I have utilized a lot of various email list systems over the years. In the last couple of years, I’ve been a big proponent of digital sovereignty and owning your own platform. Therefore (and the outstanding features), I have actually been utilizing Make Money with Beehiiv.
So, it is indeed an odd move for me to determine to utilize BeeHiiv. Nevertheless, it is a hosted application and I am paying monthly for it.
Why did I do this?
In this BeeHiiv testimonial, I intend to discuss why I made the button to BeeHiiv for my newsletters. I wish to attend to the concern of digital sovereignty while making use of the platform and I would certainly also such as to deal with why I picked to utilize it over Substack.
Let’s dive in …
BeeHiiv: Developed For E-newsletters
In Problem # 435 of my newsletter called My Pastime + A Huge Shift In Technique, I spoke about how and why I decided to turn my RV blog site into mostly an e-newsletter. I made a decision that was business version I wished to seek with that said home.
But, to intentionally pursue it as an e-newsletter, I wanted a platform that was purpose-built for that. I was using FluentCRM for the e-mail list for Happily RV, yet FluentCRM is not an e-newsletter platform. It is constructed to be a CRM and marketing automation device and, honestly, utilizing it for newsletters is a little bit of a waste. Much more on that in a little bit.
As I said because concern of the newsletter …
Simply put, BeeHiiv is a platform with tools constructed right into it certain to my objective. Things such as:
- Capability to publish (to the blog site) and send the e-mail at the same time without having it be 2 different actions.
- Integrated in e-newsletter referral program. FluentCRM does not have that and I would have needed a third-party tool like Sparkloop.
- Built-in capability to do cross-promotions with other newsletters on the BeeHiiv system.
- ” Magic Links”, which are primarily one-click subscription web links. Great for promo in various other newsletters. FluentCRM has Smart Hyperlinks, though, so there are methods to do that.
- Ability to do paid “boosts” on the BeeHiiv network to promote your newsletter.
- Integrated ad network, if I choose to generate income from with ads in the newsletter. And I may.
- Built-in ability to run a paid e-newsletter upgrade and primarily run a premium e-newsletter. And BeeHiiv doesn’t take a cut.
Basically, BeeHiiv is purpose-built for newsletter authors with features focused on development. The platform was essentially built by the individuals who accumulated the innovation for Morning Brew. They know what they’re doing.
That is the point below. BeeHiiv is constructed from scratch for the objective of running a newsletter. FluentCRM has a different purpose.
And I ended off with this:.
I may undoubtedly be moving The Edge over to BeeHiiv also. At the very least, I’m highly considering it.
Well, I didn’t consider it for long. As a matter of fact, I simply went all out. And actually, The EDGE was re-branded over to The Morning WP, triggered as it’s own residential property to make sure that I can grow it more intentionally as well.
The objective is that each newsletter has the capability to be branded as it’s own media entity and grown separately. Gladly recreational vehicle was young, so easy to transition. But, The Morning WP (formerly The Side) was buried in a sea of stuff here at the Blog Site Marketing Academy. By separating it off, I can do what I can to grow it on it’s own. It will obviously always be carefully linked with the Blog site Marketing Academy, however does not need to belong of it.
I switched over to BeeHiiv since it was developed for this function. FluentCRM was not.
Newsletters Versus Simply A Typical Email List
There’s a difference between an e-newsletter platform and just an email list.
You can hold your e-mail list anywhere you desire and there are a variety of them out there, from Aweber, ActiveCampaign, Drip, ConvertKit … over to self-hosted options like GroundHogg and FluentCRM.
What’s the distinction?
The key distinction is that, with a newsletter platform, the act of posting suggests that it is mosting likely to your site and to your e-mail subscribers simultaneously.
With both BeeHiiv and Substack, you have an internet site. You are releasing to that site. Yet, you are additionally dispatching to all subscribers at the same time. The site and it’s clients are done in one. This makes administration of the platform much less complex.
With a lot of e-mail systems, any e-newsletter you established is done as an email campaign. It is built totally independently from your internet site. So, as an example, you may publish an article to WordPress however then you would certainly need to separately build and send an email to your listing to send it to subscribers. These are then two separate sets of archives and 2 different activities because blog posts and your emails are not inherently linked.
The closest point that transforms WordPress right into a true e-newsletter platform is E-newsletter Glue.
It is a fitting name due to the fact that it virtually “adhesives” your newsletter to your WordPress articles and allows them to be the exact same thing. Absolutely, something like E-newsletter Glue would certainly be a solid alternative if I intended to remain to self-host whatever. Nonetheless, you ‘d shed the growth devices that feature a system like BeeHiiv.
