I have utilized a great deal of different e-mail list systems over the years. In the last number of years, I’ve been a big advocate of digital sovereignty and having your very own platform. For that reason (and the incredible features), I have been using Does Beehiiv Have Landing Pages.
So, it is certainly an unusual move for me to determine to make use of BeeHiiv. Besides, it is a hosted application and I am paying monthly for it.
Why did I do this?
In this BeeHiiv review, I wish to look at why I made the switch to BeeHiiv for my newsletters. I wish to address the problem of digital sovereignty while making use of the platform and I ‘d additionally such as to deal with why I chose to utilize it over Substack.
Allow’s dive in …
BeeHiiv: Constructed For Newsletters
In Problem # 435 of my newsletter called My Pastime + A Large Shift In Approach, I talked about just how and why I decided to turn my motor home blog site into mainly an e-newsletter. I decided that was the business design I wished to pursue with that home.
Yet, to purposefully seek it as an e-newsletter, I wanted a system that was purpose-built for that. I was making use of FluentCRM for the email list for Gladly RV, but FluentCRM is not a newsletter system. It is constructed to be a CRM and marketing automation tool and, frankly, using it for e-newsletters is a bit of a waste. Much more on that particular in a little bit.
As I said in that concern of the newsletter …
Put simply, BeeHiiv is a platform with devices developed into it certain to my purpose. Points such as:
- Ability to release (to the blog) and send the e-mail simultaneously without having it be two different actions.
- Built in newsletter referral program. FluentCRM doesn’t have that and I would certainly require a third-party tool like Sparkloop.
- Built-in capacity to do cross-promotions with various other e-newsletters on the BeeHiiv platform.
- ” Magic Hyperlinks”, which are basically one-click membership web links. Great for promotion in other e-newsletters. FluentCRM has Smart Links, however, so there are means to do that.
- Capability to do paid “boosts” on the BeeHiiv network to advertise your newsletter.
- Integrated advertisement network, if I pick to generate income from with advertisements in the e-newsletter. And I may.
- Integrated ability to run a paid e-newsletter upgrade and essentially run a costs e-newsletter. And BeeHiiv doesn’t take a cut.
Basically, BeeHiiv is purpose-built for newsletter publishers with features focused on development. The system was actually built by the people who developed the technology for Early morning Mixture. They understand what they’re doing.
That is the point here. BeeHiiv is developed from scratch for the purpose of running a newsletter. FluentCRM has a various function.
And I finished off with this:.
I may undoubtedly be moving The Side over to BeeHiiv also. At least, I’m strongly considering it.
Well, I really did not consider it for long. As a matter of fact, I simply went for it. And actually, The side was re-branded over to The Early morning WP, set off as it’s very own residential or commercial property to make sure that I can grow it a lot more purposefully also.
The objective is that each newsletter has the ability to be branded as it’s own media entity and grown individually. Happily motor home was young, so very easy to change. But, The Morning WP (formerly The Edge) was buried in a sea of things below at the Blog Site Marketing Academy. By dividing it off, I can do what I can to expand it on it’s own. It will certainly always be closely linked with the Blog Marketing Academy, yet does not need to belong of it.
I switched to BeeHiiv due to the fact that it was developed for this function. FluentCRM was not.
E-newsletters Versus Simply A Regular Email Checklist
There’s a difference in between a newsletter system and simply an email listing.
You can host your email list just about anywhere you want and there are a variety of them around, from Aweber, ActiveCampaign, Drip, ConvertKit … over to self-hosted options like GroundHogg and FluentCRM.
What’s the distinction?
The key difference is that, with an e-newsletter system, the act of publishing indicates that it is mosting likely to your website and to your email subscribers all at once.
With both BeeHiiv and Substack, you have a site. You are publishing to that internet site. However, you are likewise sending to all subscribers at the same time. The site and it’s clients are all in one. This makes monitoring of the system much less complex.
With many email systems, any type of e-newsletter you set up is done as an e-mail campaign. It is developed totally separately from your internet site. So, for instance, you may publish a short article to WordPress yet after that you would require to separately develop and send an email to your list to send it to customers. These are after that two different collections of archives and two different activities due to the fact that post and your emails are not naturally connected.
The closest point that turns WordPress into a true newsletter platform is E-newsletter Glue.
It is a suitable name due to the fact that it practically “adhesives” your e-newsletter to your WordPress articles and enables them to be the very same point. Definitely, something like E-newsletter Glue would be a solid option if I intended to remain to self-host every little thing. Nevertheless, you ‘d shed the growth devices that include a platform like BeeHiiv.
