I have made use of a great deal of different email list systems throughout the years. In the last number of years, I’ve been a big advocate of digital sovereignty and having your very own system. Therefore (and the awesome features), I have been making use of Beehiiv Chatbot Assistant.
So, it is certainly an unusual move for me to determine to utilize BeeHiiv. Nevertheless, it is a held application and I am paying month-to-month for it.
Why did I do this?
In this BeeHiiv testimonial, I intend to go over why I made the button to BeeHiiv for my e-newsletters. I want to attend to the issue of digital sovereignty while using the system and I would certainly additionally like to attend to why I picked to use it over Substack.
Let’s dive in …
BeeHiiv: Constructed For Newsletters
In Issue # 435 of my newsletter called My Leisure activity + A Big Change In Method, I discussed exactly how and why I determined to transform my recreational vehicle blog right into primarily a newsletter. I chose that was the business design I wanted to go after with that said residential property.
Yet, to purposefully seek it as an e-newsletter, I wanted a platform that was purpose-built for that. I was utilizing FluentCRM for the e-mail list for Happily RV, however FluentCRM is not an e-newsletter system. It is developed to be a CRM and marketing automation device and, frankly, utilizing it for newsletters is a little bit of a waste. Extra on that in a little bit.
As I stated because concern of the newsletter …
Simply put, BeeHiiv is a system with devices built right into it certain to my purpose. Things such as:
- Ability to release (to the blog) and send the e-mail all at once without having it be two different activities.
- Built in newsletter referral program. FluentCRM does not have that and I would certainly require a third-party tool like Sparkloop.
- Built-in capability to do cross-promotions with various other newsletters on the BeeHiiv system.
- ” Magic Hyperlinks”, which are basically one-click registration web links. Great for promotion in various other e-newsletters. FluentCRM has Smart Links, however, so there are methods to do that.
- Capability to do paid “boosts” on the BeeHiiv network to advertise your newsletter.
- Integrated ad network, if I select to generate income from with advertisements 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 doesn’t take a cut.
Basically, BeeHiiv is purpose-built for newsletter authors with features aimed at growth. The system was literally built by the people who accumulated the technology for Morning Brew. They recognize what they’re doing.
That is the point here. BeeHiiv is built from scratch for the purpose of running a newsletter. FluentCRM has a various objective.
And I ended off with this:.
I may certainly be relocating The Edge over to BeeHiiv also. At least, I’m highly considering it.
Well, I didn’t consider it for long. As a matter of fact, I just went all out. And actually, The EDGE was re-branded over to The Early morning WP, triggered as it’s own residential or commercial property to make sure that I can expand it much more purposefully also.
The goal is that each e-newsletter has the ability to be branded as it’s very own media entity and grown separately. Happily recreational vehicle was young, so easy to change. Yet, The Morning WP (formerly The Edge) was hidden in a sea of stuff below at the Blog Site Marketing Academy. By dividing it off, I can do what I can to grow it on it’s own. It will undoubtedly always be very closely linked with the Blog Marketing Academy, however doesn’t have to be a part of it.
I switched over to BeeHiiv due to the fact that it was developed for this function. FluentCRM was not.
E-newsletters Versus Just A Regular Email Listing
There’s a difference between a newsletter platform and simply an email listing.
You can hold your e-mail listing just about anywhere you desire and there are a variety of them available, from Aweber, ActiveCampaign, Drip, ConvertKit … over to self-hosted alternatives like GroundHogg and FluentCRM.
What’s the difference?
The key difference is that, with an e-newsletter system, the act of publishing means that it is mosting likely to your web site and to your e-mail clients at the same time.
With both BeeHiiv and Substack, you have a website. You are releasing to that web site. But, you are also dispatching to all clients at the same time. The website and it’s clients are done in one. This makes administration of the system much easier.
With a lot of email systems, any type of newsletter you established is done as an email campaign. It is constructed entirely individually from your internet site. So, as an example, you may release a short article to WordPress however after that you would certainly require to independently develop and send out an email to your listing to send it to clients. These are then two different collections of archives and two different actions since blog posts and your e-mails are not naturally linked.
The closest thing that transforms WordPress into a real e-newsletter system is Newsletter Glue.
It is a fitting name due to the fact that it virtually “glues” your e-newsletter to your WordPress messages and enables them to be the very same thing. Definitely, something like E-newsletter Glue would be a solid choice if I wished to continue to self-host everything. Nevertheless, you ‘d shed the growth tools that include a system like BeeHiiv.
Posting an e-newsletter naturally comes with a different set of needs than a normal e-mail checklist.
You don’t normally require much marketing automation. You don’t typically 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 assist you build your subscriber base that specify to e-newsletters.
BeeHiiv vs Substack
When I introduced to my clients that I was mosting likely to switch over the e-newsletter over to BeeHiiv, I had lots of people ask me why I was picking it over Substack.
To be clear, even besides the truth that I picked to choose BeeHiiv, that doesn’t suggest I believe Substack sucks. As a matter of fact, due to the fact that Substack has actually been about longer, it is elder and has even more features.
Although BeeHiiv is younger, there are a couple things that initially obtained my interest:.
- BeeHiiv is particularly customized to newsletter publishers. Actually, it is literally built by the same folks who constructed the modern technology behind Early morning Mixture. On the other hand, SubStack targets authors. In the real life, doesn’t matter. However, the noticeable positioning of BeeHiiv toward e-newsletter growth called me out over the even more common positioning of being a “designer”. Growth is what I have an interest in right here.
