I have utilized a lot of various email list systems over the years. In the last number of years, I’ve been a massive advocate of digital sovereignty and possessing your very own platform. Therefore (and the amazing features), I have actually been making use of Beehiiv Subscriber Tagging.
So, it is undoubtedly an unusual move for me to decide to make use of BeeHiiv. Besides, it is a held application and I am paying month-to-month for it.
Why did I do this?
In this BeeHiiv review, I want to go over why I made the switch to BeeHiiv for my newsletters. I want to resolve the concern of digital sovereignty while making use of the system and I would certainly likewise such as to resolve why I selected to utilize it over Substack.
Let’s dive in …
BeeHiiv: Built For E-newsletters
In Problem # 435 of my e-newsletter called My Hobby + A Big Shift In Strategy, I spoke about how and why I chose to turn my recreational vehicle blog site into largely an e-newsletter. I chose that was the business design I intended to go after with that said residential or commercial property.
Yet, to purposefully seek it as a newsletter, I desired a platform that was purpose-built for that. I was utilizing FluentCRM for the email listing for Happily RV, yet FluentCRM is not a newsletter platform. It is constructed to be a CRM and marketing automation tool and, truthfully, using it for e-newsletters is a little a waste. A lot more on that in a little bit.
As I claimed because problem of the e-newsletter …
Put simply, BeeHiiv is a system with tools built right into it specific to my function. Things such as:
- Capacity to release (to the blog site) and send the e-mail concurrently without having it be 2 different actions.
- Constructed in newsletter referral program. FluentCRM does not have that and I would have needed a third-party tool like Sparkloop.
- Built-in ability to do cross-promotions with various other e-newsletters on the BeeHiiv system.
- ” Magic Hyperlinks”, which are basically one-click registration links. Great for promo in other e-newsletters. FluentCRM has Smart Links, though, so there are ways to do that.
- Capability to do paid “boosts” on the BeeHiiv network to promote your e-newsletter.
- Built-in ad network, if I choose to generate income from with ads in the e-newsletter. And I may.
- Integrated capacity to run a paid e-newsletter upgrade and generally run a costs e-newsletter. And BeeHiiv does not take a cut.
Essentially, BeeHiiv is purpose-built for newsletter publishers with features targeted at development. The system was actually constructed by the people that built up the technology for Early morning Brew. They recognize what they’re doing.
That is the point here. BeeHiiv is built from the ground up for the purpose of running an e-newsletter. FluentCRM has a different purpose.
And I finished off with this:.
I may indeed be moving The Side over to BeeHiiv too. At least, I’m highly considering it.
Well, I really did not consider it for long. In fact, I simply went for it. And actually, The EDGE was re-branded over to The Morning WP, triggered as it’s own residential property so that I can grow it extra intentionally also.
The objective is that each newsletter has the capacity to be branded as it’s own media entity and grown separately. Happily recreational vehicle was young, so very easy to shift. However, The Early 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 very own. It will clearly constantly be carefully tied with the Blog Marketing Academy, however does not have to be a part of it.
I switched to BeeHiiv since it was constructed for this purpose. FluentCRM was not.
E-newsletters Versus Just A Normal Email Listing
There’s a difference in between a newsletter platform and simply an email listing.
You can host your email list just about anywhere you want and there are a number of them available, from Aweber, ActiveCampaign, Drip, ConvertKit … over to self-hosted choices like GroundHogg and FluentCRM.
What’s the difference?
The main distinction is that, with an e-newsletter system, the act of publishing implies that it is mosting likely to your web site and to your email customers concurrently.
With both BeeHiiv and Substack, you have a website. You are releasing to that web site. However, you are also dispatching to all subscribers at the same time. The internet site and it’s clients are all in one. This makes management of the system much easier.
With a lot of email platforms, any type of newsletter you established is done as an email campaign. It is built entirely individually from your internet site. So, as an example, you may publish an article to WordPress but then you would require to independently construct and send out an email to your listing to send it to clients. These are then two separate collections of archives and two separate activities since blog posts and your e-mails are not inherently linked.
The closest thing that turns WordPress into a real e-newsletter platform is E-newsletter Glue.
It is a fitting name since it practically “adhesives” your newsletter to your WordPress messages and enables them to be the very same thing. Definitely, something like E-newsletter Glue would certainly be a strong alternative if I wished to continue to self-host whatever. Nevertheless, you would certainly lose the development devices that include a platform like BeeHiiv.
Posting a newsletter naturally features a various set of demands than a normal e-mail list.