Posting an e-newsletter naturally features a various set of requirements than a normal e-mail list.
You don’t usually require much marketing automation. You do not normally require autoresponder series, occasion monitoring, and all the bells and whistles of a marketing automation platform.
What you DO demand, though, is one seamless publishing experience and growth tools to help you develop your subscriber base that specify to e-newsletters.
BeeHiiv vs Substack
When I announced to my clients that I was going to change the newsletter over to BeeHiiv, I had many individuals ask me why I was choosing it over Substack.
To be clear, even besides the truth that I chose to choose BeeHiiv, that doesn’t mean I think Substack draws. In fact, due to the fact that Substack has actually been around much longer, it is more mature and has even more features.
Despite the fact that BeeHiiv is younger, there are a couple points that at first got my attention:.
- BeeHiiv is specifically tailored to e-newsletter publishers. Actually, it is essentially developed by the exact same people who built the technology behind Morning Brew. On the other hand, SubStack targets writers. In the real life, does not matter. But, the evident positioning of BeeHiiv toward e-newsletter growth called me out over the more common positioning of being a “maker”. Development is what I want right here.
- That branding and distinction likewise indicates that BeeHiiv has some relatively big brands and huge magazines using it. Whereas SubStack is aimed even more at solo developers. Once again, it simply tells me the customer character difference between both companies.
Sending our my newsletter using FluentCRM really did not specifically draw. The only reason I would ponder drinking things up is if I believed I could GROW the checklist much faster. And BeeHiiv talked precisely to that goal.
Because of the targeting, I in fact do not see BeeHiiv and Substack as direct rivals. I think BeeHiiv is targeting a various sort of customer. Actually, if anything, I see BeeHiiv and ConvertKit being more straight competitors.
However, let’s dive deeper than simply the positioning here.
Points That Make BeeHiiv Better Than Substack
Generally, BeeHiiv seems like it was constructed by people that understanding e-mail marketing. On the other hand, SubStack appears more tailored towards makers.
For instance, BeeHiiv provides customized fields on clients. Currently, it isn’t as developed as something like FluentCRM. However, it has it. Substack does not.
BeeHiiv provides Automations. In fact, it is an aesthetic automation builder that works a great deal like what we have inside of FluentCRM.
To be clear, the automation performance is still early-phase. It is still fairly limited in triggers and the only activity is the capacity to send out an e-mail. Nonetheless, enhancements are coming. Quickly sufficient, automations will certainly have new triggers as well as new activities, such as modifying personalized areas, sending webhooks, and so on. I’ve already seen enhancements to their automations simply because I began using the platform. For example:
- Capacity to cause automations based on which details embed type they was available in on.
- Ability to instantly do re-engagement (and deal with people based upon opens and non-opens).
- Capability to do basic conditional logic branches.
Substack does not have automations like this. Likely, it never will. Substack just can’t do this since the target market of Substack simply would not believe to approach this like an email marketer.
When it comes to creating your newsletters, the writing interface of BeeHiiv is just more geared toward e-newsletters. Actually, it really has similarities to the WordPress block builder in just how it functions. I locate it to be extra instinctive, directly.
Substack’s composing interface behaves and tidy, however it would be much more comparable to the traditional editor for WordPress. Toolbar on top.
This difference is more than simply kind. As an example, with BeeHiiv you can put a “Section” and then put anything you desire in it. After that, you can put Visibility options on that particular section to show it just to paid subscribers, conceal it from e-mail, hide from subscribers, show only to subscribers, and so on. Substack provides absolutely nothing similar to this.
And when/if the moment comes that I start a costs membership model, BeeHiiv doesn’t take any revenue. In fact, you literally link as much as your own Stripe account and it bills straight to it. With Substack, they will take 10% of your profits. Relying on the number of subscribers you get, that 10% can be quite a bit even more cash than the regular monthly cost of BeeHiiv.
Finally, BeeHiiv has an API. This could seem unpopular, but what it indicates is that there are integrations with BeeHiiv. You can in fact make BeeHiiv deal with the outside making use of devices like Zapier or Make.com. This is HUGE. Substack essentially has … absolutely nothing. No integrations in all.
On the whole, I simply felt like BeeHiiv was a lot more developed toward actual email marketing. It was constructed by people who “get it”. Even the opt-in types and the landing page develops seem better built for conversions. Growth is the name of the game with BeeHiiv.
Despite the fact that there are still features I wish to see BeeHiiv include, I such as the direction it is going greater than Substack.
