Over 2 years earlier, I read among my favorite e-mail 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 instantaneously started wrecking Beehiiv Journalism.
I wasn’t sure why I really felt so psychological.
Being a full time designer is tough. I’m commonly getting pitched different devices and solutions that don’t appear to be worth my time.
I guess I was psychological because I invested the last 6 months checking out different e-mail and newsletter systems to help develop my e-newsletter. And to be reasonable, there are some fantastic alternatives for creating newsletters. Yet I couldn’t locate one that made me provide a precise “yes”.
The concern with many existing newsletter platforms is that they don’t feel creator-centered. I want a newsletter system that lets me totally tailor my newsletter styles, makes it incredibly very easy to create and send emails, and offers me tools that help me assess metrics and obtain even more clients.
I believe I’ve finally discovered the right device.
But, I know beehiiv may not be for everybody. So let’s dive deep and see if it’s really best 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 layout, write, send, promote, generate income from, and track the ROI of your e-newsletter.
Produced by former workers at the renowned e-newsletter company Morning Brew, beehiiv aims to assist developers launch and monetize their own e-newsletter– taking lots of growth principles from taking Morning Brew to over 4M customers.
In this post, I’m going to discuss my personal experience with beehiiv, things I love (and hate) about it, all of it’s features, and why I chose to lastly choose it as my e-newsletter system of option.
My personal experience with beehiiv
A few months back, I accidentally stumbled across beehiiv. The amusing tale is that I’ve watched for a modern e-newsletter system for fairly time now. I have actually postponed hard when it came to finally launching my newsletter.
First, I attempted Mailchimp. Then, a couple of other indie platforms. Then, Substack. And ultimately, I wound up making use of beehiiv.
I’m sure several e-newsletter creators look up to prominent newsletters with numerous customers– I know I do. The Morning Brew newsletter is one I appreciated a whole lot. They have terrific web content, lots of customers, and a smart referral program that allows them to get even much more subscribers.
So, I took place a search to find out just how these big newsletters established their logistics. What system do they use? How do they track the ROI of their e-newsletters? How do they get more subscribers? How do they create a newsletter layout that remains on-brand?
When I uncovered beehiiv for the very first time, it seemed to respond to every one of my concerns. I thought to myself, “damn individuals that built this tool really understand newsletter creation and growth.” I examined who these makers of beehiiv were.
So I went to LinkedIn, and saw that the founders were some of the very first marketing and growth staff members at Morning Brew– my mind took off.
I recognized this was going to be a various newsletter platform. One that’s concentrated on designer development.
Due to the fact that, any type of designer recognizes, you require growth to be able to make a living off of a newsletter. And finding the ideal newsletter pile (that scales) frequently means using numerous various tools to aid accomplish one goal– one system for your e-newsletter, one platform to generate income from, and one system to establish recommendations. It can obtain costly.
So when I discovered beehiiv did all of these points in one platform, and it was totally free to begin utilizing, it was a piece of cake to give it a try.
Who is beehiiv for?
beehiiv is for the lean content creator that desires a platform that enables them to send customized e-newsletters with or without requiring to have an internet site.
The most successful e-newsletters have the right tools to construct and scale their e-newsletters. beehiiv focuses on giving you those devices.
If you’re an independent author, media company, startup, or web content creator, you ought to seriously taking into consideration checking out beehiiv. It’s absolutely complimentary to get started and you only pay when you reach over 2,500 clients on your listing.
If you really wind up having to spend for beehiiv it’s most likely a great sign that people like reading your things.
beehiiv vs Substack
You may be asking, “isn’t there currently a system for writers called Substack?”.
Yes, yes there is. Substack is a terrific system made use of by countless independent writers. With Substack you obtain your own website and make use of the system as your all-in-one option for sending out e-mails (while creating an archive of previous concerns).
What collections beehiiv apart is it’s devotion to growth. beehiiv enables you do to all the important things Substack can do, with the advantage of much better analytics, more style flexibilty, and a referral program to motivate your existing subscribers to obtain words out.
beehiiv likewise provides you a website similar to Substack. But, if you have your own web site currently, you can also make use of beehiiv’s sign-up embeds (that’s what I make use of) to send your web site clients straight to your beehiiv e-mail listing. On the exact same token, you can incorporate beehiiv with a device like Revue to enable people to subscribe to your newsletter directly from Twitter.
This provides you the adaptability to leverage different marketing networks to get your e-newsletter out into the world, making beehiiv an excellent Substack choice.
Just how to begin making use of beehiiv email marketing software application.
Enroll in a free plan
The very first step is to enroll in a free plan. You can do this by clicking on the “Begin trial” button on beehiiv’s website.