Publishing an e-newsletter inherently includes a different collection of requirements than a regular e-mail list.
You don’t normally require much marketing automation. You do not usually need autoresponder series, occasion monitoring, and all the bells and whistles of a marketing automation system.
What you DO need, however, is one smooth publishing experience and development devices to help you construct your subscriber base that specify to newsletters.
BeeHiiv vs Substack
When I introduced to my customers that I was going to change the e-newsletter over to BeeHiiv, I had many individuals ask me why I was choosing it over Substack.
To be clear, also besides the truth that I picked to select BeeHiiv, that does not imply I think Substack sucks. As a matter of fact, due to the fact that Substack has actually been around longer, it is elder and has even more features.
Although BeeHiiv is younger, there are a couple points that originally got my interest:.
- BeeHiiv is especially customized to newsletter authors. In fact, it is actually constructed by the exact same folks that developed the innovation behind Morning Mixture. On the other hand, SubStack targets writers. In the real life, does not matter. But, the obvious positioning of BeeHiiv toward newsletter development called me out over the even more generic positioning of being a “designer”. Development is what I want below.
- That branding and distinction also indicates that BeeHiiv has some rather big brand names and big magazines using it. Whereas SubStack is aimed more at solo designers. Again, it just informs me the customer avatar difference between both firms.
Sending our my e-newsletter using FluentCRM really did not exactly suck. The only factor I would contemplate drinking things up is if I assumed I can GROW the listing quicker. And BeeHiiv talked exactly to that goal.
Because of the targeting, I really don’t watch BeeHiiv and Substack as direct rivals. I think BeeHiiv is targeting a different kind of consumer. In fact, if anything, I see BeeHiiv and ConvertKit being more straight rivals.
Yet, allow’s dive much deeper than simply the positioning below.
Things That Make BeeHiiv Better Than Substack
In general, BeeHiiv appears like it was developed by individuals that understanding email marketing. On the other hand, SubStack appears a lot more geared towards makers.
For instance, BeeHiiv offers customized fields on customers. Currently, it isn’t as established as something like FluentCRM. However, it has it. Substack does not.
BeeHiiv uses Automations. In fact, it is an aesthetic automation builder that functions a whole lot like what we have inside of FluentCRM.
To be clear, the automation capability is still early-phase. It is still quite restricted in triggers and the only action is the ability to send out an email. However, improvements are coming. Soon enough, automations will certainly have new triggers along with brand-new actions, such as customizing custom areas, sending webhooks, and so on. I’ve currently seen enhancements to their automations just considering that I started utilizing the platform. As an example:
- Capability to set off automations based on which particular embed kind they can be found in on.
- Capability to immediately do re-engagement (and deal with people based on opens up and non-opens).
- Ability to do basic conditional reasoning branches.
Substack does not have automations such as this. Likely, it never ever will. Substack simply can’t do this because the target market of Substack simply wouldn’t think to approach this like an e-mail online marketer.
When it involves creating your e-newsletters, the creating user interface of BeeHiiv is simply a lot more geared toward e-newsletters. In fact, it actually has resemblances to the WordPress block builder in how it functions. I find it to be much more instinctive, directly.
Substack’s writing interface behaves and clean, but it would certainly be a lot more equivalent to the traditional editor for WordPress. Toolbar on top.
This difference is more than simply form. For example, with BeeHiiv you can insert a “Area” and then put anything you desire in it. Then, you can place Exposure options on that particular section to show it only to paid customers, hide it from e-mail, conceal from clients, reveal only to customers, etc. Substack uses absolutely nothing similar to this.
And when/if the moment comes that I start a costs subscription model, BeeHiiv doesn’t take any income. In fact, you literally link as much as your very own Stripe account and it charges straight to it. With Substack, they will certainly take 10% of your income. Relying on the amount of subscribers you get, that 10% can be quite a bit even more cash than the month-to-month price of BeeHiiv.
Last but not least, BeeHiiv has an API. This could seem unpopular, yet what it means is that there are integrations with BeeHiiv. You can really make BeeHiiv deal with the outside using tools like Zapier or Make.com. This is HUGE. Substack essentially has … absolutely nothing. No integrations at all.
Generally, I just seemed like BeeHiiv was more developed towards actual email marketing. It was developed by individuals that “get it”. Even the opt-in forms and the landing page develops seem better developed for conversions. Growth is nitty-gritty with BeeHiiv.
Despite the fact that there are still features I want to see BeeHiiv add, I such as the direction it is going more than Substack.
