Over two years earlier, I read among my favored e-mail newsletters when I scrolled to the bottom of the email and saw the beehiiv logo for the first time. I clicked on it and quickly began destroying Can You Create a Blog on Beehiiv.
I wasn’t certain why I felt so emotional.
Being a full time designer is tough. I’m typically obtaining pitched different devices and solutions that don’t appear to be worth my time.
I think I was emotional due to the fact that I invested the last 6 months experimenting with different e-mail and newsletter systems to help build my e-newsletter. And to be fair, there are some great choices for composing newsletters. But I could not locate one that made me provide a definite “yes”.
The problem with many existing e-newsletter platforms is that they don’t really feel creator-centered. I desire an e-newsletter platform that lets me fully customize my newsletter layouts, makes it extremely simple to compose and send e-mails, and gives me tools that aid me evaluate metrics and obtain even more clients.
I think I’ve ultimately discovered the right device.
However, I know beehiiv might not be for everyone. So let’s dive deep and see if it’s actually appropriate for you.
What is beehiiv?
beehiiv is an all-in-one system for e-newsletters. It’s a creator-friendly newsletter system that makes it easy to layout, create, send out, advertise, monetize, and track the ROI of your newsletter.
Developed by previous staff members at the well-known e-newsletter business Morning Brew, beehiiv intends to assist creators launch and monetize their own e-newsletter– taking great deals of development principles from taking Morning Brew to over 4M customers.
In this short article, I’m going to clarify my personal experience with beehiiv, the things I love (and hate) regarding it, all of it’s features, and why I determined to finally choose it as my e-newsletter platform of option.
My individual experience with beehiiv
A few months earlier, I mistakenly came across beehiiv. The funny story is that I have actually watched for a modern-day e-newsletter system for quite time now. I have actually hesitated hard when it involved lastly releasing my newsletter.
First, I tried Mailchimp. Then, a few various other indie systems. After that, Substack. And finally, I wound up making use of beehiiv.
I make sure many newsletter developers respect prominent newsletters with numerous clients– I know I do. The Morning Brew newsletter is one I admired a whole lot. They have excellent web content, tons of customers, and a clever referral program that allows them to get even much more subscribers.
So, I went on a search to determine exactly how these large newsletters set up their logistics. What system do they utilize? How do they track the ROI of their newsletters? How do they obtain even more customers? How do they develop an e-newsletter design that stays on-brand?
When I uncovered beehiiv for the very first time, it appeared to address all of my questions. I thought to myself, “damn the people that developed this device really recognize newsletter production and development.” I questioned who these makers of beehiiv were.
So I mosted likely to LinkedIn, and saw that the founders were some of the very first marketing and development workers at Morning Brew– my brain exploded.
I knew this was mosting likely to be a different e-newsletter system. One that’s concentrated on creator development.
Because, any creator understands, you need growth to be able to earn a living off of an e-newsletter. And finding the appropriate newsletter stack (that ranges) typically indicates using several various tools to help attain one goal– one system for your newsletter, one platform to monetize, and one platform to establish referrals. It can get expensive.
So when I figured out beehiiv did all of these things in one platform, and it was free to start using, it was a piece of cake to give it a try.
Who is beehiiv for?
beehiiv is for the lean web content creator that wants a system that permits them to send custom newsletters with or without needing to have an internet site.
The most successful newsletters have the right tools to construct and scale their e-newsletters. beehiiv focuses on offering you those tools.
If you’re an independent writer, media business, startup, or content creator, you ought to seriously taking into consideration checking out beehiiv. It’s completely cost-free to get started and you only pay when you reach over 2,500 clients on your listing.
If you actually wind up having to spend for beehiiv it’s probably an excellent sign that individuals enjoy reading your things.
beehiiv vs Substack
You could be asking, “isn’t there currently a platform for writers called Substack?”.
Yes, of course there is. Substack is a great platform used by hundreds of independent writers. With Substack you get your own site and utilize the platform as your all-in-one remedy for sending emails (while developing an archive of previous issues).
What collections beehiiv apart is it’s devotion to growth. beehiiv permits you do to all the things Substack can do, with the advantage of better analytics, more layout flexibilty, and a referral program to urge your existing clients to get words out.
beehiiv also provides you a web site similar to Substack. However, if you have your very own internet site currently, you can likewise make use of beehiiv’s sign-up embeds (that’s what I use) to send your site subscribers directly to your beehiiv e-mail listing. On the exact same token, you can integrate beehiiv with a device like Performance to enable individuals to register for your newsletter directly from Twitter.
This offers you the adaptability to take advantage of various marketing channels to get your e-newsletter out into the globe, making beehiiv a terrific Substack choice.
Just how to begin making use of beehiiv email marketing software program.
