Over 2 years back, I was reading one of my preferred e-mail e-newsletters when I scrolled to the bottom of the e-mail and saw the beehiiv logo design for the first time. I clicked on it and instantly started tearing up How Do I Create a Beehiiv Website.
I wasn’t sure why I felt so emotional.
Being a permanent designer is tough. I’m commonly obtaining pitched various tools and solutions that don’t appear to be worth my time.
I guess I was emotional because I spent the last six months trying out various email and e-newsletter platforms to aid construct my e-newsletter. And to be reasonable, there are some great options for creating e-newsletters. Yet I could not find one that made me give a definite “yes”.
The concern with numerous existing e-newsletter platforms is that they don’t feel creator-centered. I desire a newsletter system that lets me totally customize my newsletter designs, makes it extremely very easy to create and send emails, and gives me tools that help me examine metrics and obtain even more customers.
I assume I’ve finally found 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 newsletters. It’s a creator-friendly newsletter system that makes it simple to style, write, send out, advertise, monetize, and track the ROI of your e-newsletter.
Developed by previous staff members at the renowned newsletter company Morning Brew, beehiiv intends to help makers launch and monetize their own newsletter– taking great deals of growth concepts from taking Morning Brew to over 4M subscribers.
In this short article, I’m going to clarify my personal experience with beehiiv, the things I like (and hate) regarding it, all of it’s features, and why I made a decision to finally opt for it as my newsletter system of option.
My personal experience with beehiiv
A few months earlier, I unintentionally stumbled across beehiiv. The amusing story is that I have actually watched for a modern-day newsletter platform for rather a long time now. I’ve put things off hard when it pertained to lastly launching my newsletter.
Initially, I attempted Mailchimp. After that, a couple of other indie platforms. Then, Substack. And finally, I ended up making use of beehiiv.
I make certain several newsletter creators admire prominent newsletters with numerous subscribers– I understand I do. The Morning Brew newsletter is one I looked up to a great deal. They have wonderful material, lots of clients, and a creative referral program that allows them to get back at much more clients.
So, I took place a hunt to identify how these big e-newsletters established their logistics. What system do they use? How do they track the ROI of their e-newsletters? How do they get even more subscribers? How do they create an e-newsletter style that remains on-brand?
When I discovered beehiiv for the first time, it seemed to answer every one of my questions. I believed to myself, “damn the people that constructed this device really understand newsletter production and development.” I questioned who these developers of beehiiv were.
So I mosted likely to LinkedIn, and saw that the founders were a few of the initial marketing and growth staff members at Morning Brew– my brain exploded.
I knew this was going to be a different e-newsletter system. One that’s focused on creator development.
Since, any kind of creator understands, you require growth to be able to make a living off of an e-newsletter. And discovering the ideal e-newsletter stack (that scales) typically implies making use of numerous various tools to assist accomplish one objective– one system for your newsletter, one platform to monetize, and one platform to set up references. It can get expensive.
So when I learnt beehiiv did all of these points in one platform, and it was complimentary to begin making use of, it was a no-brainer to give it a try.
Who is beehiiv for?
beehiiv is for the lean material maker that desires a platform that allows them to send out personalized newsletters with or without needing to have a website.
The most successful e-newsletters have the right devices to construct and scale their newsletters. beehiiv focuses on giving you those devices.
If you’re an independent author, media business, startup, or web content creator, you need to seriously taking into consideration trying out beehiiv. It’s entirely cost-free to begin and you only pay when you get to over 2,500 clients on your listing.
If you actually end up needing to spend for beehiiv it’s probably a good indication that people like reading your things.
beehiiv vs Substack
You may be asking, “isn’t there already a system for writers called Substack?”.
Yes, of course there is. Substack is a fantastic platform made use of by thousands of independent authors. With Substack you obtain your very own web site and make use of the platform as your all-in-one service for sending out e-mails (while producing an archive of previous issues).
What collections beehiiv apart is it’s dedication to development. beehiiv permits you do to all the things Substack can do, with the benefit of better analytics, more style flexibilty, and a referral program to encourage your existing customers to get the word out.
beehiiv additionally gives you a web site similar to Substack. But, if you have your very own internet site currently, you can likewise make use of beehiiv’s sign-up embeds (that’s what I utilize) to send your web site clients right to your beehiiv email checklist. On the same token, you can incorporate beehiiv with a tool like Revue to enable individuals to subscribe to your newsletter straight from Twitter.
This provides you the flexibility to utilize various marketing channels to obtain your newsletter out into the world, making beehiiv a fantastic Substack alternative.
Just how to start using beehiiv email marketing software application.
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” button on beehiiv’s site.
