I was reading among my favored email e-newsletters when I scrolled to the bottom of the email and saw the beehiiv logo for the first time. I clicked on it and immediately started wrecking. Beehiiv Free Plan…
Being a full time maker is difficult. I’m usually getting pitched different devices and services that don’t seem to be worth my time.
I guess I was psychological because I invested the last 6 months trying different email and e-newsletter platforms to help construct my newsletter. And to be reasonable, there are some terrific options for creating e-newsletters. Yet I couldn’t locate one that made me provide a definite “yes”.
The concern with many existing newsletter systems is that they do not feel creator-centered. I want an e-newsletter platform that lets me fully personalize my e-newsletter designs, makes it super simple to compose and send emails, and provides me devices that aid me assess metrics and get even more customers.
I assume I’ve lastly located the ideal device.
But, I recognize beehiiv might not be for every person. So let’s dive deep and see if it’s actually right for you.
What is beehiiv?
beehiiv is an all-in-one platform for newsletters. It’s a creator-friendly e-newsletter platform that makes it easy to style, compose, send, advertise, generate income from, and track the ROI of your e-newsletter.
Created by former employees at the popular newsletter company Morning Brew, beehiiv aims to aid creators launch and monetize their very own e-newsletter– taking great deals of development concepts from taking Morning Brew to over 4M clients.
In this write-up, I’m going to explain my personal experience with beehiiv, things I like (and hate) about it, all of it’s features, and why I decided to finally choose it as my e-newsletter system of choice.
My personal experience with beehiiv
A few months ago, I mistakenly came across beehiiv. The funny tale is that I’ve been on the lookout for a contemporary e-newsletter platform for quite some time now. I’ve procrastinated hard when it involved lastly introducing my e-newsletter.
Initially, I tried Mailchimp. Then, a couple of various other indie platforms. After that, Substack. And finally, I wound up utilizing beehiiv.
I make sure many e-newsletter makers respect prominent newsletters with numerous customers– I know I do. The Morning Brew e-newsletter is one I appreciated a lot. They have excellent web content, lots of clients, and a brilliant referral program that permits them to get back at much more customers.
So, I went on a search to find out how these huge e-newsletters established their logistics. What system do they make use of? How do they track the ROI of their newsletters? How do they obtain even more subscribers? How do they produce an e-newsletter style that remains on-brand?
When I discovered beehiiv for the first time, it seemed to address all of my concerns. I thought to myself, “damn the people that constructed this device actually recognize newsletter creation and development.” I questioned who these developers of beehiiv were.
So I mosted likely to LinkedIn, and saw that the co-founders were some of the very first marketing and growth workers at Morning Brew– my brain took off.
I recognized this was going to be a different e-newsletter platform. One that’s concentrated on designer development.
Due to the fact that, any type of developer recognizes, you require growth to be able to earn a living off of a newsletter. And discovering the best newsletter stack (that scales) typically means utilizing numerous various devices to aid accomplish one objective– one platform for your newsletter, one system to generate income from, and one platform to set up recommendations. It can obtain expensive.
So when I learnt beehiiv did every one of these things in one system, and it was free to start making use of, it was a no-brainer to give it a try.
beehiiv vs Substack
You might be asking, “isn’t there currently a platform for writers called Substack?”.
Yes, yes there is. Substack is an excellent platform made use of by thousands of independent authors. With Substack you get your own internet site and utilize the platform as your all-in-one option for sending emails (while developing an archive of previous problems).
What sets beehiiv apart is it’s commitment to growth. beehiiv permits you do to all the things Substack can do, with the benefit of far better analytics, more layout flexibilty, and a referral program to encourage your existing customers to obtain words out.
beehiiv also provides you a site comparable to Substack. But, if you have your own website already, you can additionally utilize beehiiv’s sign-up embeds (that’s what I utilize) to send your site clients straight to your beehiiv e-mail listing. On the exact same token, you can integrate beehiiv with a device like Performance to allow people to sign up for your e-newsletter directly from Twitter.
This provides you the versatility to take advantage of various marketing channels to get your e-newsletter out right into the globe, making beehiiv a terrific Substack option.
How to start using beehiiv email marketing software application.
Who is beehiiv for?
beehiiv is for the lean material creator that desires a system that enables them to send out custom e-newsletters with or without needing to have a website.
One of the most effective newsletters have the right devices to build and scale their e-newsletters. beehiiv focuses on offering you those devices.
If you’re an independent writer, media company, startup, or content creator, you need to seriously considering trying beehiiv. It’s entirely cost-free to start and you only pay when you get to over 2,500 customers on your listing.
If you in fact wind up needing to spend for beehiiv it’s most likely a great indicator that people love reviewing your things.
Sign up for a free plan
The primary step is to sign up for a free plan. You can do this by clicking the “Beginning trial” button on beehiiv’s website.
