I read one of my favorite e-mail newsletters when I scrolled to the bottom of the e-mail and saw the beehiiv logo for the very first time. I clicked it and instantly started tearing up. Inbox Income Beehiiv…
Being a full time designer is difficult. I’m usually obtaining pitched various tools and solutions that do not seem to be worth my time.
I guess I was emotional since I spent the last six months checking out different e-mail and e-newsletter platforms to aid develop my newsletter. And to be reasonable, there are some wonderful choices for writing newsletters. Yet I couldn’t locate one that made me provide a precise “yes”.
The concern with several existing newsletter platforms is that they do not really feel creator-centered. I want an e-newsletter system that lets me fully customize my newsletter styles, makes it incredibly easy to create and send emails, and gives me tools that aid me examine metrics and obtain more customers.
I assume I’ve lastly found the best tool.
But, I know beehiiv may not be for every person. So let’s dive deep and see if it’s in fact ideal for you.
What is beehiiv?
beehiiv is an all-in-one platform for e-newsletters. It’s a creator-friendly newsletter platform that makes it simple to style, compose, send, advertise, monetize, and track the ROI of your e-newsletter.
Created by former workers at the well-known newsletter business Morning Brew, beehiiv aims to help designers launch and monetize their very own newsletter– taking great deals of growth concepts from taking Morning Brew to over 4M customers.
In this short article, I’m mosting likely to describe my individual experience with beehiiv, the important things I enjoy (and hate) regarding it, all of it’s features, and why I determined to finally go with it as my e-newsletter platform of choice.
My individual experience with beehiiv
A few months earlier, I inadvertently stumbled across beehiiv. The amusing tale is that I have actually watched for a contemporary e-newsletter platform for quite some time currently. I’ve put things off hard when it pertained to finally launching my e-newsletter.
First, I attempted Mailchimp. After that, a couple of various other indie platforms. After that, Substack. And finally, I ended up using beehiiv.
I’m sure several newsletter creators admire popular e-newsletters with countless customers– I know I do. The Morning Brew newsletter is one I looked up to a lot. They have excellent web content, lots of customers, and a clever referral program that enables them to get back at more subscribers.
So, I took place a quest to find out just how these large e-newsletters set up their logistics. What system do they make use of? How do they track the ROI of their newsletters? How do they get even more clients? How do they develop an e-newsletter layout that remains on-brand?
When I uncovered beehiiv for the very first time, it seemed to answer all of my questions. I believed to myself, “damn individuals that developed this device actually understand newsletter creation and growth.” I examined who these makers of beehiiv were.
So I mosted likely to LinkedIn, and saw that the co-founders were a few of the initial marketing and growth staff members at Morning Brew– my brain blew up.
I knew this was mosting likely to be a different newsletter system. One that’s focused on maker growth.
Since, any developer understands, you require growth to be able to earn a living off of a newsletter. And locating the best newsletter stack (that scales) commonly implies utilizing multiple various devices to aid achieve one goal– one system for your newsletter, one platform to generate income from, and one platform to set up referrals. It can obtain costly.
So when I discovered beehiiv did every one of these things in one system, and it was complimentary to start using, it was a piece of cake to give it a try.
beehiiv vs Substack
You might be asking, “isn’t there already a platform for writers called Substack?”.
Yes, of course there is. Substack is a great system used by thousands of independent writers. With Substack you get your own website and utilize the platform as your all-in-one solution for sending e-mails (while producing an archive of previous issues).
What sets beehiiv apart is it’s devotion to growth. beehiiv allows you do to all things Substack can do, with the benefit of far better analytics, more design flexibilty, and a referral program to urge your existing subscribers to obtain the word out.
beehiiv likewise provides you a web site similar to Substack. However, if you have your own internet site currently, you can additionally use beehiiv’s sign-up embeds (that’s what I use) to send your website customers directly to your beehiiv email listing. On the very same token, you can incorporate beehiiv with a device like Revue to enable people to subscribe to your newsletter straight from Twitter.
This provides you the versatility to utilize various marketing channels to obtain your e-newsletter out right into the globe, making beehiiv a great Substack choice.
Just how to begin using beehiiv email marketing software.
Who is beehiiv for?
beehiiv is for the lean content designer that wants a platform that permits them to send customized e-newsletters with or without needing to have a site.
The most effective e-newsletters have the right devices to develop and scale their newsletters. beehiiv aims at offering you those devices.
If you’re an independent author, media firm, startup, or material maker, you must seriously considering checking out beehiiv. It’s totally complimentary to start and you just pay when you get to over 2,500 customers on your checklist.
If you actually end up having to spend for beehiiv it’s most likely a good sign that people enjoy reviewing your things.
Enroll in a free plan
The first step is to enroll in a free plan. You can do this by clicking the “Beginning trial” button on beehiiv’s site.
