Over 2 years back, I was reading one of my preferred email e-newsletters when I scrolled to the bottom of the email and saw the beehiiv logo for the first time. I clicked it and quickly started destroying Marketing Island Beehiiv.
I wasn’t certain why I felt so emotional.
Being a full time creator is difficult. I’m commonly obtaining pitched different tools and services that do not appear to be worth my time.
I think I was emotional due to the fact that I spent the last 6 months checking out different email and e-newsletter platforms to aid construct my newsletter. And to be fair, there are some great alternatives for composing newsletters. But I couldn’t find one that made me give a guaranteed “yes”.
The issue with many existing e-newsletter platforms is that they don’t feel creator-centered. I want an e-newsletter platform that lets me totally personalize my e-newsletter layouts, makes it extremely very easy to write and send e-mails, and provides me tools that aid me assess metrics and obtain more subscribers.
I think I’ve ultimately found the best device.
Yet, I understand beehiiv may not be for every person. So let’s dive deep and see if it’s in fact ideal 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 layout, compose, send, advertise, monetize, and track the ROI of your newsletter.
Created by previous employees at the popular newsletter business Morning Brew, beehiiv aims to help makers launch and monetize their own e-newsletter– taking lots of growth concepts from taking Morning Brew to over 4M subscribers.
In this short article, I’m mosting likely to explain my personal experience with beehiiv, the things I love (and hate) regarding it, all of it’s features, and why I chose to finally select it as my e-newsletter platform of choice.
My individual experience with beehiiv
A few months earlier, I mistakenly stumbled across beehiiv. The amusing tale is that I have actually watched for a modern-day newsletter platform for rather a long time now. I’ve hesitated hard when it involved ultimately releasing my e-newsletter.
Initially, I attempted Mailchimp. Then, a couple of various other indie systems. After that, Substack. And ultimately, I wound up making use of beehiiv.
I make certain many newsletter creators admire popular newsletters with numerous clients– I recognize I do. The Morning Brew e-newsletter is one I respected a great deal. They have fantastic material, lots of customers, and a brilliant referral program that allows them to get back at more clients.
So, I went on a search to determine exactly how these big e-newsletters established their logistics. What platform do they use? How do they track the ROI of their e-newsletters? How do they obtain more customers? How do they produce an e-newsletter style that stays on-brand?
When I found beehiiv for the very first time, it appeared to address all of my inquiries. I believed to myself, “damn the people that built this device truly comprehend newsletter production and growth.” I examined who these developers of beehiiv were.
So I went to LinkedIn, and saw that the founders were several of the initial marketing and growth employees at Morning Brew– my brain exploded.
I recognized this was going to be a various newsletter platform. One that’s focused on designer growth.
Since, any developer recognizes, you need development to be able to earn a living off of a newsletter. And finding the right newsletter stack (that ranges) usually indicates using multiple different tools to aid achieve one goal– one system for your e-newsletter, one system to generate income from, and one platform to establish recommendations. It can obtain expensive.
So when I figured out beehiiv did all of these things in one platform, and it was cost-free to start utilizing, it was a no-brainer to give it a try.
Who is beehiiv for?
beehiiv is for the lean web content designer that desires a platform that allows them to send customized e-newsletters with or without requiring to have a website.
One of the most effective newsletters have the right tools to construct and scale their newsletters. beehiiv focuses on offering you those tools.
If you’re an independent author, media business, startup, or content developer, you must seriously considering experimenting with beehiiv. It’s entirely cost-free to get started and you just pay when you reach over 2,500 customers on your checklist.
If you really end up having to pay for beehiiv it’s probably an excellent sign that people enjoy reading your stuff.
beehiiv vs Substack
You could be asking, “isn’t there currently a platform for authors called Substack?”.
Yes, yes there is. Substack is an excellent platform utilized by hundreds of independent authors. With Substack you obtain your very own website and make use of the system as your all-in-one solution for sending out emails (while developing an archive of previous problems).
What sets beehiiv apart is it’s dedication to development. beehiiv enables you do to all the things Substack can do, with the advantage of far better analytics, more style flexibilty, and a referral program to motivate your existing subscribers to obtain words out.
beehiiv likewise gives you an internet site comparable to Substack. But, if you have your own web site currently, you can additionally use beehiiv’s sign-up embeds (that’s what I use) to send your website customers directly to your beehiiv email list. On the same token, you can incorporate beehiiv with a tool like Revue to enable people to sign up for your newsletter straight from Twitter.
This gives you the flexibility to leverage various marketing channels to get your newsletter out into the world, making beehiiv a terrific Substack alternative.
How to begin making use of beehiiv email marketing software.
Register for a free plan
The very first step is to enroll in a free plan. You can do this by clicking the “Start trial” button on beehiiv’s web site.
