Over two years ago, I read one of my favorite e-mail newsletters when I scrolled to the bottom of the email and saw the beehiiv logo for the first time. I clicked it and immediately started wrecking Jonathan Katz Beehiiv.
I had not been certain why I felt so psychological.
Being a permanent designer is tough. I’m often getting pitched various tools and solutions that don’t seem to be worth my time.
I guess I was emotional since I invested the last 6 months trying out different e-mail and e-newsletter platforms to assist construct my e-newsletter. And to be fair, there are some wonderful alternatives for composing newsletters. But I couldn’t discover one that made me give a precise “yes”.
The concern with several existing e-newsletter platforms is that they do not really feel creator-centered. I want an e-newsletter system that lets me completely personalize my e-newsletter layouts, makes it extremely simple to compose and send e-mails, and offers me tools that aid me assess metrics and get more subscribers.
I think I have actually finally found the appropriate tool.
Yet, I know beehiiv might not be for everyone. So let’s dive deep and see if it’s really ideal for you.
What is beehiiv?
beehiiv is an all-in-one platform for e-newsletters. It’s a creator-friendly e-newsletter system that makes it easy to layout, create, send out, promote, monetize, and track the ROI of your newsletter.
Produced by previous employees at the well-known newsletter business Morning Brew, beehiiv aims to assist creators launch and monetize their very own e-newsletter– taking great deals of growth principles from taking Morning Brew to over 4M clients.
In this short article, I’m mosting likely to explain my personal experience with beehiiv, the important things I enjoy (and hate) about it, all of it’s features, and why I made a decision to finally select it as my e-newsletter platform of selection.
My individual experience with beehiiv
A few months earlier, I mistakenly came across beehiiv. The amusing story is that I have actually been on the lookout for a contemporary e-newsletter system for fairly time now. I have actually put things off hard when it concerned finally releasing my newsletter.
First, I attempted Mailchimp. After that, a couple of other indie platforms. Then, Substack. And lastly, I ended up using beehiiv.
I make certain several e-newsletter makers appreciate prominent e-newsletters with millions of clients– I understand I do. The Morning Brew e-newsletter is one I appreciated a whole lot. They have wonderful material, lots of subscribers, and a creative referral program that enables them to get back at a lot more clients.
So, I went on a quest to figure out just how these large newsletters established their logistics. What platform do they utilize? How do they track the ROI of their e-newsletters? How do they get even more customers? How do they produce an e-newsletter layout that stays on-brand?
When I found beehiiv for the first time, it appeared to answer all of my questions. I believed to myself, “damn the people that constructed this device actually recognize e-newsletter production and growth.” I questioned who these developers of beehiiv were.
So I mosted likely to LinkedIn, and saw that the co-founders were some of the initial marketing and development workers at Morning Brew– my mind blew up.
I recognized this was going to be a different e-newsletter platform. One that’s focused on maker development.
Because, any developer knows, you need growth to be able to earn a living off of an e-newsletter. And finding the ideal e-newsletter stack (that scales) usually implies using multiple different devices to assist achieve one goal– one platform for your e-newsletter, one platform to monetize, and one system to establish referrals. It can get costly.
So when I figured out beehiiv did every one of these things in one platform, and it was complimentary to start making use of, it was a no-brainer to give it a try.
Who is beehiiv for?
beehiiv is for the lean material developer that wants a platform that permits them to send out custom-made newsletters with or without needing to have a website.
One of the most successful e-newsletters have the right devices to develop and scale their e-newsletters. beehiiv aims at giving you those tools.
If you’re an independent author, media business, startup, or content maker, you must seriously taking into consideration checking out beehiiv. It’s totally complimentary to begin and you just pay when you reach over 2,500 customers on your checklist.
If you actually wind up having to spend for beehiiv it’s most likely an excellent sign that people like reading your things.
beehiiv vs Substack
You could be asking, “isn’t there already a platform for writers called Substack?”.
Yes, of course there is. Substack is a great system made use of by thousands of independent writers. With Substack you get your very own internet site and use the platform as your all-in-one solution for sending e-mails (while creating an archive of previous problems).
What sets beehiiv apart is it’s commitment to growth. beehiiv enables you do to all the things Substack can do, with the advantage of much better analytics, more design flexibilty, and a referral program to encourage your existing subscribers to get the word out.
beehiiv also provides you a website comparable to Substack. Yet, if you have your very own site currently, you can also use beehiiv’s sign-up installs (that’s what I make use of) to send your site subscribers right to your beehiiv email checklist. On the very same token, you can incorporate beehiiv with a tool like Revue to allow people to sign up for your newsletter directly from Twitter.
This provides you the versatility to utilize various marketing channels to get your newsletter out right into the globe, making beehiiv an excellent Substack alternative.