The free plan will certainly allow you to have up to 2,500 subscribers, offer you access to web site hosting, a newsletter CMS, advancement modification, analytics, exterior embed forms, and much more. It’s a really charitable offering for those just starting (or for those searching for a brand-new platform to move to).
Onboarding
After producing an account, you’ll experience an onboarding procedure that will ask things like, “is this your very first newsletter?”, “what various other systems have you used?”, “do you have any kind of paying clients?”, and more.
You’ll after that produce a name and URL for your newsletter’s site. On the free plan, your newsletter will survive a beehiiv subdomain. So if your newsletter is called “Cooking Cakes,” your website link may be something like “baking-cakes. beehiiv.com”.
Throughout the onboarding procedure, you’ll likewise pick your brand design and colors to see to it your e-newsletter template looks right.
Browsing your dashboard
Once you reach your primary dashboard, you’ll see every one of your analytics and settings.
You will have outlined details on the number of sign-ups you’re obtaining and from where.
In the sidebar, you’ll see options for “Begin creating”, “Messages”, “Audience”, “Expand”, “Monetize”, “Style” and” Examine”. And at the really lower you’ll see the setups choice.
Control panel is your primary control center (screenshot over), Beginning writing is where you develop and publish newsletters, Messages is where you can see all of your previous newsletter versions, Target market is where you can see who your subscribers are (and damage them down right into sectors), Grow is where you have accessibility 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 advertisements, Layout is where you make your e-newsletter landing page and article template, Analyze is where you can see all your analytics, and Settings is where you can manage all of your admin things.
Writing your newsletter
beehiiv makes it easy to begin composing, with little to no friction. If you’re simply starting out, and have a concept you intend to discuss, I suggest just going to the “Compose” area in the navbar and clicking “Begin creating”.
You can fine-tune your template and styling later– focus on the web content initially.
As you can see, beehiiv’s editor provides a clean and straightforward interface for creating.
Once you begin composing, you can enhance headings, add links, and style your content just how you such as.
beehiiv provides you lots of alternatives for different sorts of content like video clips, web links, pictures, and much more.
The team at beehiiv is likewise constantly launching product feature and updates so I make certain there will certainly be a great deal more content features depending on when you’re reading this.
Optimizing your settings and templates
When you have an e-newsletter that’s ready to send, it’s time to make your e-mail template and readjust some setups.
Below, you can update the name of your e-newsletter, provide it a description, include your logo, switch on or off a welcome e-mail to very first time subscribers, and a lot more.
Next, you can head over to the “Email Template” tab to make your design.
You can edit history shades, borders, spacing, fonts, picture layouts, and much more. I’m not mosting likely to go through ever before solitary point you can maximize with your email template because it’s a whole lot. Simply try out the system absolutely free and see it for yourself!
Essential beehiiv features
beehiiv has tons of incredible features that make it a fantastic posting platform for any type of newsletter developer.
Below are some of the essential features you can find with beehiiv:.
Newsletter builder Inbox Income Beehiiv
At its core, beehiiv is a newsletter publishing platform. It makes it very very easy to create and send out e-mails. I mentioned over a few of the important things you can do with your settings and email style so I’ll spare you some added analysis.
Things to keep in mind with beehiiv’s e-newsletter builder is that it has a truly modern-day and minimalistic feeling. It’s definitely among the much better email editors I have actually ever before written in.
Website hosting
When you create a beehiiv e-newsletter, every one of your e-newsletters (if you want) live on an internet site. Think of it as a website for your e-newsletter that’s a home to every one of your previous concerns of your newsletter, and a place where individuals can subscribe to your newsletter.
If you’re familiar with Substack, it’s virtually comparable to that.
All plans, including the complimentary one, offer you a site. Nevertheless, the free plan areas your web site on a beehiiv subdomain so if you wish to add a custom-made domain name to remove all the beehiiv branding you’ll require to upgrade to a paid plan.
Subscribe forms
Obtaining customers is necessary. After all, that’s why you have an e-newsletter right?
With beehiiv, people can subscribe to your newsletter right from your beehiiv website or through embed types.
If you already have a site, and want individuals to subscribe to your newsletter from your existing site, you’ll need to use an embed kind. This is what I make use of on this internet site (you can see the sign-up installed on the right-hand man column of this blog post if you scroll up).
With embed kinds, you have three different options– a full size, a repaired size, and a slim embed. I personally make use of the slim installed.
You can find the code snippet for these embeds in the “Subscribe Types” tab in your settings.
There’s likewise an alternative for attribution monitoring if you wish to forward UTM criteria for tracking functions– quite neat.
Nevertheless, there are a couple of features I want beehiiv had when it concerned subscribe features. I make certain the team is dealing with updates for these, yet I discussed a few issues I had in the benefits and drawbacks section listed below.
Referral program
Among the amazing things regarding beehiiv, that I have yet to see in any other newsletter system, is a solution for creating a referral program.
