Over 2 years ago, I was reading among my favorite e-mail e-newsletters when I scrolled to the bottom of the e-mail and saw the beehiiv logo design for the very first time. I clicked it and immediately began destroying Beehiiv Plan Tiers.
I had not been sure why I felt so psychological.
Being a full-time creator is tough. I’m often getting pitched different tools and services that do not appear to be worth my time.
I guess I was emotional due to the fact that I spent the last 6 months experimenting with different e-mail and e-newsletter platforms to assist develop my e-newsletter. And to be fair, there are some terrific alternatives for composing e-newsletters. But I could not find one that made me offer a precise “yes”.
The problem with numerous existing e-newsletter platforms is that they do not feel creator-centered. I desire an e-newsletter system that lets me totally customize my newsletter designs, makes it incredibly easy to create and send e-mails, and offers me devices that aid me assess metrics and get even more customers.
I think I have actually ultimately found the right tool.
However, I know beehiiv may not be for everyone. So let’s dive deep and see if it’s really best for you.
What is beehiiv?
beehiiv is an all-in-one system for newsletters. It’s a creator-friendly newsletter system that makes it very easy to design, write, send out, advertise, generate income from, and track the ROI of your e-newsletter.
Produced by former staff members at the popular e-newsletter firm Morning Brew, beehiiv intends to assist developers launch and monetize their very own newsletter– taking lots of growth principles from taking Morning Brew to over 4M clients.
In this post, I’m going to explain my individual experience with beehiiv, the things I like (and hate) about it, all of it’s features, and why I decided to finally select it as my newsletter platform of selection.
My personal experience with beehiiv
A few months earlier, I mistakenly came across beehiiv. The amusing tale is that I’ve watched for a modern-day newsletter platform for fairly time currently. I’ve postponed hard when it pertained to finally releasing my e-newsletter.
First, I tried Mailchimp. Then, a few various other indie systems. After that, Substack. And finally, I ended up using beehiiv.
I make sure lots of newsletter developers admire preferred e-newsletters with millions of customers– I recognize I do. The Morning Brew newsletter is one I respected a lot. They have great material, tons of customers, and a smart referral program that permits them to get even more customers.
So, I went on a hunt to identify just how these huge newsletters set up their logistics. What platform do they make use of? How do they track the ROI of their e-newsletters? How do they get more subscribers? How do they develop an e-newsletter design that stays on-brand?
When I found beehiiv for the first time, it appeared to respond to all of my concerns. I believed to myself, “damn individuals that built this device actually recognize e-newsletter production and development.” I examined who these developers of beehiiv were.
So I went to LinkedIn, and saw that the founders were some of the very first marketing and development workers at Morning Brew– my brain blew up.
I understood this was mosting likely to be a different e-newsletter system. One that’s focused on developer growth.
Due to the fact that, any kind of developer knows, you require development to be able to earn a living off of a newsletter. And discovering the ideal newsletter pile (that scales) often indicates utilizing numerous different tools to assist achieve one goal– one platform for your newsletter, one platform to monetize, and one platform to establish referrals. It can get costly.
So when I found out beehiiv did every one of these points in one platform, and it was totally free to begin using, it was a no-brainer to give it a try.
Who is beehiiv for?
beehiiv is for the lean material developer that wants a system that permits them to send out custom-made e-newsletters with or without needing to have a web site.
One of the most successful newsletters have the right devices to build and scale their e-newsletters. beehiiv aims at offering you those devices.
If you’re an independent writer, media firm, start-up, or content developer, you ought to seriously taking into consideration checking out beehiiv. It’s absolutely cost-free to start and you only pay when you get to over 2,500 clients on your list.
If you actually wind up having to pay for beehiiv it’s possibly a good indication that individuals love reviewing your things.
beehiiv vs Substack
You could be asking, “isn’t there currently a system for writers called Substack?”.
Yes, indeed there is. Substack is a wonderful platform utilized by thousands of independent writers. With Substack you obtain your own site and make use of the system as your all-in-one service for sending emails (while developing an archive of previous issues).
What sets beehiiv apart is it’s dedication to development. beehiiv allows you do to all the things Substack can do, with the advantage of better analytics, more design flexibilty, and a referral program to urge your existing subscribers to get the word out.
beehiiv likewise provides you a site similar to Substack. But, if you have your very own website already, you can also utilize beehiiv’s sign-up embeds (that’s what I use) to send your site customers straight to your beehiiv e-mail listing. On the very same token, you can integrate beehiiv with a tool like Revue to enable people to subscribe to your newsletter directly from Twitter.
This offers you the versatility to take advantage of different marketing networks to obtain your newsletter out into the world, making beehiiv a wonderful Substack alternative.
Exactly how to begin using beehiiv e-mail marketing software application.