The free plan will allow you to have up to 2,500 customers, offer you access to web site hosting, a newsletter CMS, advancement personalization, analytics, external embed forms, and much more. It’s a very charitable offering for those just starting (or for those searching for a new platform to migrate to).
Onboarding How Do I Create a Beehiiv Website
After developing an account, you’ll go through an onboarding procedure that will ask things like, “is this your initial newsletter?”, “what other platforms have you utilized?”, “do you have any paying clients?”, and extra.
You’ll after that create a name and link for your e-newsletter’s site. On the free plan, your e-newsletter will reside on a beehiiv subdomain. So if your newsletter is called “Cooking Cakes,” your web site link might be something like “baking-cakes. beehiiv.com”.
Throughout the onboarding process, you’ll likewise choose your brand colors and design 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 all of your analytics and setups.
You will certainly have outlined info on the number of sign-ups you’re obtaining and where.
In the sidebar, you’ll see choices for “Beginning creating,” “Articles,” “Target market,” “Grow,” “Generate income from,” “Design,” and” Evaluate.” And at the very bottom you’ll see the setups choice.
Dashboard is your primary control center (screenshot above), Start composing is where you develop and release newsletters, Articles is where you can see all of your previous e-newsletter editions, Audience is where you can view 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 ads, Style is where you design your newsletter landing page and post template, Assess is where you can see all your analytics, and Settings is where you can manage every one of your admin things.
Creating your e-newsletter
beehiiv makes it simple to begin writing, with little to no rubbing. If you’re simply beginning, and have a concept you wish to blog about, I advise just mosting likely to the “Create” section in the navbar and clicking on “Beginning writing”.
You can tweak your template and styling later– focus on the content first.
As you can see, beehiiv’s editor supplies a clean and easy to use user interface for composing.
As soon as you start creating, you can maximize headings, include web links, and style your content how you like.
beehiiv provides you tons of options for different types of web content like videos, links, photos, and much more.
The team at beehiiv is also regularly launching item feature and updates so I make sure there will be a whole lot much more material features depending upon when you read this.
Maximizing your settings and templates
Once you have an e-newsletter that’s ready to send out, it’s time to design your email template and change some setups.
Here, you can update the name of your newsletter, give it a description, add your logo, turn on or off a welcome e-mail to very first time customers, and extra.
Next off, you can head over to the “Email Template” tab to make your style.
You can modify history colors, boundaries, spacing, typefaces, photo styles, and much more. I’m not mosting likely to undergo ever before solitary thing you can optimize with your e-mail template since it’s a great deal. Just experiment with the platform for free and see it on your own!
Necessary beehiiv features
beehiiv has lots of incredible features that make it an excellent posting system for any kind of newsletter maker.
Below are a few of the important features you can discover with beehiiv:.
E-newsletter builder
At its core, beehiiv is a newsletter publishing platform. It makes it very simple to create and send e-mails. I discussed over some of the things you can do with your setups and e-mail layout so I’ll spare you some added reading.
The thing to keep in mind with beehiiv’s newsletter builder is that it has a really modern-day and minimalistic feel. It’s most definitely among the much better e-mail editors I have actually ever before written in.
Internet site hosting
When you produce a beehiiv e-newsletter, every one of your e-newsletters (if you want) live on a website. Think about it as a web site for your e-newsletter that’s a home to every one of your previous problems of your e-newsletter, and a location where individuals can register for your e-newsletter.
If you’re familiar with Substack, it’s practically comparable to that.
All plans, including the free one, give you a web site. However, the free plan locations your website on a beehiiv subdomain so if you wish to include a custom domain name to get rid of all the beehiiv branding you’ll require to upgrade to a paid plan.
Subscribe forms
Obtaining customers is necessary. Nevertheless, that’s why you have an e-newsletter right?
With beehiiv, individuals can register for your newsletter right from your beehiiv site or with embed types.
If you currently have an internet site, and want people to register for your newsletter from your existing site, you’ll need to make use of an embed form. This is what I make use of on this internet site (you can see the sign-up embed on the right hand column of this post if you scroll up).
With embed types, you have three various choices– a full size, a repaired size, and a slim installed. I personally use the slim installed.
You can discover the code fragment for these embeds in the “Subscribe Types” tab in your setups.
There’s likewise a choice for attribution tracking if you want to ahead UTM parameters for tracking objectives– rather cool.
Nonetheless, there are a few features I want beehiiv had when it concerned subscribe features. I’m sure the group is working on updates for these, but I stated a few concerns I had in the benefits and drawbacks section listed below.
Referral program
Among the amazing things about beehiiv, that I have yet to see in any other e-newsletter platform, is a service for producing a referral program.