You can motivate existing customers on your list to onward your emails to good friends and coworkers and if they obtain other individuals to sign up for your checklist, you can award them. These benefits can be in whatever kind you desire. I have actually appear several e-newsletter companies give rewards in the form of merch and sticker labels.
This can seriously transform your clients right into a word of mouth growth engine for your newsletter– giving you one more opportunity for expanding your e-mail list.
However, to get access to the referral program feature, you’ll have to upgrade to a more premium plan. I’ll discuss all the plans later on in this write-up.
Costs memberships
They say all you need to make a living online is 1,000 real followers. Subscription earnings is definitely a monster of its own. If you’re seeking a system to monetize your e-newsletter, this is it.
With beehiiv, you can develop “costs” problems of your newsletter that are only sent to paying clients. This can be really profitable relying on what your e-newsletter needs to provide. For example, Trends.co is a popular costs newsletter that creates millions in revenue a year merely by having pay-only e-newsletter material.
Data analytics
One of the important things I love about beehiiv is exactly how clean and simple the analytics are. You obtain real-time day on exactly how your newsletter is doing, with open/click prices and customer matter.
You obtain access to all the metrics you require to get a bird-eye sight on just how your e-newsletter is in fact doing. Logging right into your dashboard and seeing that subscriber count increase is absolutely a dopamine booster.
beehiiv pricing plans
beehiiv supplies 4 different pricing plans. You can check them out below.
The (complimentary) Launch plan offers you whatever you require to get going and grow your newsletter (approximately 2,500 subscribers).
The Scale plan ($ 39/month) gives you every little thing in the Launch plan with the addition the ad network, referral program, custom-made domain name, polls, and accessibility to premium registrations. This is the plan I am on.
The Max plan ($ 76/month) gives you every little thing in the Grow plan with addition of concern support and getting rid of the beehiiv branding.
Every one of these plans are fairly charitable in my viewpoint.
For example, if you have 100,000 subscribers you will certainly pay around $329 each month. In contrast to some rivals, like Kit (formerly ConvertKit), that would certainly charge $679 monthly for the exact same quantity– making beehiiv a terrific Kit option for lots of users.
I’m uncertain exactly how the device economics service this, but beehiiv is most definitely less costly (right now) than what it can be.
beehiiv benefits and drawbacks
Of course, with every system, it has its advantages and disadvantages. Right here are some of the benefits and drawbacks I’ve personally experienced while utilizing beehiiv:
Pros of using beehiiv
Below are a few of the pros of using beehiiv as your e-newsletter system of choice:
- Easy to set up and begin sending newsletters absolutely free
- Tidy and modern-day customer analytics
- Great deals of adaptability with e-mail layouts.
- Referral program feature Inbox Income Beehiiv
- Internet site hosting
- Create premium options to monetize
- Polls
To be straightforward, I haven’t seen another newsletter platform that has actually been able to package all of these features with each other so well.
However of course, I don’t wish to be prejudiced so I’m mosting likely to mention some disadvantages.
Cons of using beehiiv
Below are several of the disadvantages I’ve discovered while using beehiiv:.
- Limitations around incorporating Webflow and beehiiv
- Limitations around including custom-made font styles
I use Webflow as my site structure system of selection (I finished from WordPress and Squarespace a long time ago). I’m not going to go in excessive information why I love Webflow a lot however you can review my Webflow testimonial if you would love to find out more.
Today, there truly is no other way I can integrate beehiiv with my Webflow website aside from using an iframe embed. I personally do not such as using iframe’s due to the fact that they often tend to decrease my website a little bit. Whenever a web page on my website (with a beehiiv embed) loads, the sign-up embed is the last thing to pack on the web page. It’s extremely visible when you get on a sluggish net connection. However I can navigate that.
The main gripe I have is that I can not use a normal Webflow form (which I love making use of). There are methods around this by using a device like Zapier however that would certainly simply add additional costs that I do not require. To be straightforward, this is even more of a Webflow disadvantage over a beehiiv con however I assumed I would mention it.
Besides that, I still think the pros far surpass the cons here. I’m additionally hopeful that Webflow will eventually create a far better method to incorporate with beehiiv.
Final Thought
In general, beehiiv is a terrific option for any individual aiming to dive into the globe of e-mail marketing and e-newsletters.
The performance of this e-newsletter platform much outweighs lots of that are currently on the market. And with a charitable free plan, you actually have absolutely nothing to shed for trying it.
The paid plans are also relatively low-cost wherefore they are. Paying just $329/month to have 100,000 clients on your list is uncommon. If you were to have an e-newsletter with 100k clients, and all of these features beehiiv has, it could cost you well into the thousands each month.
Anyways, I do not create review blog posts frequently. I just do when I in fact use the tool myself and would recommend it to a close friend.
I wish you discovered some clearness on whether or not beehiiv is a great platform for you.