How to begin utilizing beehiiv email marketing software.
Sign up for a free plan
The primary step is to enroll in a free plan. You can do this by clicking on the “Beginning trial” switch on beehiiv’s site.
The free plan will certainly allow you to have up to 2,500 subscribers, provide you access to internet site hosting, an e-newsletter CMS, advance personalization, analytics, external embed forms, and much more. It’s a very generous offering for those just starting (or for those searching for a new system to migrate to).
Onboarding Jonathan Katz Beehiiv
After producing an account, you’ll go through an onboarding process that will ask things like, “is this your initial newsletter?”, “what various other systems have you used?”, “do you have any paying subscribers?”, and a lot more.
You’ll then produce a name and URL for your e-newsletter’s web site. On the free plan, your newsletter will certainly reside on a beehiiv subdomain. So if your newsletter is called “Baking Cakes,” your site link could be something like “baking-cakes. beehiiv.com”.
Throughout the onboarding process, you’ll likewise select your brand design and colors to see to it your e-newsletter template looks right.
Navigating your dashboard
Once you reach your primary dashboard, you’ll see every one of your analytics and setups.
You will certainly have detailed details on the number of sign-ups you’re obtaining and from where.
In the sidebar, you’ll see alternatives for “Begin writing,” “Articles,” “Target market,” “Expand,” “Monetize,” “Layout,” and” Assess.” And at the really lower you’ll see the settings choice.
Control panel is your main nerve center (screenshot above), Beginning creating is where you produce and publish newsletters, Blog posts is where you can see every one of your previous e-newsletter editions, Audience is where you can see who your subscribers are (and damage them down into segments), Expand is where you have access to a referral program (and growth tutorials) and boosts to run advertisements, 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, Examine is where you can see all your analytics, and Settings is where you can manage every one of your admin stuff.
Writing your newsletter
beehiiv makes it simple to start creating, with little to no rubbing. If you’re simply starting out, and have a concept you intend to write about, I advise just mosting likely to the “Write” section in the navbar and clicking “Start creating”.
You can tweak your template and designing later on– concentrate on the material initially.
As you can see, beehiiv’s editor uses a tidy and easy to use user interface for composing.
Once you start creating, you can optimize headings, include web links, and style your material how you such as.
beehiiv gives you lots of alternatives for different sorts of material like videos, links, images, and a lot more.
The group at beehiiv is additionally continuously releasing product feature and updates so I’m sure there will be a lot more material features relying on when you’re reading this.
Maximizing your setups and templates
Once you have a newsletter that’s ready to send, it’s time to make your e-mail template and readjust some setups.
Right here, you can update the name of your newsletter, provide it a summary, add your logo, switch on or off a welcome email to first time customers, and extra.
Next, you can head over to the “Email Template” tab to make your design.
You can edit background shades, borders, spacing, font styles, image styles, and much more. I’m not mosting likely to undergo ever solitary point you can optimize with your email template due to the fact that it’s a great deal. Just try out the platform for free and see it for yourself!
Important beehiiv features
beehiiv has lots of incredible features that make it an excellent publishing system for any e-newsletter maker.
Here are a few of the vital features you can discover with beehiiv:.
Newsletter builder
At its core, beehiiv is a newsletter posting platform. It makes it extremely simple to write and send emails. I stated above several of the important things you can do with your setups and email style so I’ll save you some additional analysis.
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 have actually ever written in.
Internet site hosting
When you create a beehiiv newsletter, every one of your e-newsletters (if you want) reside on a site. Think about it as a web site for your e-newsletter that’s a home to every one of your previous problems of your newsletter, and a place where people can subscribe to your newsletter.
If you recognize with Substack, it’s basically similar to that.
All plans, consisting of the complimentary one, provide you an internet site. Nonetheless, the free plan places your site on a beehiiv subdomain so if you intend to include a customized domain to get rid of all the beehiiv branding you’ll need to update to a paid plan.
Subscribe forms
Getting clients is essential. Besides, that’s why you have an e-newsletter right?
With beehiiv, people can register for your newsletter straight from your beehiiv website or with embed types.
If you currently have a website, and want individuals to register for your e-newsletter from your existing site, you’ll need to make use of an embed kind. This is what I make use of on this web site (you can see the sign-up embed on the right-hand man column of this blog post if you scroll up).
With embed forms, you have three different alternatives– a complete width, a repaired size, and a slim embed. I personally make use of the slim embed.
You can locate the code fragment for these embeds in the “Subscribe Kinds” tab in your setups.
There’s additionally a choice for attribution monitoring if you wish to ahead UTM specifications for tracking functions– pretty neat.
Nonetheless, there are a couple of features I want beehiiv had when it concerned subscribe features. I make certain the group is dealing with updates for these, however I discussed a couple of concerns I had in the pros and cons area below.