You can urge existing clients on your listing to forward your e-mails to buddies and colleagues and if they get other people to register for your listing, you can compensate them. These incentives can be in whatever form you want. I have actually seem numerous newsletter firms offer benefits in the form of merch and sticker labels.
This can seriously transform your customers right into a word of mouth development engine for your newsletter– offering you one more method for growing your e-mail checklist.
Nonetheless, to obtain accessibility to the referral program feature, you’ll have to update to a much more premium plan. I’ll go over all the plans later in this article.
Costs subscriptions
They say all you need to earn a living online is 1,000 real fans. Registration earnings is definitely a monster of its own. If you’re looking for a platform to monetize your newsletter, this is it.
With beehiiv, you can create “premium” problems of your e-newsletter that are only sent to paying clients. This can be very profitable relying on what your newsletter has to offer. For example, Trends.co is a popular premium e-newsletter that creates millions in income a year merely by having pay-only newsletter content.
Data analytics
Among things I like about beehiiv is exactly how clean and simple the analytics are. You get real-time day on how your e-newsletter is doing, with open/click rates and customer count How Do I Create a Beehiiv Website.
You get access to all the metrics you need to get a bird-eye sight on how your e-newsletter is in fact doing. Logging into your dashboard and seeing that subscriber count rise is most definitely a dopamine booster.
beehiiv pricing plans
beehiiv supplies 4 different pricing plans. You can check them out below.
The (free) Launch plan gives you whatever you need to get going and expand your e-newsletter (approximately 2,500 subscribers).
The Scale plan ($ 49/month) gives you everything in the Launch plan with the enhancement the ad network, referral program, custom-made domain, polls, and access to premium subscriptions. This is the plan I am on.
The Max plan ($ 109/month) gives you everything in the Grow plan with enhancement of concern assistance and removing the beehiiv branding.
Every one of these plans are quite charitable in my point of view.
As an example, if you have 100,000 subscribers you will pay around $329 monthly. As opposed to some rivals, like Kit (formerly ConvertKit), that would certainly bill $679 each month for the very same amount– making beehiiv a great Kit alternative for several users.
I’m uncertain just how the system business economics work on this, but beehiiv is absolutely cheaper (at the moment) than what it can be.
beehiiv benefits and drawbacks
Obviously, with every platform, it has its advantages and disadvantages. Below are a few of the benefits and drawbacks I’ve directly experienced while making use of beehiiv:
Pros of using beehiiv
Here are some of the pros of using beehiiv as your e-newsletter platform of option:
Easy to establish and start sending newsletters free of cost.
Tidy and contemporary customer analytics.
Great deals of versatility with e-mail styles.
Referral program feature.
Internet site hosting.
Produce costs options to monetize.
Surveys.
To be honest, I haven’t seen an additional e-newsletter system that has had the ability to package all of these features with each other so well.
Yet of course, I don’t intend to be prejudiced so I’m mosting likely to point out some disadvantages.
Cons of using beehiiv
Here are some of the cons I’ve found while making use of beehiiv:.
Limitations around incorporating Webflow and beehiiv.
Limitations around including customized fonts.
I utilize Webflow as my web site building platform of choice (I finished from WordPress and Squarespace a very long time ago). I’m not mosting likely to enter way too much information why I like Webflow a lot however you can review my Webflow evaluation if you wish to find out more.
Now, there truly is no other means I can integrate beehiiv with my Webflow web site aside from utilizing an iframe embed. I personally do not such as utilizing iframe’s since they often tend to reduce my web site a bit. Every time a page on my website (with a beehiiv installed) loads, the sign-up embed is the last point to pack on the web page. It’s really visible when you get on a slow internet connection. However I can get around that.
The main complaint I have is that I can’t make use of a normal Webflow form (which I like utilizing). There are methods around this by utilizing a tool like Zapier however that would just add additional expenses that I don’t require. To be truthful, this is even more of a Webflow con over a beehiiv disadvantage however I assumed I would certainly state it.
Besides that, I still think the pros much outweigh the disadvantages here. I’m also hopeful that Webflow will eventually produce a better method to integrate with beehiiv.
Final Thought
Overall, beehiiv is a wonderful remedy for any person looking to dive into the globe of e-mail marketing and e-newsletters.
The performance of this newsletter system far outweighs numerous that are currently on the market. And with a charitable free plan, you truly have absolutely nothing to shed for trying it.
The paid plans are also relatively cheap wherefore they are. Paying just $329/month to have 100,000 clients on your listing is uncommon. If you were to have an e-newsletter with 100k subscribers, and all of these features beehiiv has, it could cost you well right into the thousands per month.
Anyways, I do not compose review articles usually. I just do when I actually utilize the tool myself and would advise it to a good friend.
I wish you discovered some clearness on whether or not beehiiv is a great platform for you.