Points That Make Substack Better Than BeeHiiv
As I have claimed, Substack placements itself toward “developers” greater than e-mail marketing professionals and e-newsletter proprietors. Therefore, you see some things geared extra towards people who simply assume in regards to material production.
For example, Substack sustains podcasts. BeeHiiv does not.
Additionally, while BeeHiiv does support several publications, they are dealt with rather separately. Whereas Substack does have the capacity to cross-post to multiple magazines at the same time. This isn’t something I require, however … trendy for individuals that could need it.
Substack likewise has more social functionality built-in. For instance, it has a conversation feature to host talks with customers. It likewise has a “Notes” function which works kind of like a social networks newsfeed where you can share things from various other “Stacks” you read. Interesting. On the whole, Substack is established to be extra like a social media network which sustains long-form material.
In general, Substack is also much more … minimal. You either look after that or do not. Directly, I do not. However, if the objective is simplicity of user interface and, frankly, features … Substack works rather well.
However, I’ll be clear below …
When it concerns real marketing, I do not believe there’s much uncertainty that BeeHiiv is better suited. I tried to find even more factors that make Substack better than BeeHiiv, but honestly … I have a hard time finding them.
BeeHiiv Vs ConvertKit
While BeeHiiv and Substack are frequently via to be the closest competitors, I really see BeeHiiv and ConvertKit being the closer opponents. Both are pursuing the exact same target audience and have comparable capacities.
ConvertKit is also positioned at developers (like Substack), yet it is much more strongly satisfying people that do it for service. ConvertKit has good visual automation structure, it’s own commerce system, and extra. ConvertKit is an actually great system.
I’m not going to birthed you with a complete feature-by-feature failure here. ConvertKit is popular already. However, here’s exactly how I feel BeeHiiv and ConvertKit contrast …
Things ConvertKit Is Much Better At …
As of now, ConvertKit has much more versatility when it involves it’s automations. I will certainly likewise say that I locate ConvertKit’s automation builder to be a little bit a lot more user-friendly than that of BeeHiiv.
ConvertKit sustains marking. This is just a standard feature of e-mail checklists that allows division in a far more flexible method than BeeHiiv currently does. I expect BeeHiiv to support marking eventually soon, frankly. It feels like an oversight that it is missing Make Money with Beehiiv.
ConvertKit does now offer the ability to sell things through their own system. BeeHiiv does not. If that’s important to you, it may be a big deal for you. For me, nonetheless, I would always choose a much more straight choice anyway. For me, I like to utilize my very own system powered by WooCommerce.
ConvertKit has been about a lot longer and for that reason has way extra integration options. Tons of web-based devices and WordPress plugins integrate with ConvertKit. ConvertKit also has their very own WordPress plugin that is fairly effective. As an example, their plugin now also supports member-gated content along with auto-embed of your newsletter archives right into your website. In essence, this a lot more closely places ConvertKit into straight competition by having you have the ability to release to your site and your e-mail listing at the same time.
BeeHiiv is drastically doing not have in these type of third-party integrations at the moment. It’ll arrive. However, we’re not there yet with it.
ConvertKit is also hectic dealing with the growth devices of BeeHiiv. As an example, BeeHiiv has the referral program and the Referral Engine where you can not just incentivize people to share your e-newsletter with perks, yet you can additionally pay per lead within the interior advertisement network of BeeHiiv to expand your checklist. These are actually awesome features of BeeHiiv. However …
Did you understand ConvertKit got Sparkloop? Sparkloop is among the most well known viral promo systems for newsletters … and ConvertKit bought it. You can see the writing on the wall for what this indicates for the system going forward.
Things BeeHiiv Is Much Better At … Make Money with Beehiiv
BeeHiiv is a lot earlier in it’s product cycle than ConvertKit. Part of that suggests much less features and less integrations, which is all-natural for this stage of the cycle. Nonetheless, it likewise suggests that they are quickly establishing.
In the short time that I have actually been a customer of BeeHiiv, I have actually seen nearly regular launch of brand-new features into the system. And these aren’t undersized little features … however huge features that are rather important. Their speed of development now has been impressive.
I also very much appreciate exactly how receptive they are. As a matter of fact, one of their item news concerning some style improvements to the website design features actually contained a little problem with the web content width. I merely responded to that e-mail to tell them. I rapidly got a reply straight from the chief executive officer:.
That exact same day, the problem was fixed.
Few days later, I provided an additional idea …
Sure enough, in a bit over a week of that exchange, the ability to set off automations based on the embed form made use of was contributed to the system.