The free plan will allow you to have up to 2,500 customers, offer you access to internet site hosting, an e-newsletter CMS, development customization, analytics, exterior embed types, and extra. It’s a very charitable offering for those just beginning (or for those trying to find a brand-new system to move to).
Onboarding Marketing Island Beehiiv
After developing an account, you’ll go through an onboarding procedure that will ask things like, “is this your very first newsletter?”, “what other platforms have you used?”, “do you have any paying customers?”, and extra.
You’ll then develop a name and link for your newsletter’s web site. On the free plan, your e-newsletter will certainly live on a beehiiv subdomain. So if your e-newsletter is called “Baking Cakes,” your site URL might be something like “baking-cakes. beehiiv.com”.
Throughout the onboarding process, you’ll also pick your brand name design and colors to ensure your e-newsletter template looks right.
Navigating your control panel
As soon as you reach your primary dashboard, you’ll see all of your analytics and setups.
You will have detailed information on the amount of sign-ups you’re getting and where.
In the sidebar, you’ll see options for “Start writing,” “Posts,” “Audience,” “Expand,” “Monetize,” “Style,” and” Evaluate.” And at the extremely lower you’ll see the settings choice.
Dashboard is your primary control center (screenshot above), Begin composing is where you create and release e-newsletters, Blog posts is where you can see all of your previous newsletter versions, Audience is where you can see who your clients are (and damage them down into sections), 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 ads, Style is where you design your e-newsletter landing page and post template, Examine is where you can see all your analytics, and Setups is where you can take care of all of your admin stuff.
Writing your e-newsletter
beehiiv makes it easy to begin creating, with little to no rubbing. If you’re simply starting out, and have a concept you wish to write about, I suggest simply mosting likely to the “Write” section in the navbar and clicking on “Beginning creating”.
You can fine-tune your template and designing later on– focus on the content first.
As you can see, beehiiv’s editor provides a clean and straightforward interface for writing.
Once you begin creating, you can optimize headings, add links, and design your web content how you such as.
beehiiv gives you lots of alternatives for different types of content like video clips, web links, photos, and more.
The group at beehiiv is likewise regularly releasing item feature and updates so I make certain there will certainly be a whole lot much more material features depending on when you read this.
Maximizing your setups and templates
As soon as you have an e-newsletter that’s ready to send out, it’s time to make your email template and adjust some setups.
Here, you can upgrade the name of your e-newsletter, provide it a summary, include your logo, activate or off a welcome email to first time clients, and more.
Next, you can head over to the “Email Template” tab to make your style.
You can edit background shades, boundaries, spacing, fonts, picture styles, and extra. I’m not mosting likely to undergo ever before solitary thing you can enhance with your e-mail template because it’s a lot. Simply experiment with the system totally free and see it for yourself!
Vital beehiiv features
beehiiv has lots of amazing features that make it an excellent publishing system for any type of e-newsletter developer.
Below are some of the essential features you can find with beehiiv:.
Newsletter builder
At its core, beehiiv is an e-newsletter posting platform. It makes it extremely easy to create and send emails. I discussed above some of the important things you can do with your setups and email layout so I’ll save you some added reading.
Things to keep in mind with beehiiv’s newsletter builder is that it has an actually modern-day and minimalistic feeling. It’s most definitely among the better e-mail editors I have actually ever before written in.
Website hosting
When you create a beehiiv newsletter, all of your newsletters (if you desire) reside on a website. Consider it as an internet site for your e-newsletter that’s a home to every one of your previous problems of your e-newsletter, and a place where individuals can subscribe to your e-newsletter.
If you recognize with Substack, it’s virtually comparable to that.
All plans, including the totally free one, offer you an internet site. Nonetheless, the free plan locations your web site on a beehiiv subdomain so if you wish to include a customized domain name to get rid of all the beehiiv branding you’ll need to update to a paid plan.
Subscribe forms
Getting clients is necessary. After all, that’s why you have an e-newsletter right?
With beehiiv, people can sign up for your newsletter directly from your beehiiv web site or via embed kinds.
If you already have a website, and want people to register for your newsletter from your existing site, you’ll have to make use of an embed form. This is what I make use of on this 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 options– a full size, a fixed width, and a slim embed. I personally utilize the slim installed.
You can discover the code fragment for these embeds in the “Subscribe Forms” tab in your settings.
There’s also an option for acknowledgment monitoring if you intend to onward UTM specifications for tracking purposes– quite 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, however I discussed a few problems I had in the advantages and disadvantages section listed below.
Referral program
Among the amazing things concerning beehiiv, that I have yet to see in any other e-newsletter platform, is an option for developing a referral program.
