexibility to utilize different marketing networks to obtain your e-newsletter out into the world, making beehiiv a fantastic Substack alternative.
How to begin utilizing beehiiv e-mail marketing software.
Who is beehiiv for?
beehiiv is for the lean material creator that desires a system that enables them to send custom newsletters with or without needing to have a site.
The most effective e-newsletters have the right tools to construct and scale their e-newsletters. beehiiv aims at providing you those devices.
If you’re an independent author, media firm, start-up, or web content maker, you should seriously considering trying beehiiv. It’s completely cost-free to begin and you only pay when you get to over 2,500 customers on your list.
If you actually wind up needing to pay for beehiiv it’s probably a great indicator that individuals like reading your stuff.
Register for a free plan
The initial step is to enroll in a free plan. You can do this by clicking the “Beginning trial” switch on beehiiv’s site.
The free plan will permit you to have up to 2,500 subscribers, offer you accessibility to internet site hosting, an e-newsletter CMS, advance personalization, analytics, external embed kinds, and much more. It’s a really charitable offering for those simply starting (or for those seeking a brand-new system to move to).
Onboarding
After creating an account, you’ll undergo an onboarding process that will ask things like, “is this your initial newsletter?”, “what other platforms have you used?”, “do you have any kind of paying clients?”, and much more.
You’ll then develop a name and URL for your e-newsletter’s site. On the free plan, your newsletter will survive a beehiiv subdomain. So if your e-newsletter is called “Baking Cakes,” your internet site URL may be something like “baking-cakes. beehiiv.com”.
Throughout the onboarding process, you’ll also choose your brand name design and colors to make certain your newsletter template looks right.
Navigating your control panel
Once you reach your main dashboard, you’ll see every one of your analytics and setups.
You will certainly have outlined info on the number of sign-ups you’re getting and from where.
In the sidebar, you’ll see alternatives for “Beginning composing”, “Posts”, “Target market”, “Expand”, “Monetize”, “Layout” and” Evaluate”. And at the really lower you’ll see the settings option.
Dashboard is your major control center (screenshot above), Start composing is where you produce and publish newsletters, Messages is where you can see all of your previous newsletter versions, Target market is where you can see who your clients are (and damage them down right into sections), Expand is where you have access to a referral program (and growth tutorials) and boosts to run advertisements, Monetize is where you can access the beehiiv ad network and monetize your e-newsletter with advertisements, Design is where you design your e-newsletter landing page and post template, Analyze is where you can see all your analytics, and Settings is where you can take care of every one of your admin stuff.
Composing your newsletter
beehiiv makes it simple to begin writing, with little to no rubbing. If you’re simply starting, and have a concept you intend to blog about, I recommend just mosting likely to the “Create” area in the navbar and clicking “Beginning composing”.
You can fine-tune your template and designing later– focus on the material initially.
As you can see, beehiiv’s editor uses a clean and straightforward user interface for creating.
When you begin composing, you can maximize headings, include links, and style your web content exactly how you like.
beehiiv provides you lots of choices for different kinds of material like video clips, web links, pictures, and extra.
The team at beehiiv is also regularly launching product feature and updates so I’m sure there will certainly be a whole lot more content features depending upon when you read this.
Maximizing your settings and templates
Once you have an e-newsletter that’s ready to send, it’s time to design your e-mail template and adjust some setups.
Here, you can update the name of your newsletter, offer it a summary, add your logo, activate or off a welcome email to very first time clients, and a lot more.
Next off, you can head over to the “Email Template” tab to make your design.
You can modify background shades, borders, spacing, typefaces, picture formats, and much more. I’m not mosting likely to undergo ever single point you can enhance with your email template because it’s a great deal. Just try out the platform completely free and see it on your own!
Vital beehiiv features
beehiiv has lots of incredible features that make it a fantastic posting system for any kind of e-newsletter developer.
Here are several of the important features you can locate with beehiiv:.
Newsletter builder Beehiiv Email Capture
At its core, beehiiv is an e-newsletter publishing platform. It makes it incredibly simple to create and send emails. I pointed out above a few of the important things you can do with your setups and email layout so I’ll spare you some extra reading.
Things to note with beehiiv’s newsletter builder is that it has a really modern-day and minimalistic feel. It’s most definitely one of the much better email editors I’ve ever written in.
Site hosting
When you develop a beehiiv e-newsletter, every one of your e-newsletters (if you desire) survive on a web site. Think about it as a site for your newsletter that’s a home to all of your previous concerns of your newsletter, and a place where individuals can register for your e-newsletter.
If you’re familiar with Substack, it’s basically similar to that.
All plans, consisting of the totally free one, give you a website. However, the free plan areas your internet site on a beehiiv subdomain so if you want to include a customized domain to get rid of all the beehiiv branding you’ll require to upgrade to a paid plan.
Subscribe forms
Getting clients is necessary. After all, that’s why you have a newsletter right?
With beehiiv, individuals can sign up for your e-newsletter straight from your beehiiv internet site or through embed types.
If you currently have a website, and desire people to register for your e-newsletter from your existing site, you’ll have to use an embed kind. This is what I make use of on this site (you can see the sign-up installed on the right hand column of this post if you scroll up).
With embed types, you have 3 different options– a complete size, a taken care of size, and a slim installed. I personally make use of the slim installed.