You don’t typically require much marketing automation. You do not typically need autoresponder series, occasion monitoring, and all the bells and whistles of a marketing automation platform.
What you DO need, however, is one seamless publishing experience and growth devices to aid you build your customer base that specify to e-newsletters.
BeeHiiv vs Substack
When I introduced to my subscribers that I was going to switch over the e-newsletter over to BeeHiiv, I had many individuals ask me why I was selecting it over Substack.
To be clear, also besides the truth that I selected to go with BeeHiiv, that doesn’t mean I believe Substack sucks. As a matter of fact, due to the fact that Substack has been around much longer, it is elder and has even more features.
Although BeeHiiv is more youthful, there are a couple things that at first got my attention:.
- BeeHiiv is especially tailored to newsletter authors. As a matter of fact, it is essentially constructed by the same people who built the modern technology behind Early morning Mixture. On the other hand, SubStack targets authors. In the real world, does not matter. However, the apparent positioning of BeeHiiv toward newsletter growth called me out over the even more generic positioning of being a “designer”. Development is what I want below.
- That branding and differentiation likewise suggests that BeeHiiv has some rather large brands and big publications utilizing it. Whereas SubStack is aimed even more at solo designers. Once again, it just informs me the consumer avatar distinction between both companies.
Sending our my newsletter via FluentCRM didn’t exactly suck. The only reason I would contemplate trembling things up is if I thought I might expand the list much faster. And BeeHiiv spoke exactly to that objective.
Because of the targeting, I in fact do not view BeeHiiv and Substack as direct competitors. I believe BeeHiiv is targeting a different type of customer. In fact, if anything, I see BeeHiiv and ConvertKit being more straight rivals.
But, let’s dive deeper than just the positioning here.
Things That Make BeeHiiv Better Than Substack
In general, BeeHiiv feels like it was built by people that comprehending email marketing. On the other hand, SubStack appears more geared towards developers.
As an example, BeeHiiv provides custom-made fields on clients. Now, it isn’t as created as something like FluentCRM. However, it has it. Substack doesn’t.
BeeHiiv uses Automations. Actually, it is a visual automation builder that works a great deal like what we have within FluentCRM.
To be clear, the automation functionality is still early-phase. It is still fairly restricted in triggers and the only activity is the capacity to send an e-mail. Nonetheless, improvements are coming. Quickly enough, automations will have brand-new triggers as well as new activities, such as modifying custom-made areas, sending out webhooks, etc. I have actually already seen improvements to their automations just because I began making use of the system. As an example:
- Capacity to cause automations based upon which certain embed form they was available in on.
- Ability to automatically do re-engagement (and take care of people based on opens up and non-opens).
- Capability to do basic conditional reasoning branches.
Substack does not have automations like this. Likely, it never ever will. Substack simply can not do this due to the fact that the target market of Substack simply would not think to approach this like an e-mail marketing expert.
When it comes to composing your newsletters, the composing user interface of BeeHiiv is simply more geared towards e-newsletters. As a matter of fact, it actually has similarities to the WordPress block builder in how it functions. I locate it to be more user-friendly, personally.
Substack’s composing user interface behaves and clean, however it would be much more equal to the timeless editor for WordPress. Toolbar at the top.
This difference is greater than just form. For instance, with BeeHiiv you can insert a “Section” and then placed anything you desire in it. After that, you can place Presence choices on that area to show it just to paid clients, hide it from email, hide from customers, reveal just to subscribers, and so on. Substack uses absolutely nothing like this.
And when/if the moment comes that I begin a costs registration design, BeeHiiv doesn’t take any kind of earnings. As a matter of fact, you literally connect approximately your very own Stripe account and it charges directly to it. With Substack, they will certainly take 10% of your income. Depending on the amount of clients you get, that 10% can be a fair bit even more cash than the regular monthly price of BeeHiiv.
Lastly, BeeHiiv has an API. This could appear unpopular, yet what it means is that there are integrations with BeeHiiv. You can in fact make BeeHiiv work with the outside utilizing tools like Zapier or Make.com. This is HUGE. Substack essentially has … absolutely nothing. No integrations at all.
In general, I simply seemed like BeeHiiv was more developed toward actual email marketing. It was built by individuals that “get it”. Even the opt-in types and the landing page makes seem better constructed for conversions. Growth is nitty-gritty with BeeHiiv.
Despite the fact that there are still features I want to see BeeHiiv include, I like the direction it is going more than Substack.
