Over two years back, I read among my favored 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 wrecking Beehiiv Report Spam.
I wasn’t sure why I felt so emotional.
Being a full time designer is difficult. I’m often obtaining pitched different devices and solutions that do not seem to be worth my time.
I think I was emotional because I spent the last 6 months checking out various email and e-newsletter systems to aid build my newsletter. And to be fair, there are some terrific choices for creating e-newsletters. Yet I could not discover one that made me give a guaranteed “yes”.
The concern with lots of existing newsletter platforms is that they do not really feel creator-centered. I want a newsletter platform that lets me fully personalize my newsletter designs, makes it very very easy to write and send emails, and gives me tools that aid me assess metrics and obtain more subscribers.
I believe I have actually ultimately located the ideal device.
However, I know beehiiv may not be for every person. 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 e-newsletter platform that makes it very easy to style, compose, send out, advertise, monetize, and track the ROI of your newsletter.
Produced by previous employees at the well-known e-newsletter business Morning Brew, beehiiv aims to aid makers launch and monetize their very own e-newsletter– taking lots of development principles from taking Morning Brew to over 4M customers.
In this write-up, I’m mosting likely to discuss my individual experience with beehiiv, things I like (and hate) concerning it, all of it’s features, and why I determined to lastly choose it as my newsletter system of option.
My personal experience with beehiiv
A couple of months back, I inadvertently came across beehiiv. The funny tale is that I’ve been on the lookout for a modern-day newsletter system for quite some time now. I have actually postponed hard when it involved lastly introducing my newsletter.
First, I attempted Mailchimp. Then, a few various other indie systems. Then, Substack. And lastly, I ended up making use of beehiiv.
I’m sure lots of e-newsletter developers look up to preferred e-newsletters with countless subscribers– I understand I do. The Morning Brew e-newsletter is one I respected a whole lot. They have wonderful content, tons of customers, and a creative referral program that permits them to get even more clients.
So, I went on a hunt to figure out exactly how these big e-newsletters established their logistics. What platform do they utilize? How do they track the ROI of their newsletters? How do they obtain even more subscribers? How do they develop an e-newsletter design that remains on-brand?
When I uncovered beehiiv for the first time, it seemed to address every one of my questions. I thought to myself, “damn the people that constructed this tool really recognize e-newsletter development and development.” I questioned who these creators of beehiiv were.
So I went to LinkedIn, and saw that the founders were a few of the very first marketing and development workers at Morning Brew– my mind exploded.
I recognized this was going to be a various newsletter platform. One that’s focused on developer growth.
Due to the fact that, any kind of maker knows, you need growth to be able to earn a living off of a newsletter. And locating the best newsletter pile (that ranges) commonly suggests using numerous different devices to aid achieve one goal– one platform for your e-newsletter, one platform to monetize, and one system to establish references. It can get expensive.
So when I discovered beehiiv did all of these points in one platform, and it was totally free to begin using, it was a piece of cake to give it a try.
Who is beehiiv for?
beehiiv is for the lean web content designer that wants a platform that permits them to send out custom e-newsletters with or without needing to have an internet site.
The most effective e-newsletters have the right devices to construct and scale their newsletters. beehiiv focuses on giving you those tools.
If you’re an independent writer, media firm, start-up, or content maker, you must seriously considering trying out beehiiv. It’s absolutely cost-free to begin and you just pay when you get to over 2,500 subscribers on your listing.
If you in fact end up needing to pay for beehiiv it’s possibly an excellent indication that people enjoy reviewing your stuff.
beehiiv vs Substack
You may be asking, “isn’t there already a system for writers called Substack?”.
Yes, yes there is. Substack is a fantastic platform utilized by countless independent writers. With Substack you obtain your very own site and make use of the system as your all-in-one option for sending emails (while producing an archive of previous concerns).
What sets beehiiv apart is it’s commitment to development. beehiiv allows you do to all the important things Substack can do, with the benefit of better analytics, even more layout flexibilty, and a referral program to urge your existing customers to obtain words out.
beehiiv additionally gives you an internet site comparable to Substack. But, if you have your own site already, you can also utilize beehiiv’s sign-up installs (that’s what I use) to send your site clients straight to your beehiiv email checklist. On the exact same token, you can integrate beehiiv with a device like Revue to allow individuals to subscribe to your e-newsletter directly from Twitter.
This gives you the flexibility to take advantage of various marketing channels to obtain your e-newsletter out right into the globe, making beehiiv an excellent Substack option.
Exactly how to begin using beehiiv email marketing software.
Register for a free plan
The primary step is to enroll in a free plan. You can do this by clicking on the “Begin trial” switch on beehiiv’s internet site.