The free plan will permit you to have up to 2,500 subscribers, provide you accessibility to site hosting, a newsletter CMS, breakthrough customization, analytics, external embed types, and a lot more. It’s a very generous offering for those simply starting (or for those seeking a new system to migrate to).
Onboarding
After producing an account, you’ll go through an onboarding procedure that will ask points like, “is this your very first e-newsletter?”, “what various other platforms have you made use of?”, “do you have any paying customers?”, and a lot more.
You’ll after that develop a name and URL for your e-newsletter’s website. On the free plan, your e-newsletter will certainly survive on a beehiiv subdomain. So if your newsletter is called “Baking Cakes,” your website link could be something like “baking-cakes. beehiiv.com”.
Throughout the onboarding process, you’ll likewise select your brand design and colors to make certain your e-newsletter template looks right.
Browsing your dashboard
As soon as you reach your main control panel, you’ll see all of your analytics and settings.
You will certainly have described details on the number of sign-ups you’re getting and where.
In the sidebar, you’ll see choices for “Beginning composing”, “Posts”, “Audience”, “Expand”, “Generate income from”, “Style” and” Assess”. And at the extremely lower you’ll see the setups option.
Control panel is your major control center (screenshot over), Beginning creating is where you produce and publish newsletters, Blog posts is where you can see every one of your previous e-newsletter versions, Audience is where you can view who your customers are (and break them down right into sections), Expand is where you have access to a referral program (and development tutorials) and boosts to run ads, Monetize is where you can access the beehiiv ad network and monetize your newsletter with ads, Style is where you create your e-newsletter landing page and blog post template, Examine is where you can see all your analytics, and Settings is where you can handle every one of your admin things.
Writing your e-newsletter
beehiiv makes it very easy to start composing, with little to no rubbing. If you’re simply beginning, and have an idea you wish to write about, I recommend just mosting likely to the “Create” section in the navbar and clicking on “Begin composing”.
You can modify your template and styling later– focus on the material first.
As you can see, beehiiv’s editor offers a tidy and straightforward interface for creating.
As soon as you begin composing, you can enhance headings, include links, and design your web content exactly how you such as.
beehiiv offers you lots of options for various kinds of content like videos, links, images, and more.
The team at beehiiv is also continuously releasing item feature and updates so I’m sure there will be a great deal more material features depending upon when you’re reading this.
Optimizing your setups and templates
As soon as you have a newsletter that’s ready to send out, it’s time to design your email template and readjust some settings.
Below, you can upgrade the name of your newsletter, give it a summary, include your logo design, activate or off a welcome email to very first time clients, and much more.
Next off, you can head over to the “Email Template” tab to make your design.
You can modify history colors, boundaries, spacing, fonts, photo layouts, and a lot more. I’m not going to undergo ever single thing you can enhance with your e-mail template due to the fact that it’s a lot. Just check out the system free of charge and see it on your own!
Important beehiiv features
beehiiv has lots of fantastic features that make it a wonderful posting system for any newsletter designer.
Right here are some of the important features you can locate with beehiiv:.
Newsletter builder Beehiiv Free Plan
At its core, beehiiv is a newsletter publishing platform. It makes it very simple to write and send out emails. I mentioned over several of the things you can do with your setups and email design so I’ll spare you some added analysis.
Things to note with beehiiv’s newsletter builder is that it has an actually contemporary and minimalistic feel. It’s most definitely one of the far better e-mail editors I have actually ever written in.
Site hosting
When you develop a beehiiv newsletter, all of your e-newsletters (if you desire) survive an internet site. Consider it as an internet site for your newsletter that’s a home to every one of your previous problems of your newsletter, and a location where individuals can sign up for your newsletter.
If you recognize with Substack, it’s pretty much similar to that.
All plans, including the cost-free one, provide you a site. Nonetheless, the free plan areas your web site on a beehiiv subdomain so if you intend to add a custom domain name to get rid of all the beehiiv branding you’ll require to upgrade to a paid plan.
Subscribe forms
Obtaining subscribers is very important. After all, that’s why you have a newsletter right?
With beehiiv, individuals can register for your e-newsletter directly from your beehiiv internet site or via embed types.
If you already have an internet site, and want individuals to subscribe to your e-newsletter from your existing site, you’ll need to make use of an embed type. This is what I utilize on this internet site (you can see the sign-up installed on the right-hand man column of this post if you scroll up).
With embed types, you have three different options– a full width, a fixed width, and a slim embed. I personally use the slim installed.
You can find the code fragment for these embeds in the “Subscribe Types” tab in your settings.
There’s likewise an alternative for acknowledgment tracking if you wish to onward UTM criteria for tracking objectives– quite cool.
Nevertheless, there are a couple of features I want beehiiv had when it pertained to subscribe features. I make certain the team is working with updates for these, however I pointed out a few worries I had in the benefits and drawbacks area listed below.