Register for a free plan
The primary step is to register for a free plan. You can do this by clicking on the “Begin trial” switch on beehiiv’s web site.
The free plan will permit you to have up to 2,500 customers, provide you accessibility to site hosting, a newsletter CMS, advancement personalization, analytics, outside embed forms, and much more. It’s a very generous offering for those simply starting out (or for those seeking a brand-new system to move to).
Onboarding Beehiiv Plan Tiers
After developing an account, you’ll experience 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 kind of paying clients?”, and much more.
You’ll then develop a name and link for your e-newsletter’s website. On the free plan, your e-newsletter will certainly reside on a beehiiv subdomain. So if your newsletter is called “Baking Cakes,” your web site link may be something like “baking-cakes. beehiiv.com”.
Throughout the onboarding procedure, you’ll additionally choose your brand design and colors to make sure your e-newsletter template looks right.
Browsing your control panel
When you reach your main dashboard, you’ll see every one of your analytics and setups.
You will have outlined details on the number of sign-ups you’re obtaining and from where.
In the sidebar, you’ll see choices for “Start writing,” “Blog posts,” “Target market,” “Expand,” “Monetize,” “Layout,” and” Evaluate.” And at the extremely lower you’ll see the setups choice.
Dashboard is your main nerve center (screenshot above), Begin creating is where you develop and release e-newsletters, Messages is where you can see every one of your previous newsletter editions, Audience is where you can see who your customers are (and break them down into segments), Grow is where you have accessibility to a referral program (and development tutorials) and boosts to run advertisements, Monetize is where you can access the beehiiv ad network and monetize your newsletter with advertisements, Style is where you develop your e-newsletter landing page and article template, Examine is where you can see all your analytics, and Settings is where you can manage all of your admin stuff.
Writing your e-newsletter
beehiiv makes it easy to begin composing, with little to no friction. If you’re just starting out, and have an idea you wish to cover, I recommend simply mosting likely to the “Write” area in the navbar and clicking “Start writing”.
You can fine-tune your template and designing later– concentrate on the material initially.
As you can see, beehiiv’s editor provides a clean and straightforward user interface for writing.
As soon as you start creating, you can maximize headings, add web links, and design your content just how you such as.
beehiiv gives you lots of options for various sorts of content like videos, web links, pictures, and a lot more.
The team at beehiiv is also regularly launching product feature and updates so I’m sure there will be a lot extra material features depending upon when you read this.
Maximizing your setups and templates
As soon as you have a newsletter that’s ready to send out, it’s time to develop your e-mail template and readjust some settings.
Here, you can update the name of your newsletter, give it a description, include your logo, activate or off a welcome e-mail to very first time clients, and extra.
Next, you can head over to the “Email Template” tab to make your design.
You can modify history shades, borders, spacing, font styles, picture styles, and extra. I’m not going to undergo ever solitary point you can optimize with your email template because it’s a lot. Simply try out the system totally free and see it for yourself!
Crucial beehiiv features
beehiiv has lots of outstanding features that make it an excellent publishing system for any kind of newsletter creator.
Right here are several of the important features you can find with beehiiv:.
Newsletter builder
At its core, beehiiv is an e-newsletter posting system. It makes it super simple to compose and send emails. I mentioned over a few of the important things you can do with your settings and e-mail design so I’ll spare you some added reading.
The thing to keep in mind with beehiiv’s e-newsletter builder is that it has an actually contemporary and minimalistic feel. It’s certainly among the much better email editors I’ve ever written in.
Website hosting
When you develop a beehiiv e-newsletter, all of your e-newsletters (if you want) live on a web site. Think about 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 an area where individuals can register for your e-newsletter.
If you know with Substack, it’s pretty much comparable to that.
All plans, consisting of the complimentary one, provide you a site. Nonetheless, the free plan areas your internet site on a beehiiv subdomain so if you wish to include a customized domain to get rid of all the beehiiv branding you’ll require to upgrade to a paid plan.
Subscribe forms
Obtaining customers is essential. Besides, that’s why you have a newsletter right?
With beehiiv, people can subscribe to your e-newsletter right from your beehiiv web site or through embed forms.
If you already have an internet site, and desire people to subscribe to your newsletter from your existing site, you’ll have to utilize an embed kind. This is what I utilize on this website (you can see the sign-up embed on the right-hand man column of this article if you scroll up).
With embed forms, you have 3 different alternatives– a complete size, a dealt with width, and a slim installed. I personally utilize the slim installed.
You can discover the code snippet for these embeds in the “Subscribe Forms” tab in your setups.
There’s additionally a choice for attribution monitoring if you intend to ahead UTM criteria for tracking objectives– quite neat.
Nonetheless, there are a few features I want beehiiv had when it pertained to subscribe features. I make sure the group is working on updates for these, yet I discussed a few worries I had in the advantages and disadvantages area below.