The free plan will certainly allow you to have up to 2,500 customers, provide you accessibility to website hosting, a newsletter CMS, breakthrough modification, analytics, exterior embed types, and extra. It’s a really charitable offering for those simply starting (or for those seeking a new platform to move to).
Onboarding Beehiiv Report Spam
After creating an account, you’ll go through an onboarding procedure that will ask things like, “is this your very first newsletter?”, “what various other platforms have you used?”, “do you have any type of paying subscribers?”, and a lot more.
You’ll then develop a name and URL for your newsletter’s site. On the free plan, your newsletter will reside on a beehiiv subdomain. So if your newsletter is called “Cooking Cakes,” your web site URL could be something like “baking-cakes. beehiiv.com”.
During the onboarding procedure, you’ll likewise select your brand name design and colors to see to it your newsletter template looks right.
Navigating your control panel
As soon as you reach your main control panel, you’ll see every one of your analytics and setups.
You will have described details on the number of sign-ups you’re obtaining and from where.
In the sidebar, you’ll see alternatives for “Begin creating,” “Posts,” “Target market,” “Grow,” “Generate income from,” “Design,” and” Evaluate.” And at the extremely lower you’ll see the setups alternative.
Control panel is your major nerve center (screenshot above), Begin creating is where you create and release newsletters, Articles is where you can see all of your previous e-newsletter editions, Target market is where you can see who your subscribers are (and break them down right into segments), Expand 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 make your e-newsletter landing page and post template, Analyze is where you can see all your analytics, and Setups is where you can take care of all of your admin stuff.
Composing your newsletter
beehiiv makes it very easy to start writing, with little to no rubbing. If you’re simply starting, and have an idea you intend to cover, I suggest just mosting likely to the “Compose” section in the navbar and clicking on “Beginning writing”.
You can fine-tune your template and styling later– focus on the content initially.
As you can see, beehiiv’s editor offers a clean and straightforward user interface for creating.
When you start creating, you can maximize headings, include web links, and design your material just how you like.
beehiiv provides you tons of choices for different types of content like videos, links, pictures, and extra.
The group at beehiiv is also continuously releasing item feature and updates so I make certain there will certainly be a lot a lot more content features depending on when you’re reading this.
Enhancing your setups and templates
Once you have an e-newsletter that’s ready to send, it’s time to develop your email template and readjust some settings.
Here, you can upgrade the name of your e-newsletter, give it a summary, add your logo, turn on or off a welcome e-mail to very first time subscribers, and a lot more.
Next off, you can head over to the “Email Template” tab to make your style.
You can edit history shades, borders, spacing, typefaces, photo styles, and more. I’m not mosting likely to undergo ever before single point you can enhance with your e-mail template because it’s a whole lot. Simply check out the platform free of charge and see it on your own!
Vital beehiiv features
beehiiv has lots of fantastic features that make it a fantastic posting system for any e-newsletter designer.
Right here are some of the essential features you can discover with beehiiv:.
E-newsletter builder
At its core, beehiiv is a newsletter posting system. It makes it extremely simple to compose and send emails. I pointed out over several of the things you can do with your settings and email design so I’ll save you some extra analysis.
The important things to note with beehiiv’s e-newsletter builder is that it has a truly modern and minimalistic feeling. It’s absolutely among the better e-mail editors I have actually ever written in.
Web site hosting
When you create a beehiiv e-newsletter, all of your e-newsletters (if you want) reside on a web site. Think of it as an internet site for your e-newsletter that’s a home to every one of your previous issues of your e-newsletter, and an area where people can sign up for your newsletter.
If you know with Substack, it’s basically comparable to that.
All plans, consisting of the totally free one, provide you a web site. Nevertheless, the free plan areas your website on a beehiiv subdomain so if you want to include a custom domain to remove all the beehiiv branding you’ll need to update to a paid plan.
Subscribe forms
Getting subscribers is important. Nevertheless, that’s why you have a newsletter right?
With beehiiv, people can register for your e-newsletter straight from your beehiiv website or with embed forms.
If you already have a website, and desire people to register for your e-newsletter from your existing website, you’ll need to use an embed kind. This is what I use on this site (you can see the sign-up installed on the right-hand man column of this blog post if you scroll up).
With embed forms, you have three various alternatives– a full width, a repaired width, and a slim installed. I personally use the slim embed.
You can locate the code fragment for these embeds in the “Subscribe Kinds” tab in your setups.
There’s additionally an option for attribution monitoring if you want to onward UTM parameters for tracking functions– rather cool.
However, there are a few features I want beehiiv had when it pertained to subscribe features. I make certain the group is dealing with updates for these, however I mentioned a few issues I had in the pros and cons section below.
Referral program
One of the amazing things regarding beehiiv, that I have yet to see in any other e-newsletter system, is a service for creating a referral program.