You can locate the code fragment for these embeds in the “Subscribe Forms” tab in your settings.
There’s additionally a choice for acknowledgment tracking if you want to forward UTM parameters for tracking objectives– rather neat.
However, there are a few features I want beehiiv had when it came to subscribe features. I’m sure the group is servicing updates for these, but I discussed a few issues I had in the advantages and disadvantages section below.
Referral program
One of the amazing things about beehiiv, that I have yet to see in any other newsletter platform, is a remedy for developing a referral program.
You can encourage existing customers on your listing to ahead your e-mails to friends and coworkers and if they get other people to sign up for your checklist, you can reward them. These incentives can be in whatever kind you want. I have actually seem several newsletter business offer rewards in the form of merch and stickers.
This can seriously turn your subscribers into a word of mouth growth engine for your e-newsletter– providing you another method for growing your e-mail list.
Nonetheless, to obtain access to the referral program feature, you’ll need to upgrade to a much more superior plan. I’ll go over all the plans later on in this post.
Costs registrations
They say all you require to make a living online is 1,000 true followers. Registration revenue is most definitely a monster of its very own. If you’re trying to find a platform to monetize your newsletter, this is it.
With beehiiv, you can develop “premium” issues of your e-newsletter that are only sent to paying subscribers. This can be very rewarding depending upon what your newsletter has to use. For instance, Trends.co is a prominent costs e-newsletter that generates millions in earnings a year merely by having pay-only e-newsletter web content.
Data analytics
Among the things I enjoy concerning beehiiv is exactly how tidy and easy the analytics are. You obtain real-time day on just how your e-newsletter is doing, with open/click prices and subscriber count.
You get access to all the metrics you need to get a bird-eye sight on just how your newsletter is actually doing. Logging right into your control panel and seeing that client count go up is absolutely a dopamine booster.
beehiiv pricing plans
beehiiv offers four various pricing plans. You can check them out below.
The (complimentary) Launch plan provides you whatever you need to get going and grow your newsletter (up to 2,500 customers).
The Scale plan ($ 39/month) provides you everything in the Launch plan with the enhancement the ad network, referral program, customized domain name, surveys, and accessibility to costs subscriptions. This is the plan I am on.
The Max plan ($ 76/month) offers you everything in the Grow plan with addition of top priority support and getting rid of the beehiiv branding.
Every one of these plans are fairly charitable in my point of view.
As an example, if you have 100,000 customers you will certainly pay around $329 each month. In contrast to some rivals, like Kit (previously ConvertKit), that would certainly bill $679 per month for the same quantity– making beehiiv a terrific Kit alternative for lots of customers.
I’m not exactly sure exactly how the system economics work on this, yet beehiiv is definitely less costly (presently) than what it can be.
beehiiv advantages and disadvantages
Certainly, with every system, it has its advantages and disadvantages. Below are a few of the benefits and drawbacks I’ve directly experienced while using beehiiv:
Pros of using beehiiv
Right here are several of the pros of using beehiiv as your e-newsletter platform of choice:
- Easy to set up and start sending out e-newsletters absolutely free
- Tidy and modern subscriber analytics
- Lots of versatility with email designs.
- Referral program feature Beehiiv Email Capture
- Website hosting
- Develop costs choices to generate income from
- Polls
To be honest, I haven’t seen an additional newsletter platform that has been able to package all of these features together so well.
Yet of course, I do not intend to be prejudiced so I’m going to point out some cons.
Disadvantages of using beehiiv
Below are some of the disadvantages I have actually found while utilizing beehiiv:.
- Limitations around integrating Webflow and beehiiv
- Limitations around adding custom typefaces
I utilize Webflow as my web site structure platform of choice (I finished from WordPress and Squarespace a very long time ago). I’m not going to enter way too much information why I like Webflow so much however you can read my Webflow review if you ‘d like to learn more.
Right now, there really is no other way I can integrate beehiiv with my Webflow website apart from utilizing an iframe embed. I directly do not like using iframe’s since they often tend to slow down my internet site a little bit. Every single time a page on my website (with a beehiiv embed) loads, the sign-up embed is the last thing to load on the web page. It’s extremely recognizable when you get on a slow-moving net connection. But I can get around that.
The main gripe I have is that I can not utilize a normal Webflow kind (which I love using). There are ways around this by using a device like Zapier however that would just include extra prices that I don’t require. To be sincere, this is even more of a Webflow con over a beehiiv con however I assumed I would state it.
Besides that, I still think the pros much outweigh the disadvantages here. I’m likewise confident that Webflow will eventually create a far better means to integrate with beehiiv.
Final Thought
In general, beehiiv is a wonderful solution for anybody wanting to study the globe of e-mail marketing and newsletters.
The capability of this e-newsletter system much exceeds numerous that are presently on the marketplace. And with a charitable free plan, you really have absolutely nothing to shed for trying it.
The paid plans are also rather economical of what they are. Paying just $329/month to have 100,000 subscribers on your checklist is unprecedented. If you were to have a newsletter with 100k subscribers, and all of these features beehiiv has, it might cost you well into the thousands each month.
Anyways, I do not compose testimonial posts commonly. I only do when I in fact make use of the device myself and would advise it to a friend.
I hope you discovered some clarity on whether or not beehiiv is an excellent platform for you.