Points That Make Substack Better Than BeeHiiv
As I have said, Substack settings itself toward “makers” greater than e-mail marketers and newsletter proprietors. Because of that, you see some things geared a lot more toward individuals that simply assume in terms of content development.
For instance, Substack sustains podcasts. BeeHiiv does not.
Likewise, while BeeHiiv does support numerous publications, they are treated rather independently. Whereas Substack does have the capability to cross-post to multiple magazines at the same time. This isn’t something I require, but … great for individuals who might require it.
Substack likewise has more social functionality built-in. As an example, it has a conversation function to host talks with customers. It also has a “Notes” function which functions type of like a social networks newsfeed where you can share things from various other “Stacks” you read. Fascinating. Generally, Substack is established to be more like a social media network which supports long-form material.
On the whole, Substack is additionally more … minimal. You either look after that or don’t. Personally, I do not. Nevertheless, if the goal is simplicity of user interface and, honestly, features … Substack functions quite well.
But, I’ll be clear right here …
When it involves real marketing, I don’t think there’s much question that BeeHiiv is better matched. I tried to find even more factors that make Substack much better than BeeHiiv, however honestly … I have a difficult time locating them.
BeeHiiv Vs ConvertKit
While BeeHiiv and Substack are commonly with to be the closest rivals, I actually see BeeHiiv and ConvertKit being the closer competitors. Both are going after the same target audience and have comparable capabilities.
ConvertKit is additionally placed at creators (like Substack), but it is a lot more strongly accommodating individuals that do it for company. ConvertKit has nice aesthetic automation structure, it’s very own business platform, and extra. ConvertKit is an actually good system.
I’m not mosting likely to birthed you with a full feature-by-feature break down right here. ConvertKit is well known currently. However, below’s exactly how I feel BeeHiiv and ConvertKit contrast …
Things ConvertKit Is Better At …
As of now, ConvertKit has more adaptability when it involves it’s automations. I will also state that I find ConvertKit’s automation builder to be a bit extra instinctive than that of BeeHiiv.
ConvertKit sustains marking. This is simply a fundamental feature of email lists that makes it possible for division in a far more versatile way than BeeHiiv presently does. I anticipate BeeHiiv to support labeling at some time soon, truthfully. It seems like an oversight that it is missing Beehiiv Subscriber Tagging.
ConvertKit does currently give the capability to market things by means of their very own system. BeeHiiv does not. If that’s important to you, it might be a big deal for you. For me, nonetheless, I would certainly constantly select a more direct option anyway. For me, I favor to use my own platform powered by WooCommerce.
ConvertKit has been about a lot longer and for that reason has way extra integration choices. Lots of web-based devices and WordPress plugins incorporate with ConvertKit. ConvertKit even has their very own WordPress plugin that is rather effective. For example, their plugin currently even sustains member-gated web content in addition to auto-embed of your newsletter archives right into your site. In essence, this much more closely puts ConvertKit into direct competitors by having you be able to publish to your site and your e-mail listing at the same time.
BeeHiiv is severely doing not have in these sort of third-party integrations presently. It’ll arrive. But, we’re not there yet with it.
ConvertKit is even active taking on the growth devices of BeeHiiv. For example, BeeHiiv has the referral program and the Recommendation Engine where you can not just incentivize individuals to share your e-newsletter with rewards, but you can also pay per lead within the internal advertisement network of BeeHiiv to expand your listing. These are actually awesome features of BeeHiiv. Yet …
Did you recognize ConvertKit obtained Sparkloop? Sparkloop is just one of one of the most popular viral promo platforms for newsletters … and ConvertKit bought it. You can see the composing on the wall surface of what this indicates for the system moving forward.
Points BeeHiiv Is Better At … Beehiiv Subscriber Tagging
BeeHiiv is a lot previously in it’s item cycle than ConvertKit. Part of that means less features and less integrations, which is all-natural for this stage of the cycle. Nonetheless, it likewise implies that they are swiftly developing.
In the short time that I have actually been a customer of BeeHiiv, I have observed practically weekly launch of brand-new features into the system. And these aren’t puny little features … however big features that are rather important. Their speed of advancement now has actually been impressive.
I likewise very much appreciate how responsive they are. Actually, one of their product news regarding some layout improvements to the web design features in fact consisted of a little problem with the web content width. I merely replied to that e-mail to tell them. I rapidly got a reply directly from the CEO:.
That exact same day, the issue was fixed.
Couple of days later on, I provided another idea …
Sure enough, in a bit over a week of that exchange, the ability to activate automations based on the embed kind used was added to the system.
That sort of responsiveness and straight involvement of the group is something I actually value.