Register for a free plan
The initial step is to register for a free plan. You can do this by clicking on the “Start trial” switch on beehiiv’s site.
The free plan will certainly enable you to have up to 2,500 customers, give you accessibility to internet site hosting, a newsletter CMS, breakthrough modification, analytics, exterior embed forms, and much more. It’s a really generous offering for those simply starting out (or for those looking for a brand-new system to migrate to).
Onboarding Can You Create a Blog on Beehiiv
After creating an account, you’ll experience an onboarding process that will ask things like, “is this your first e-newsletter?”, “what other platforms have you made use of?”, “do you have any kind of paying clients?”, and a lot more.
You’ll then create a name and URL for your newsletter’s internet site. On the free plan, your newsletter will survive a beehiiv subdomain. So if your e-newsletter is called “Cooking Cakes,” your web site URL could be something like “baking-cakes. beehiiv.com”.
During the onboarding process, you’ll likewise select your brand name design and colors to make certain your newsletter template looks right.
Navigating your control panel
Once you reach your main control panel, you’ll see every one of your analytics and settings.
You will certainly have described info on how many sign-ups you’re obtaining and from where.
In the sidebar, you’ll see options for “Start creating,” “Posts,” “Target market,” “Grow,” “Generate income from,” “Style,” and” Evaluate.” And at the really lower you’ll see the setups option.
Dashboard is your main nerve center (screenshot above), Start creating is where you produce and publish e-newsletters, Messages is where you can see all of your previous e-newsletter versions, Target market is where you can view who your clients are (and damage them down into segments), Expand is where you have access 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 e-newsletter with advertisements, Layout is where you make your e-newsletter landing page and blog post template, Evaluate is where you can see all your analytics, and Settings is where you can take care of all of your admin stuff.
Writing your e-newsletter
beehiiv makes it very easy to start writing, with little to no friction. If you’re simply starting, and have a concept you intend to cover, I recommend simply mosting likely to the “Write” section in the navbar and clicking on “Start creating”.
You can fine-tune your template and styling later on– focus on the web content first.
As you can see, beehiiv’s editor supplies a clean and user-friendly interface for composing.
When you begin creating, you can enhance headings, add links, and style your material just how you like.
beehiiv provides you lots of options for various types of web content like videos, web links, photos, and much more.
The group at beehiiv is also continuously launching item feature and updates so I make certain there will certainly be a great deal much more material features relying on when you read this.
Maximizing your settings and templates
As soon as you have an e-newsletter that’s ready to send out, it’s time to develop your email template and adjust some setups.
Right here, you can upgrade the name of your newsletter, offer it a summary, add your logo design, turn on or off a welcome e-mail to first time subscribers, and much more.
Next off, you can head over to the “Email Template” tab to make your design.
You can modify history shades, borders, spacing, typefaces, photo layouts, and extra. I’m not mosting likely to go through ever before single thing you can maximize with your email template due to the fact that it’s a whole lot. Simply try out the system free of charge and see it on your own!
Necessary beehiiv features
beehiiv has lots of outstanding features that make it a fantastic publishing platform for any kind of e-newsletter creator.
Below are some of the necessary features you can locate with beehiiv:.
E-newsletter builder
At its core, beehiiv is an e-newsletter posting system. It makes it super simple to compose and send out emails. I mentioned above several of the things you can do with your setups and email layout so I’ll save you some added analysis.
Things to note with beehiiv’s newsletter builder is that it has an actually modern-day and minimalistic feeling. It’s absolutely among the far better email editors I’ve ever written in.
Website hosting
When you create a beehiiv newsletter, all of your e-newsletters (if you desire) survive on a web site. Consider it as a website for your newsletter that’s a home to all of your previous issues of your e-newsletter, and an area where individuals can sign up for your newsletter.
If you’re familiar with Substack, it’s virtually comparable to that.
All plans, including the totally free one, provide you a website. Nevertheless, the free plan locations your web site on a beehiiv subdomain so if you want to include a custom-made domain name to remove all the beehiiv branding you’ll need to upgrade to a paid plan.
Subscribe forms
Obtaining clients is essential. After all, that’s why you have an e-newsletter right?
With beehiiv, individuals can sign up for your e-newsletter straight from your beehiiv website or through embed kinds.
If you currently have a website, and want people to sign up for your e-newsletter from your existing website, you’ll have to make use of an embed type. 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 kinds, you have three different choices– a complete size, a dealt with width, and a slim installed. I personally make use of the slim embed.
You can discover the code bit for these embeds in the “Subscribe Kinds” tab in your setups.
There’s additionally an option for attribution tracking if you want to onward UTM criteria for tracking objectives– quite neat.
However, there are a couple of features I wish beehiiv had when it came to subscribe features. I’m sure the team is working on updates for these, but I stated a few issues I had in the advantages and disadvantages section below.