The free plan will certainly allow you to have up to 2,500 clients, provide you accessibility to website hosting, an e-newsletter CMS, advance modification, analytics, outside embed forms, and more. It’s an extremely charitable offering for those simply starting out (or for those trying to find a brand-new platform to move to).
Onboarding Beehiiv Journalism
After developing an account, you’ll undergo an onboarding process that will ask things like, “is this your very first newsletter?”, “what various other systems have you made use of?”, “do you have any paying subscribers?”, and much more.
You’ll after that create a name and link for your e-newsletter’s internet site. On the free plan, your newsletter will certainly live on a beehiiv subdomain. So if your newsletter is called “Baking Cakes,” your web site URL could be something like “baking-cakes. beehiiv.com”.
During the onboarding process, you’ll additionally choose your brand name design and colors to ensure your e-newsletter template looks right.
Browsing your control panel
When you reach your main dashboard, you’ll see all of your analytics and setups.
You will certainly have outlined information on the number of sign-ups you’re getting and where.
In the sidebar, you’ll see options for “Start writing,” “Posts,” “Audience,” “Grow,” “Generate income from,” “Design,” and” Assess.” And at the extremely bottom you’ll see the setups alternative.
Dashboard is your primary control center (screenshot over), Beginning composing is where you produce and publish e-newsletters, Posts is where you can see every one of your previous newsletter editions, Target market is where you can see who your clients are (and break them down into segments), Grow is where you have accessibility to a referral program (and growth 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 design your e-newsletter landing page and article template, Evaluate is where you can see all your analytics, and Settings is where you can manage every one of your admin stuff.
Writing your e-newsletter
beehiiv makes it simple to begin creating, with little to no rubbing. If you’re just starting out, and have a concept you want to write about, I suggest simply going to the “Compose” area in the navbar and clicking on “Start composing”.
You can modify your template and styling later on– concentrate on the content initially.
As you can see, beehiiv’s editor offers a clean and easy to use user interface for writing.
Once you begin creating, you can maximize headings, include web links, and style your material exactly how you like.
beehiiv gives you lots of options for various types of web content like videos, links, photos, and extra.
The team at beehiiv is additionally regularly launching product feature and updates so I make sure there will be a great deal a lot more material features relying on when you’re reading this.
Maximizing your setups and templates
When you have an e-newsletter that’s ready to send, it’s time to develop your email template and adjust some setups.
Below, you can update the name of your newsletter, offer it a summary, add your logo, turn on or off a welcome email to first time customers, and extra.
Next off, you can head over to the “Email Template” tab to make your design.
You can edit history shades, boundaries, spacing, fonts, photo styles, and a lot more. I’m not going to go through ever solitary thing you can maximize with your email template since it’s a whole lot. Simply try the system for free and see it on your own!
Crucial beehiiv features
beehiiv has tons of incredible features that make it a great publishing platform for any kind of newsletter developer.
Here are a few of the important features you can locate with beehiiv:.
Newsletter builder
At its core, beehiiv is a newsletter publishing platform. It makes it extremely simple to create and send out emails. I discussed above some of things you can do with your settings and email design so I’ll save you some extra reading.
The thing to keep in mind with beehiiv’s e-newsletter builder is that it has a truly contemporary and minimalistic feeling. It’s absolutely one of the much better email editors I’ve ever before written in.
Web site hosting
When you produce a beehiiv e-newsletter, all of your newsletters (if you want) survive a web site. Consider it as an internet site for your e-newsletter that’s a home to every one of your previous concerns of your e-newsletter, and a location where individuals can register for your newsletter.
If you know with Substack, it’s practically similar to that.
All plans, including the totally free one, give you a website. Nonetheless, the free plan places your website on a beehiiv subdomain so if you wish to include a customized domain to eliminate all the beehiiv branding you’ll require to update to a paid plan.
Subscribe forms
Getting subscribers is essential. After all, that’s why you have an e-newsletter right?
With beehiiv, people can register for your newsletter directly from your beehiiv internet site or through embed types.
If you currently have a web site, and want people to subscribe to your e-newsletter from your existing site, you’ll need to utilize an embed kind. This is what I make use of on this site (you can see the sign-up embed on the right-hand man column of this blog post if you scroll up).
With embed types, you have three various alternatives– a complete width, a dealt with width, and a slim embed. I personally make use of the slim embed.
You can locate the code fragment for these embeds in the “Subscribe Types” tab in your setups.
There’s additionally a choice for attribution tracking if you intend to ahead UTM criteria for tracking functions– pretty neat.
Nevertheless, there are a few features I desire beehiiv had when it pertained to subscribe features. I make sure the group is working on updates for these, yet I discussed a couple of problems I had in the pros and cons section below.