Referral program
One of the amazing things about beehiiv, that I have yet to see in any other e-newsletter platform, is a service for developing a referral program.
You can motivate existing subscribers on your listing to forward your emails to close friends and associates and if they obtain other people to register for your listing, you can compensate them. These rewards can be in whatever kind you desire. I have actually seem several e-newsletter companies provide incentives in the form of merch and sticker labels.
This can seriously transform your clients into a word of mouth development engine for your newsletter– providing you an additional opportunity for expanding your e-mail checklist.
Nonetheless, to obtain access to the referral program feature, you’ll have to update to an extra superior plan. I’ll review all the plans later on in this write-up.
Costs subscriptions
They claim all you need to make a living online is 1,000 true fans. Subscription earnings is absolutely a monster of its very own. If you’re seeking a system to monetize your newsletter, this is it.
With beehiiv, you can produce “premium” problems of your newsletter that are just sent to paying subscribers. This can be very lucrative depending upon what your e-newsletter has to provide. As an example, Trends.co is a prominent costs e-newsletter that creates millions in earnings a year just by having pay-only e-newsletter content.
Information analytics
One of things I like about beehiiv is how tidy and straightforward the analytics are. You obtain real-time day on just how your e-newsletter is doing, with open/click rates and client matter Jonathan Katz Beehiiv.
You obtain accessibility to all the metrics you require to obtain a bird-eye sight on just how your e-newsletter is in fact doing. Logging right into your control panel and seeing that customer matter rise is most definitely a dopamine booster.
beehiiv pricing plans
beehiiv uses four various pricing plans. You can check them out below.
The (free) Launch plan offers you every little thing you require to start and grow your e-newsletter (as much as 2,500 clients).
The Scale plan ($ 49/month) offers you whatever in the Launch plan with the addition the advertisement network, referral program, personalized domain, surveys, and access to costs 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 eliminating the beehiiv branding.
All of these plans are quite charitable in my opinion.
As an example, if you have 100,000 clients you will pay around $329 each month. As opposed to some competitors, like Kit (previously ConvertKit), that would bill $679 each month for the same quantity– making beehiiv a terrific Kit alternative for lots of customers.
I’m not sure just how the system economics deal with this, but beehiiv is certainly more affordable (presently) than what it can be.
beehiiv benefits and drawbacks
Certainly, with every system, it has its advantages and disadvantages. Right here are a few of the benefits and drawbacks I’ve personally experienced while utilizing beehiiv:
Pros of using beehiiv
Here are a few of the pros of using beehiiv as your e-newsletter system of selection:
Easy to establish and begin sending newsletters free of cost.
Clean and contemporary subscriber analytics.
Great deals of versatility with e-mail designs.
Referral program feature.
Website hosting.
Produce premium options to generate income from.
Surveys.
To be honest, I have not seen an additional newsletter system that has been able to package every one of these features with each other so well.
But naturally, I do not wish to be prejudiced so I’m mosting likely to discuss some cons.
Cons of using beehiiv
Right here are several of the cons I’ve found while utilizing beehiiv:.
Limitations around incorporating Webflow and beehiiv.
Limitations around including custom-made typefaces.
I use Webflow as my web site structure platform of choice (I finished from WordPress and Squarespace a very long time ago). I’m not going to enter excessive detail why I enjoy Webflow a lot however you can review my Webflow testimonial if you would love to learn more.
Today, there really is nothing else means I can integrate beehiiv with my Webflow internet site apart from using an iframe embed. I personally don’t such as using iframe’s since they tend to reduce my website a bit. Each time a web page on my website (with a beehiiv embed) lots, the sign-up installed is the last point to fill on the page. It’s really visible when you’re on a slow net connection. However I can get around that.
The primary gripe I have is that I can not make use of a regular Webflow type (which I enjoy utilizing). There are means around this by utilizing a tool like Zapier but that would certainly simply include added expenses that I don’t need. To be truthful, this is even more of a Webflow con over a beehiiv con yet I believed I would certainly discuss it.
Besides that, I still think the pros much surpass the disadvantages below. I’m also hopeful that Webflow will eventually develop a far better way to incorporate with beehiiv.
Conclusion
On the whole, beehiiv is a terrific remedy for anyone looking to dive into the globe of email marketing and e-newsletters.
The performance of this newsletter platform much exceeds many that are presently on the market. And with a generous free plan, you actually have absolutely nothing to lose for trying it.
The paid plans are additionally fairly economical of what they are. Paying only $329/month to have 100,000 clients on your listing is unheard of. 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 don’t write evaluation blog posts typically. I only do when I actually utilize the device myself and would certainly advise it to a close friend.
I hope you located some clarity on whether or not beehiiv is a great system for you.