That sort of responsiveness and direct involvement of the team is something I actually appreciate.
An additional significant factor of differentiation here is the price. Both platforms provide free plans, nevertheless the BeeHiiv free plan provides much more capability and more clients (2,500 vs 1,000) than ConvertKit.
When you most likely to paid plans, the pricing of BeeHiiv is likewise FAR more desirable. ConvertKit seems less costly in the beginning glimpse since their pricing web page reveals reduced numbers, nonetheless the client restrictions are FAR reduced and your cost quickly increases as your checklist grows.
With BeeHiiv, your very first degree paid plan begins at $42/mo (paid each year), however you can have up to 10,000 customers. That same dimension checklist is going to run you $100/month with ConvertKit.
If you update to the “Scale” plan with BeeHiiv (their finest plan and the one I personally use), you can grow your list approximately 100,000. A listing of that dimension would run you $566/month with ConvertKit. If you want their referral network, too, that puts you at the $733/month plan. That’s if you pay every year, also. With BeeHiiv, you can get all that for simply $84/month if you pay annually.
BeeHiiv is in an entirely different organization when it comes to pricing (in a good way).
Will BeeHiiv ultimately raise rates? They could as time takes place. But, I’m thinking people like myself who are already in will be locked-in. We’ll see exactly how points proceed.
Things I Would Certainly Like BeeHiiv To Add
Among things you definitely need to remember is that BeeHiiv is relatively young. They do appear to evolve rather promptly and make brand-new product news somewhat frequently, however there are some standard features I really want they had that I need to just await.
One is that they require to have a setting on membership types where I could choose an automation to run right at the form level. That would be outstanding for so many reasons. As of now, membership kinds look OK, but there’s extremely little setups for them to aid in segmentation.
It would behave to have labeling at the client level. This would be effective.
I think webhooks must become part of automations to make built-in automations simpler and lower dependence on outdoors tools like Zapier.
There are also some minor management user interface adjustments that would certainly be handy. For example:
- Capacity to mass edit/remove customers.
- Ability to bulk edit posts (for instance, to tag a lot of them at the same time).
- Having a couple of basic fields as basic on subscribers (like the name).
- Some more personalization options for the web site (such as even more adaptable color choices, heading control, etc).
So, yeah … there are some drawbacks. Things I hope they perform with it in the near future. BeeHiiv is pretty good, however it isn’t best and certainly not nearly as developed as something like FluentCRM or any other real CRM product.
It possibly never ever will certainly be, either. As I claimed, the function is different so it wouldn’t much a lot of feeling for BeeHiiv to come to be a complete marketing automation platform. I think you never understand, however.
Final Ideas On This BeeHiiv Evaluation
I like BeeHiiv quite a great deal. Enough where I decided to switch my own e-newsletters over to the system despite my personal preference for digital sovereignty and owning my own platform.
Basically, for the newsletter posting version specifically, I saw sufficient worth in their platform to require the adjustment.
Bear in mind, I do not use BeeHiiv as my special email listing. I utilize BeeHiiv wherefore it is proficient at, but I intentionally have points establish to make sure that I likewise maintain my list “in house” inside of FluentCRM.
If you make use of BeeHiiv, I recommend you do the exact same. It is just an excellent insurance plan, for one. Yet, having a full-featured marketing automation system for your listing will be of high usage (FluentCRM is a complete marketing automation platform and BeeHiiv is not and likely never will certainly be).
So, the concern is … should YOU make use of BeeHiiv?
In my point of view, if you are utilizing Substack today, I ‘d certainly take into consideration changing to BeeHiiv. It will just be extra business-friendly. It is targeting various abilities and different requirements. And also, BeeHiiv even has import devices for Substack, so the switch should be quite simple.
If you get on ConvertKit currently, I ‘d probably stay put unless you have a large email list and are for that reason being wooled with their high regular monthly costs. You will not (yet) have every feature of ConvertKit with BeeHiiv, yet they are iterating rapidly. There’s also a respectable opportunity you’re not also utilizing some of those fancier features of ConvertKit and you do not also require them. For that reason, BeeHiiv might easily be a better and a lot more cost effective fit.
Lastly, if you plan to be extremely deliberate regarding expanding a newsletter, I believe BeeHiiv is THE system to consider and keep and eye on for you.
If you use BeeHiiv with eyes wide open concerning what it is designed to be, it is one of the very best games in town now. This is the platform to watch.
BeeHiiv uses a 14-day trial on their paid plans. It deserves looking into for yourself. And if you wind up not sticking with the paid plan, you’ll locate the cost-free account to be quite feature rich.