You can urge existing subscribers on your listing to onward your e-mails to close friends and coworkers and if they obtain other people to sign up for your list, you can reward them. These incentives can be in whatever type you desire. I have actually seem lots of newsletter business offer incentives in the form of merch and stickers.
This can seriously transform your clients into a word of mouth growth engine for your newsletter– giving you another opportunity for growing your e-mail list.
Nevertheless, to obtain access to the referral program feature, you’ll need to upgrade to an extra superior plan. I’ll discuss all the plans later in this write-up.
Costs memberships
They state all you require to earn a living online is 1,000 true fans. Subscription earnings is definitely a beast of its own. If you’re seeking a platform to monetize your newsletter, this is it.
With beehiiv, you can create “premium” concerns of your e-newsletter that are only sent out to paying clients. This can be really financially rewarding relying on what your e-newsletter has to offer. As an example, Trends.co is a popular premium e-newsletter that produces millions in income a year merely by having pay-only newsletter content.
Data analytics
Among the things I love concerning beehiiv is just how clean and straightforward the analytics are. You obtain real-time day on how your e-newsletter is doing, with open/click prices and customer count Marketing Island Beehiiv.
You get access to all the metrics you need to get a bird-eye sight on just how your e-newsletter is actually doing. Logging right into your dashboard and seeing that subscriber count rise is certainly a dopamine booster.
beehiiv pricing plans
beehiiv provides four different pricing plans. You can check them out listed below.
The (free) Launch plan gives you every little thing you require to begin and grow your e-newsletter (up to 2,500 subscribers).
The Scale plan ($ 49/month) provides you everything in the Launch plan with the addition the advertisement network, referral program, custom domain, polls, and accessibility to premium registrations. This is the plan I am on.
The Max plan ($ 109/month) gives you every little thing in the Grow plan with enhancement of top priority assistance and removing the beehiiv branding.
All of these plans are fairly charitable in my viewpoint.
For instance, if you have 100,000 subscribers you will certainly pay around $329 monthly. Instead of some rivals, like Kit (previously ConvertKit), that would bill $679 per month for the exact same quantity– making beehiiv a terrific Kit option for several users.
I’m unsure how the system economics work with this, yet beehiiv is certainly cheaper (currently) than what it can be.
beehiiv benefits and drawbacks
Naturally, with every platform, it has its advantages and disadvantages. Below are some of the advantages and disadvantages I have actually directly experienced while making use of beehiiv:
Pros of using beehiiv
Right here are some of the pros of using beehiiv as your newsletter platform of choice:
Easy to set up and begin sending e-newsletters absolutely free.
Tidy and modern-day customer analytics.
Lots of versatility with e-mail designs.
Referral program feature.
Website hosting.
Create costs choices to generate income from.
Surveys.
To be straightforward, I have not seen another e-newsletter system that has been able to package every one of these features with each other so well.
But certainly, I do not wish to be biased so I’m mosting likely to discuss some disadvantages.
Disadvantages of using beehiiv
Here are several of the cons I have actually discovered while using beehiiv:.
Limitations around incorporating Webflow and beehiiv.
Limitations around including customized typefaces.
I utilize Webflow as my website structure system of choice (I finished from WordPress and Squarespace a long time ago). I’m not going to enter way too much information why I like Webflow so much however you can review my Webflow review if you want to discover more.
Right now, there truly is no other means I can integrate beehiiv with my Webflow site besides making use of an iframe embed. I directly don’t such as utilizing iframe’s because they often tend to reduce my internet site a bit. Every single time a page on my site (with a beehiiv installed) loads, the sign-up installed is the last point to pack on the page. It’s very recognizable when you get on a sluggish internet link. But I can get around that.
The main gripe I have is that I can’t make use of a routine Webflow type (which I love making use of). There are means around this by utilizing a device like Zapier but that would just add additional expenses that I don’t need. To be straightforward, this is even more of a Webflow disadvantage over a beehiiv con however I assumed I would certainly state it.
Besides that, I still believe the pros much exceed the disadvantages right here. I’m additionally enthusiastic that Webflow will eventually create a much better method to incorporate with beehiiv.
Verdict
Generally, beehiiv is a fantastic service for any individual seeking to study the world of e-mail marketing and e-newsletters.
The performance of this e-newsletter platform far surpasses numerous that are presently on the marketplace. And with a charitable free plan, you actually have absolutely nothing to lose for trying it.
The paid plans are likewise fairly economical wherefore they are. Paying just $329/month to have 100,000 customers on your listing is unheard of. If you were to have a newsletter with 100k subscribers, and all of these features beehiiv has, it could cost you well right into the thousands each month.
Anyways, I don’t write review posts typically. I just do when I really make use of the device myself and would suggest it to a close friend.
I wish you found some quality on whether or not beehiiv is a good system for you.