Referral program
Among the amazing things regarding beehiiv, that I have yet to see in any other newsletter system, is a remedy for creating a referral program.
You can motivate existing clients on your checklist to onward your e-mails to friends and colleagues and if they get other people to register for your listing, you can award them. These benefits can be in whatever type you desire. I have actually seem many newsletter business give benefits in the form of merch and stickers.
This can seriously transform your subscribers into a word of mouth development engine for your e-newsletter– providing you one more opportunity for expanding your email checklist.
Nonetheless, to obtain accessibility to the referral program feature, you’ll have to upgrade to a more superior plan. I’ll go over all the plans later in this article.
Costs memberships
They say all you need to make a living online is 1,000 true followers. Subscription earnings 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 produce “costs” problems of your newsletter that are only sent out to paying clients. This can be very profitable relying on what your e-newsletter needs to offer. As an example, Trends.co is a popular costs e-newsletter that produces millions in income a year simply by having pay-only e-newsletter web content.
Data analytics
One of things I enjoy regarding beehiiv is exactly how clean and simple the analytics are. You get real-time date on how your e-newsletter is doing, with open/click rates and client count.
You get accessibility to all the metrics you need to obtain a bird-eye sight on just how your newsletter is in fact doing. Logging into your dashboard and seeing that subscriber matter increase is absolutely a dopamine booster.
beehiiv pricing plans
beehiiv uses 4 different pricing plans. You can check them out listed below.
The (cost-free) Launch plan provides you everything you require to begin and expand your newsletter (up to 2,500 subscribers).
The Scale plan ($ 39/month) offers you whatever in the Launch plan with the addition the advertisement network, referral program, personalized domain name, polls, and access to premium registrations. This is the plan I am on.
The Max plan ($ 76/month) offers you whatever in the Grow plan with enhancement of top priority support and getting rid of the beehiiv branding.
All of these plans are fairly generous in my point of view.
For example, if you have 100,000 clients you will pay around $329 each month. As opposed 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 numerous customers.
I’m not sure exactly how the unit business economics work with this, but beehiiv is most definitely cheaper (currently) than what it can be.
beehiiv advantages and disadvantages
Certainly, with every platform, it has its benefits and drawbacks. Below are several of the advantages and disadvantages I’ve personally experienced while making use of beehiiv:
Pros of using beehiiv
Right here are a few of the pros of using beehiiv as your e-newsletter system of selection:
- Easy to set up and start sending out e-newsletters free of charge
- Tidy and modern-day customer analytics
- Lots of flexibility with e-mail layouts.
- Referral program feature Beehiiv Free Plan
- Website hosting
- Create premium options to monetize
- Surveys
To be honest, I haven’t seen another e-newsletter system that has been able to package all of these features with each other so well.
Yet certainly, I don’t intend to be biased so I’m going to discuss some disadvantages.
Cons of using beehiiv
Here are several of the disadvantages I’ve found while utilizing beehiiv:.
- Limitations around integrating Webflow and beehiiv
- Limitations around adding personalized fonts
I utilize Webflow as my internet site structure platform of choice (I finished from WordPress and Squarespace a long period of time ago). I’m not mosting likely to enter excessive detail why I like Webflow a lot but you can review my Webflow evaluation if you want to learn more.
Now, there actually is nothing else way I can integrate beehiiv with my Webflow site other than using an iframe embed. I personally do not such as making use of iframe’s since they often tend to reduce my web site a little bit. Every single time a page on my site (with a beehiiv installed) lots, the sign-up embed is the last thing to pack on the page. It’s extremely obvious when you’re on a slow-moving web connection. However I can navigate that.
The major gripe I have is that I can’t use a normal Webflow form (which I enjoy utilizing). There are ways around this by using a tool like Zapier yet that would just add additional prices that I do not need. To be straightforward, this is even more of a Webflow disadvantage over a beehiiv disadvantage but I assumed I would certainly mention it.
Besides that, I still think the pros far surpass the cons here. I’m additionally hopeful that Webflow will eventually create a better way to integrate with beehiiv.
Verdict
Overall, beehiiv is a terrific remedy for anybody aiming to dive into the world of email marketing and e-newsletters.
The functionality of this newsletter platform far surpasses lots of that are currently on the market. And with a charitable free plan, you really have absolutely nothing to lose for trying it.
The paid plans are additionally relatively low-cost wherefore they are. Paying only $329/month to have 100,000 clients on your listing is unprecedented. If you were to have an e-newsletter with 100k clients, and all of these features beehiiv has, it can cost you well into the thousands per month.
Anyways, I do not compose evaluation messages often. I only do when I really make use of the tool myself and would recommend it to a pal.
I hope you located some clearness on whether or not beehiiv is a great platform for you.