Things That Make Substack Better Than BeeHiiv
As I have said, Substack positions itself toward “creators” more than email marketers and e-newsletter proprietors. Because of that, you see some things tailored much more towards individuals that simply assume in regards to content creation.
For example, Substack supports podcasts. BeeHiiv does not.
Also, while BeeHiiv does support numerous publications, they are treated quite separately. Whereas Substack does have the capability to cross-post to numerous publications at the same time. This isn’t something I need, but … cool for individuals that might require it.
Substack likewise has more social capability built-in. As an example, it has a chat function to host chats with subscribers. It additionally has a “Notes” feature which works type of like a social media newsfeed where you can share things from various other “Stacks” you read. Intriguing. On the whole, Substack is set up to be much more like a social media network which supports long-form material.
On the whole, Substack is additionally more … minimal. You either care for that or do not. Personally, I don’t. Nonetheless, if the objective is simpleness of user interface and, honestly, features … Substack works pretty well.
However, I’ll be clear below …
When it involves actual marketing, I don’t think there’s much uncertainty that BeeHiiv is much better fit. I looked for even more factors that make Substack far better than BeeHiiv, but truthfully … I have a hard time discovering them.
BeeHiiv Vs ConvertKit
While BeeHiiv and Substack are commonly through to be the closest competitors, I in fact see BeeHiiv and ConvertKit being the closer rivals. Both are pursuing the exact same target audience and have similar abilities.
ConvertKit is also positioned at makers (like Substack), but it is much more strongly catering to individuals who do it for organization. ConvertKit has good visual automation building, it’s own business system, and much more. ConvertKit is a really great system.
I’m not mosting likely to bore you with a full feature-by-feature breakdown here. ConvertKit is well known already. However, here’s how I feel BeeHiiv and ConvertKit contrast …
Points ConvertKit Is Much Better At …
Already, ConvertKit has extra flexibility when it concerns it’s automations. I will additionally claim that I discover ConvertKit’s automation builder to be a bit extra user-friendly than that of BeeHiiv.
ConvertKit sustains marking. This is just a standard feature of email lists that allows segmentation in an even more flexible means than BeeHiiv currently does. I expect BeeHiiv to support marking at some time quickly, frankly. It seems like an oversight that it is missing Does Beehiiv Have Landing Pages.
ConvertKit does currently supply the capacity to market things through their very own platform. BeeHiiv does not. If that is essential to you, it may be a big deal for you. For me, nevertheless, I would constantly pick a much more straight choice anyway. For me, I like to utilize my own platform powered by WooCommerce.
ConvertKit has actually been around much longer and because of that has way much more integration choices. Lots of online tools and WordPress plugins integrate with ConvertKit. ConvertKit also has their own WordPress plugin that is fairly powerful. For example, their plugin now also sustains member-gated material in addition to auto-embed of your newsletter archives right into your site. Essentially, this much more very closely places ConvertKit into direct competitors by having you have the ability to publish to your website and your e-mail list at the same time.
BeeHiiv is seriously lacking 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 taking on the growth tools of BeeHiiv. For instance, BeeHiiv has the referral program and the Suggestion Engine where you can not just incentivize people to share your newsletter with rewards, but you can also pay per lead within the interior advertisement network of BeeHiiv to grow your list. These are really outstanding features of BeeHiiv. But …
Did you recognize ConvertKit obtained Sparkloop? Sparkloop is among the most popular viral promo systems for newsletters … and ConvertKit bought it. You can see the creating on the wall wherefore this implies for the system going forward.
Things BeeHiiv Is Much Better At … Does Beehiiv Have Landing Pages
BeeHiiv is much previously in it’s item cycle than ConvertKit. Part of that suggests less features and much less integrations, which is all-natural for this phase of the cycle. Nevertheless, it additionally implies that they are rapidly establishing.
In the short time that I have actually been a customer of BeeHiiv, I have seen virtually regular launch of brand-new features right into the system. And these aren’t puny little features … but huge features that are rather vital. Their rate of advancement now has actually gone over.
I also quite value how receptive they are. Actually, one of their item statements concerning some design improvements to the website design features in fact consisted of a little issue with the content size. I just replied to that email to tell them. I quickly got a reply straight from the CEO:.
That same day, the problem was taken care of.
Few days later, I gave them one more tip …
Certainly, in a bit over a week of that exchange, the capacity to cause automations based on the embed form used was added to the system.
That type of responsiveness and direct involvement of the team is something I actually appreciate.