Referral program
One of the amazing things concerning 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 customers on your list to ahead your e-mails to pals and associates and if they obtain other people to sign up for your listing, you can reward them. These rewards can be in whatever form you desire. I’ve seem lots of e-newsletter business give benefits in the form of merch and stickers.
This can seriously turn your subscribers into a word of mouth growth engine for your e-newsletter– providing you one more method for growing your email listing.
However, to obtain accessibility to the referral program feature, you’ll need to upgrade to a more premium plan. I’ll go over all the plans later on in this short article.
Costs subscriptions
They state all you require to earn a living online is 1,000 real fans. Membership revenue is absolutely a beast of its very own. If you’re searching for a system to monetize your e-newsletter, this is it.
With beehiiv, you can produce “costs” issues of your newsletter that are only sent to paying customers. This can be extremely profitable relying on what your newsletter needs to offer. As an example, Trends.co is a preferred premium e-newsletter that generates millions in income a year just by having pay-only e-newsletter material.
Data analytics
One of things I love regarding beehiiv is just how clean and simple the analytics are. You get real-time date on just how your e-newsletter is doing, with open/click prices and client count Beehiiv Plan Tiers.
You get accessibility to all the metrics you need to obtain a bird-eye view on exactly how your newsletter is actually doing. Logging into your control panel and seeing that client matter go up is most definitely a dopamine booster.
beehiiv pricing plans
beehiiv offers 4 various pricing plans. You can check them out listed below.
The (totally free) Launch plan gives you every little thing you need to start and grow your newsletter (up to 2,500 customers).
The Scale plan ($ 49/month) gives you every little thing in the Launch plan with the enhancement the ad network, referral program, custom domain name, surveys, and access to costs memberships. This is the plan I get on.
The Max plan ($ 109/month) provides you every little thing in the Grow plan with addition of top priority assistance and removing the beehiiv branding.
Every one of these plans are rather generous in my viewpoint.
As an example, if you have 100,000 subscribers you will pay around $329 each month. As opposed to some competitors, like Kit (previously ConvertKit), that would certainly bill $679 each month for the very same amount– making beehiiv a fantastic Kit choice for many customers.
I’m uncertain exactly how the unit business economics service this, however beehiiv is certainly cheaper (right now) than what it can be.
beehiiv benefits and drawbacks
Certainly, with every system, it has its benefits and drawbacks. Right here are some of the benefits and drawbacks I have actually directly experienced while using beehiiv:
Pros of using beehiiv
Here are a few of the pros of using beehiiv as your newsletter system of selection:
Easy to set up and begin sending e-newsletters completely free.
Clean and contemporary customer analytics.
Lots of adaptability with e-mail designs.
Referral program feature.
Internet site hosting.
Develop costs alternatives to generate income from.
Polls.
To be honest, I haven’t seen one more e-newsletter system that has actually had the ability to package all of these features together so well.
Yet of course, I do not wish to be prejudiced so I’m going to state some cons.
Disadvantages of using beehiiv
Right here are a few of the cons I’ve discovered while making use of beehiiv:.
Limitations around incorporating Webflow and beehiiv.
Limitations around adding custom typefaces.
I make use of Webflow as my website building system of option (I graduated from WordPress and Squarespace a long time ago). I’m not mosting likely to go in excessive information why I like Webflow a lot yet you can read my Webflow evaluation if you wish to find out more.
Right now, there actually is no other way I can incorporate beehiiv with my Webflow site apart from making use of an iframe embed. I directly do not like making use of iframe’s due to the fact that they tend to reduce my website a bit. Whenever a page on my site (with a beehiiv installed) loads, the sign-up embed is the last thing to load on the page. It’s extremely noticeable when you’re on a slow-moving web connection. Yet I can navigate that.
The major complaint I have is that I can’t utilize a routine Webflow type (which I love making use of). There are methods around this by utilizing a tool like Zapier however that would simply add extra prices that I don’t need. To be truthful, this is more of a Webflow disadvantage over a beehiiv disadvantage but I believed I would certainly mention it.
Besides that, I still believe the pros far exceed the cons here. I’m additionally confident that Webflow will at some point create a far better way to integrate with beehiiv.
Verdict
Overall, beehiiv is a great solution for anyone looking to study the world of email marketing and newsletters.
The functionality of this newsletter system far outweighs lots of that are currently on the market. And with a generous free plan, you actually have absolutely nothing to lose for trying it.
The paid plans are also rather cheap of what they are. Paying just $329/month to have 100,000 clients on your list is unusual. If you were to have a newsletter with 100k customers, and all of these features beehiiv has, it can cost you well right into the thousands monthly.
Anyways, I don’t write review blog posts commonly. I just do when I actually make use of the device myself and would certainly recommend it to a good friend.
I hope you located some quality on whether beehiiv is a great platform for you.