You can motivate existing clients on your listing to onward your e-mails to buddies and coworkers and if they obtain other people to register for your list, you can reward them. These benefits can be in whatever type you desire. I’ve appear many newsletter firms give rewards in the form of merch and sticker labels.
This can seriously transform your subscribers into a word of mouth growth engine for your newsletter– offering you one more method for expanding your e-mail list.
However, to get accessibility to the referral program feature, you’ll need to update to a more premium plan. I’ll review all the plans later in this write-up.
Costs registrations
They claim all you need to earn a living online is 1,000 real followers. Subscription profits is certainly a monster of its own. If you’re seeking a platform to monetize your newsletter, this is it.
With beehiiv, you can create “premium” issues of your e-newsletter that are just sent to paying clients. This can be really lucrative depending upon what your newsletter has to offer. For instance, Trends.co is a popular premium newsletter that produces millions in income a year simply by having pay-only e-newsletter content.
Data analytics
One of things I enjoy concerning beehiiv is how clean and straightforward the analytics are. You obtain real-time date on just how your e-newsletter is doing, with open/click rates and customer count Beehiiv Report Spam.
You get access to all the metrics you need to get a bird-eye sight on how your newsletter is actually doing. Logging into your control panel and seeing that client count increase is definitely a dopamine booster.
beehiiv pricing plans
beehiiv uses four various pricing plans. You can check them out below.
The (totally free) Launch plan gives you everything you require to get started and grow your e-newsletter (approximately 2,500 customers).
The Scale plan ($ 49/month) provides you whatever in the Launch plan with the addition the advertisement network, referral program, custom domain name, polls, and accessibility to premium registrations. This is the plan I get on.
The Max plan ($ 109/month) provides you everything in the Grow plan with addition of priority support and getting rid of the beehiiv branding.
All of these plans are quite generous in my point of view.
As an example, if you have 100,000 customers you will pay around $329 monthly. In contrast to some rivals, like Kit (formerly ConvertKit), that would bill $679 monthly for the exact same quantity– making beehiiv a terrific Kit alternative for lots of users.
I’m not exactly sure how the device economics work on this, however beehiiv is certainly more affordable (right now) than what it can be.
beehiiv benefits and drawbacks
Naturally, with every platform, it has its advantages and disadvantages. Here are a few of the advantages and disadvantages I have actually personally experienced while using beehiiv:
Pros of using beehiiv
Below 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.
Clean and modern subscriber analytics.
Great deals of flexibility with email layouts.
Referral program feature.
Web site hosting.
Create costs options to generate income from.
Surveys.
To be honest, I have not seen another e-newsletter platform that has actually been able to package all of these features with each other so well.
But obviously, I don’t intend to be biased so I’m mosting likely to mention some cons.
Disadvantages of using beehiiv
Right here are some of the disadvantages I’ve found while utilizing beehiiv:.
Limitations around integrating Webflow and beehiiv.
Limitations around including custom-made fonts.
I make use of Webflow as my website building platform of option (I graduated from WordPress and Squarespace a long time ago). I’m not mosting likely to go in excessive detail why I love Webflow a lot however you can read my Webflow testimonial if you ‘d like to learn more.
Now, there actually is nothing else way I can integrate beehiiv with my Webflow site apart from making use of an iframe embed. I personally don’t such as utilizing iframe’s because they have a tendency to reduce my site a little bit. Whenever a web page on my site (with a beehiiv installed) tons, the sign-up embed is the last point to load on the web page. It’s very obvious when you get on a slow web link. But I can navigate that.
The major gripe I have is that I can’t use a regular Webflow kind (which I enjoy making use of). There are means around this by utilizing a device like Zapier but that would certainly just include extra prices that I don’t require. To be straightforward, this is even more of a Webflow disadvantage over a beehiiv disadvantage however I thought I would certainly state it.
Besides that, I still believe the pros much outweigh the cons here. I’m additionally enthusiastic that Webflow will at some point produce a much better way to integrate with beehiiv.
Verdict
In general, beehiiv is a great remedy for any individual wanting to study the globe of e-mail marketing and newsletters.
The functionality of this newsletter platform far surpasses several that are currently on the market. And with a charitable free plan, you truly have absolutely nothing to lose for trying it.
The paid plans are likewise relatively affordable of what they are. Paying just $329/month to have 100,000 clients on your checklist is unusual. If you were to have an e-newsletter with 100k customers, and all of these features beehiiv has, it might cost you well right into the thousands per month.
Anyways, I don’t write testimonial posts frequently. I only do when I actually make use of the device myself and would suggest it to a pal.
I hope you discovered some clarity on whether beehiiv is a good system for you.