Referral program
One of the amazing things concerning beehiiv, that I have yet to see in any other newsletter system, is a service for developing a referral program.
You can urge existing subscribers on your checklist to onward your emails to pals and associates and if they get other people to subscribe to your listing, you can award them. These rewards can be in whatever type you desire. I have actually seem lots of newsletter companies offer incentives in the form of merch and stickers.
This can seriously transform your customers right into a word of mouth growth engine for your newsletter– offering you an additional opportunity for expanding your email checklist.
Nevertheless, to obtain access to the referral program feature, you’ll have to update to an extra premium plan. I’ll review all the plans later in this post.
Premium registrations
They state all you need to make a living online is 1,000 true fans. Registration revenue is most definitely a monster of its own. If you’re looking for a platform to monetize your newsletter, this is it.
With beehiiv, you can develop “premium” concerns of your newsletter that are only sent to paying subscribers. This can be extremely lucrative relying on what your e-newsletter has to offer. For example, Trends.co is a prominent premium newsletter that generates millions in earnings a year merely by having pay-only e-newsletter web content.
Data analytics
One of the important things I like regarding beehiiv is how tidy and simple the analytics are. You get real-time day on just how your e-newsletter is doing, with open/click prices and client count Beehiiv Journalism.
You get access to all the metrics you require to get a bird-eye sight on exactly how your newsletter is really doing. Logging right into your dashboard and seeing that customer matter rise is absolutely a dopamine booster.
beehiiv pricing plans
beehiiv provides four various pricing plans. You can check them out below.
The (totally free) Launch plan provides you whatever you require to start and expand your e-newsletter (up to 2,500 customers).
The Scale plan ($ 49/month) offers you whatever in the Launch plan with the enhancement the advertisement network, referral program, custom-made domain, polls, and accessibility to costs registrations. This is the plan I get on.
The Max plan ($ 109/month) offers you whatever in the Grow plan with enhancement of top priority assistance and getting rid of the beehiiv branding.
All of these plans are rather generous in my point of view.
For example, if you have 100,000 subscribers you will pay around $329 monthly. In contrast to some rivals, like Kit (previously ConvertKit), that would certainly bill $679 per month for the exact same amount– making beehiiv a great Kit option for numerous users.
I’m unsure exactly how the unit business economics service this, but beehiiv is most definitely less expensive (right now) than what it can be.
beehiiv advantages and disadvantages
Obviously, with every platform, it has its advantages and disadvantages. Here are a few of the advantages and disadvantages I’ve personally experienced while making use of beehiiv:
Pros of using beehiiv
Right here are some of the pros of using beehiiv as your e-newsletter platform of option:
Easy to establish and begin sending newsletters free of cost.
Tidy and modern customer analytics.
Great deals of versatility with e-mail styles.
Referral program feature.
Site hosting.
Create premium alternatives to generate income from.
Surveys.
To be honest, I haven’t seen another newsletter platform that has been able to package every one of these features with each other so well.
But of course, I don’t want to be biased so I’m going to discuss some disadvantages.
Cons of using beehiiv
Right here are a few of the cons I have actually located while making use of beehiiv:.
Limitations around incorporating Webflow and beehiiv.
Limitations around adding customized font styles.
I use Webflow as my site building system of option (I finished from WordPress and Squarespace a very long time ago). I’m not mosting likely to go in excessive detail why I like Webflow so much however you can review my Webflow evaluation if you ‘d like to discover more.
Today, there truly is nothing else means I can incorporate beehiiv with my Webflow website apart from making use of an iframe embed. I directly don’t such as using iframe’s because they have a tendency to slow down my website a little bit. Every time a page on my site (with a beehiiv installed) tons, the sign-up installed is the last thing to pack on the page. It’s very noticeable when you get on a slow-moving net link. But I can navigate that.
The major gripe I have is that I can’t utilize a regular Webflow form (which I like making use of). There are methods around this by utilizing a tool like Zapier but that would simply add extra expenses that I don’t require. To be honest, this is even more of a Webflow disadvantage over a beehiiv con however I thought I would state it.
Besides that, I still think the pros far outweigh the cons below. I’m also hopeful that Webflow will at some point develop a far better way to incorporate with beehiiv.
Conclusion
In general, beehiiv is a terrific option for any individual seeking to dive into the globe of e-mail marketing and newsletters.
The capability of this e-newsletter system far surpasses lots of that are currently on the marketplace. And with a generous free plan, you truly have absolutely nothing to lose for trying it.
The paid plans are also fairly affordable wherefore 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 clients, and all of these features beehiiv has, it can cost you well into the thousands monthly.
Anyways, I do not compose review messages frequently. I only do when I really make use of the device myself and would advise it to a close friend.
I wish you located some clearness on whether beehiiv is a good platform for you.