Another major point of differentiation right here is the price. Both systems offer cost-free plans, nonetheless the BeeHiiv free plan provides much more capacity and even more clients (2,500 vs 1,000) than ConvertKit.
When you most likely to paid plans, the pricing of BeeHiiv is likewise FAR more favorable. ConvertKit appears less expensive at first look due to the fact that their pricing page reveals reduced numbers, nevertheless the subscriber limits are much reduced and your rate promptly boosts as your checklist grows.
With BeeHiiv, your very first level paid plan starts at $42/mo (paid annually), however you can have up to 10,000 customers. That very same dimension listing is mosting likely to run you $100/month with ConvertKit.
If you update to the “Scale” plan with BeeHiiv (their ideal plan and the one I personally utilize), you can grow your listing approximately 100,000. A listing of that size would certainly run you $566/month with ConvertKit. If you want their referral network, also, that places you at the $733/month plan. That’s if you pay each year, too. With BeeHiiv, you can obtain all that for just $84/month if you pay yearly.
BeeHiiv remains in a totally different league when it concerns pricing (in an excellent way).
Will BeeHiiv ultimately raise prices? They might as time goes on. Yet, I’m thinking individuals like myself who are currently in will certainly be locked-in. We’ll see how things continue.
Things I Would Like BeeHiiv To Add
One of the important things you absolutely need to keep in mind is that BeeHiiv is relatively young. They do appear to progress instead quickly and make brand-new item news rather usually, however there are some standard features I really desire they had that I need to simply wait on.
One is that they need to have a setting on registration kinds where I can pick an automation to run right at the kind level. That would be amazing for many factors. Already, subscription types look OK, but there’s extremely little setups for them to help in segmentation.
It would behave to have identifying at the client level. This would certainly be powerful.
I assume webhooks ought to belong to automations to make integrated automations less complicated and lower reliance on outside devices like Zapier.
There are also some minor administrative interface adjustments that would come in handy. As an example:
- Capacity to bulk edit/remove customers.
- Capability to mass edit messages (for example, to tag a lot of them at the same time).
- Having a few basic fields as conventional on subscribers (like the name).
- Some more customization alternatives for the website (such as more adaptable color selections, heading control, and so on).
So, yeah … there are some shortcomings. Things I wish they make with it in the near future. BeeHiiv is pretty good, however it isn’t excellent and definitely not nearly as created as something like FluentCRM or any other real CRM product.
It probably never will be, either. As I said, the function is different so it wouldn’t a lot a lot of sense for BeeHiiv to end up being a full marketing automation platform. I guess you never ever recognize, though.
Last Thoughts On This BeeHiiv Evaluation
I such as BeeHiiv quite a lot. Enough where I chose to switch my very own newsletters over to the platform in spite of my personal preference for digital sovereignty and having my very own platform.
Basically, for the newsletter publishing version especially, I saw adequate worth in their platform to necessitate the change.
Remember, I do not make use of BeeHiiv as my unique email checklist. I utilize BeeHiiv of what it is good at, but I intentionally have things set up to ensure that I additionally keep my list “in residence” within FluentCRM.
If you make use of BeeHiiv, I suggest you do the same. It is just a good insurance policy, for one. But, having a full-featured marketing automation system for your checklist will be of high use (FluentCRM is a complete marketing automation platform and BeeHiiv is not and likely never will be).
So, the inquiry is … should YOU utilize BeeHiiv?
In my opinion, if you are using Substack today, I ‘d most definitely think about switching over to BeeHiiv. It will simply be extra business-friendly. It is targeting various capabilities and different demands. And also, BeeHiiv even has import tools for Substack, so the button should be rather uncomplicated.
If you get on ConvertKit now, I ‘d possibly stay unless you have a big e-mail checklist and are as a result being wooled with their high monthly expense. You will certainly not (yet) have every feature of ConvertKit with BeeHiiv, however they are repeating quickly. There’s likewise a respectable chance you’re not also using several of those fancier functions of ConvertKit and you don’t also need them. For that reason, BeeHiiv might quickly be a better and more budget friendly fit.
Lastly, if you plan to be really deliberate regarding expanding a newsletter, I assume BeeHiiv is THE system to think about and maintain and eye on for you.
If you utilize BeeHiiv with eyes wide open about what it is made to be, it is one of the very best video games around right now. This is the system to enjoy.
BeeHiiv provides a 14-day trial on their paid plans. It deserves taking a look at for yourself. And if you end up not sticking with the paid plan, you’ll locate the totally free account to be quite feature rich.