Referral program
Among the amazing things concerning beehiiv, that I have yet to see in any other newsletter platform, is a remedy for creating a referral program.
You can urge existing clients on your checklist to ahead your e-mails to friends and associates and if they get other individuals to register for your checklist, you can reward them. These incentives can be in whatever kind you want. I have actually appear several e-newsletter companies give benefits in the form of merch and stickers.
This can seriously turn your subscribers into a word of mouth development engine for your newsletter– giving you an additional opportunity for growing your e-mail list.
Nonetheless, to obtain accessibility to the referral program feature, you’ll have to update to a more exceptional plan. I’ll discuss all the plans later on in this article.
Costs registrations
They say all you need to earn a living online is 1,000 real fans. Registration revenue is certainly a monster of its own. If you’re looking for a system to monetize your e-newsletter, this is it.
With beehiiv, you can produce “premium” concerns of your e-newsletter that are only sent to paying clients. This can be extremely rewarding relying on what your e-newsletter needs to supply. For example, Trends.co is a popular premium newsletter that creates millions in revenue a year just by having pay-only e-newsletter web content.
Data analytics
Among the important things I like concerning beehiiv is just how tidy and straightforward the analytics are. You obtain real-time day on exactly how your e-newsletter is doing, with open/click rates and client matter Can You Create a Blog on Beehiiv.
You get access to all the metrics you need to obtain a bird-eye sight on just how your newsletter is really doing. Logging right into your control panel and seeing that client count increase is definitely a dopamine booster.
beehiiv pricing plans
beehiiv provides 4 different pricing plans. You can check them out listed below.
The (complimentary) Launch plan offers you every little thing you need to start and expand your e-newsletter (as much as 2,500 customers).
The Scale plan ($ 49/month) gives you everything in the Launch plan with the addition the advertisement network, referral program, custom domain, surveys, and access to premium registrations. This is the plan I am on.
The Max plan ($ 109/month) offers 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 charitable in my point of view.
For instance, if you have 100,000 subscribers you will certainly pay around $329 monthly. As opposed to some rivals, like Kit (previously ConvertKit), that would bill $679 monthly for the exact same quantity– making beehiiv a great Kit choice for numerous users.
I’m not exactly sure just how the device business economics service this, but beehiiv is absolutely cheaper (right now) than what it can be.
beehiiv advantages and disadvantages
Naturally, with every platform, it has its benefits and drawbacks. Here are some of the advantages and disadvantages I have actually personally experienced while utilizing beehiiv:
Pros of using beehiiv
Below are several of the pros of using beehiiv as your e-newsletter platform of option:
Easy to set up and begin sending out newsletters completely free.
Tidy and contemporary subscriber analytics.
Lots of flexibility with email layouts.
Referral program feature.
Website hosting.
Develop premium choices to monetize.
Surveys.
To be truthful, I have not seen another e-newsletter system that has actually had the ability to package every one of these features together so well.
But naturally, I do not intend to be prejudiced so I’m going to mention some disadvantages.
Disadvantages of using beehiiv
Below are a few of the disadvantages I’ve located while utilizing beehiiv:.
Limitations around integrating Webflow and beehiiv.
Limitations around adding customized font styles.
I use Webflow as my internet site structure platform of option (I finished from WordPress and Squarespace a long period of time ago). I’m not going to go in way too much detail why I like Webflow a lot yet you can read my Webflow review if you would love to learn more.
Now, there actually is no other way I can integrate beehiiv with my Webflow website apart from using an iframe embed. I directly don’t such as making use of iframe’s due to the fact that they have a tendency to slow down my web site a little bit. Every single time a page on my site (with a beehiiv embed) tons, the sign-up installed is the last point to pack on the web page. It’s really noticeable when you get on a slow net link. Yet I can navigate that.
The major complaint I have is that I can not make use of a routine Webflow type (which I love using). There are means around this by utilizing a device like Zapier but that would certainly simply include extra expenses that I don’t require. To be straightforward, this is more of a Webflow disadvantage over a beehiiv disadvantage yet I assumed I would certainly discuss it.
Besides that, I still think the pros far surpass the disadvantages right here. I’m also enthusiastic that Webflow will ultimately produce a far better method to incorporate with beehiiv.
Final Thought
Generally, beehiiv is an excellent option for anyone aiming to dive into the world of e-mail marketing and e-newsletters.
The functionality of this newsletter system far surpasses numerous that are presently on the market. And with a charitable free plan, you really have nothing to shed for trying it.
The paid plans are likewise relatively cheap wherefore they are. Paying only $329/month to have 100,000 subscribers 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 monthly.
Anyways, I do not create evaluation posts commonly. I just do when I really use the tool myself and would suggest it to a friend.
I wish you found some clearness on whether or not beehiiv is a great system for you.