One more significant factor of differentiation here is the price. Both systems use cost-free plans, nonetheless the BeeHiiv free plan provides a lot more ability and more customers (2,500 vs 1,000) than ConvertKit.
As soon as you most likely to paid plans, the pricing of BeeHiiv is additionally FAR more beneficial. ConvertKit seems cheaper in the beginning glance because their pricing web page reveals reduced numbers, nevertheless the client restrictions are FAR lower and your cost swiftly boosts as your checklist grows.
With BeeHiiv, your initial degree paid plan begins at $42/mo (paid every year), nevertheless you can have up to 10,000 customers. That same dimension listing is going to run you $100/month with ConvertKit.
If you upgrade to the “Scale” plan with BeeHiiv (their ideal plan and the one I directly make use of), you can grow your list as much as 100,000. A listing of that dimension would run you $566/month with ConvertKit. If you desire their referral network, too, that places you at the $733/month plan. That’s if you pay each year, also. With BeeHiiv, you can get all that for just $84/month if you pay every year.
BeeHiiv remains in a totally various league when it pertains to pricing (in a good way).
Will BeeHiiv eventually enhance costs? They may as time takes place. However, I’m presuming people like myself who are currently in will be locked-in. We’ll see how points continue.
Things I Would Like BeeHiiv To Include
One of the important things you most definitely need to remember is that BeeHiiv is relatively young. They do appear to develop rather promptly and make new product statements somewhat commonly, yet there are some basic features I actually wish they had that I need to just wait for.
One is that they require to have a setting on membership types where I can choose an automation to run right at the kind degree. That would certainly be outstanding for a lot of factors. Currently, registration kinds look OK, yet there’s really little settings for them to aid in division.
It would certainly behave to have identifying at the customer degree. This would certainly be powerful.
I think webhooks need to belong to automations to make integrated automations easier and minimize reliance on outdoors tools like Zapier.
There are likewise some small administrative user interface changes that would be handy. For example:
- Ability to mass edit/remove subscribers.
- Ability to bulk edit blog posts (as an example, to mark a lot of them at the same time).
- Having a few basic fields as typical on customers (like the name).
- Some more modification options for the site (such as more flexible shade choices, heading control, and so on).
So, yeah … there are some shortcomings. Things I hope they finish with it in the future. BeeHiiv is respectable, yet it isn’t ideal and definitely not nearly as created as something like FluentCRM or any other genuine CRM product.
It possibly never ever will be, either. As I stated, the purpose is different so it would not a lot a great deal of feeling for BeeHiiv to end up being a complete marketing automation platform. I guess you never know, though.
Final Thoughts On This BeeHiiv Testimonial
I such as BeeHiiv fairly a great deal. Enough where I determined to switch my own e-newsletters over to the platform in spite of my personal choice for digital sovereignty and owning my own platform.
Basically, for the e-newsletter publishing design particularly, I saw sufficient worth in their platform to call for the change.
Keep in mind, I do not utilize BeeHiiv as my unique e-mail checklist. I use BeeHiiv wherefore it is good at, yet I deliberately have things establish to make sure that I additionally keep my checklist “in home” inside of FluentCRM.
If you make use of BeeHiiv, I recommend you do the very same. It is just an excellent insurance coverage, for one. Yet, having a full-featured marketing automation platform for your checklist will be of high use (FluentCRM is a complete marketing automation platform and BeeHiiv is not and likely never ever will certainly be).
So, the question is … should YOU use BeeHiiv?
In my viewpoint, if you are using Substack today, I ‘d definitely think about switching to BeeHiiv. It will merely be extra business-friendly. It is targeting different abilities and different demands. Plus, BeeHiiv also has import tools for Substack, so the switch must be rather simple.
If you are on ConvertKit currently, I ‘d possibly stay put unless you have a huge e-mail listing and are therefore being fleeced with their high month-to-month costs. You will certainly not (yet) have every feature of ConvertKit with BeeHiiv, yet they are iterating swiftly. There’s likewise a pretty good possibility you’re not also utilizing some of those fancier functions of ConvertKit and you don’t even need them. For that reason, BeeHiiv might easily be a much better and extra economical fit.
Finally, if you plan to be really intentional regarding growing a newsletter, I believe BeeHiiv is THE system to think about and maintain and eye on for you.
If you make use of BeeHiiv with eyes wide open concerning what it is made to be, it is just one of the very best games around today. This is the platform to watch.
BeeHiiv offers a 14-day trial on their paid plans. It is worth taking a look at on your own. And if you wind up not sticking to the paid plan, you’ll locate the complimentary account to be rather feature abundant.