- That branding and differentiation additionally means that BeeHiiv has some relatively huge brands and big magazines using it. Whereas SubStack is intended more at solo makers. Again, it just tells me the customer character distinction in between the two business.
Sending our my e-newsletter via FluentCRM really did not precisely suck. The only reason I would certainly ponder shaking things up is if I thought I could expand the list faster. And BeeHiiv spoke precisely to that goal.
As a result of the targeting, I actually don’t watch BeeHiiv and Substack as direct rivals. I assume BeeHiiv is targeting a different sort of customer. As a matter of fact, if anything, I see BeeHiiv and ConvertKit being much more direct rivals.
But, let’s dive deeper than just the placing here.
Things That Make BeeHiiv Better Than Substack
Overall, BeeHiiv feels like it was built by people who recognizing email marketing. On the other hand, SubStack appears extra geared towards designers.
For instance, BeeHiiv offers custom-made fields on customers. Currently, it isn’t as developed as something like FluentCRM. However, it has it. Substack doesn’t.
BeeHiiv uses Automations. As a matter of fact, it is a visual automation builder that functions a great deal like what we have inside of FluentCRM.
To be clear, the automation performance is still early-phase. It is still quite limited in triggers and the only action is the ability to send out an email. Nevertheless, improvements are coming. Quickly sufficient, automations will certainly have new triggers as well as brand-new activities, such as modifying personalized areas, sending webhooks, and so on. I have actually currently seen enhancements to their automations simply given that I started using the system. For instance:
- Capability to activate automations based upon which particular embed type they was available in on.
- Ability to immediately do re-engagement (and take care of people based on opens up and non-opens).
- Capacity to do basic conditional reasoning branches.
Substack does not have automations such as this. Likely, it never will. Substack just can not do this since the target market of Substack just would not think to approach this like an e-mail marketer.
When it comes to creating your newsletters, the creating interface of BeeHiiv is just a lot more geared towards e-newsletters. In fact, it actually has similarities to the WordPress block builder in exactly how it functions. I discover it to be much more instinctive, personally.
Substack’s composing interface is nice and tidy, however it would be extra equal to the timeless editor for WordPress. Toolbar on top.
This difference is greater than simply type. As an example, with BeeHiiv you can insert a “Area” and afterwards put anything you want in it. After that, you can put Exposure alternatives on that particular area to reveal it only to paid clients, hide it from e-mail, hide from customers, reveal only to clients, etc. Substack provides absolutely nothing similar to this.
And when/if the moment comes that I begin a premium subscription model, BeeHiiv does not take any income. Actually, you actually connect up to your own Stripe account and it charges directly to it. With Substack, they will take 10% of your revenue. Relying on the number of customers you obtain, that 10% can be a fair bit even more cash than the regular monthly cost of BeeHiiv.
Lastly, BeeHiiv has an API. This might seem nerdy, but what it means is that there are integrations with BeeHiiv. You can in fact make BeeHiiv deal with the outdoors making use of devices like Zapier or Make.com. This is HUGE. Substack literally has … nothing. No integrations at all.
Overall, I simply seemed like BeeHiiv was more built toward real e-mail marketing. It was developed by individuals who “get it”. Also the opt-in forms and the landing page creates appear better built for conversions. Development is nitty-gritty with BeeHiiv.
Even though there are still features I want to see BeeHiiv include, I such as the direction it is going more than Substack.
Things That Make Substack Better Than BeeHiiv
As I have actually stated, Substack placements itself towards “developers” greater than email marketing professionals and e-newsletter owners. Because of that, you see some things geared a lot more toward people that simply believe in terms of content development.
For example, Substack supports podcasts. BeeHiiv does not.
Also, while BeeHiiv does support several magazines, they are treated rather individually. Whereas Substack does have the capacity to cross-post to multiple magazines at the same time. This isn’t something I need, yet … amazing for individuals that may need it.
Substack additionally has even more social functionality built-in. For instance, it has a conversation feature to host talks with customers. It additionally has a “Notes” feature which works kind of like a social media sites newsfeed where you can share points from other “Stacks” you’re reading. Intriguing. On the whole, Substack is set up to be more like a social media network which sustains long-form material.
In general, Substack is likewise more … minimal. You either take care of that or don’t. Directly, I don’t. However, if the goal is simpleness of interface and, honestly, features … Substack works pretty well.
Yet, I’ll be clear below …
When it concerns real marketing, I do not think there’s much uncertainty that BeeHiiv is better suited. I tried to find more points that make Substack far better than BeeHiiv, however frankly … I have a hard time discovering them.
BeeHiiv Vs ConvertKit
While BeeHiiv and Substack are usually with to be the closest competitors, I actually see BeeHiiv and ConvertKit being the closer rivals. Both are pursuing the same target audience and have similar capacities.
ConvertKit is also positioned at creators (like Substack), but it is far more highly satisfying people that do it for company. ConvertKit has good aesthetic automation building, it’s very own business system, and much more. ConvertKit is a really great platform.
I’m not mosting likely to bore you with a complete feature-by-feature breakdown right here. ConvertKit is well known already. Yet, right here’s exactly how I really feel BeeHiiv and ConvertKit compare …
Points ConvertKit Is Better At …
Already, ConvertKit has much more versatility when it comes to it’s automations. I will certainly additionally claim that I find ConvertKit’s automation builder to be a little bit a lot more intuitive than that of BeeHiiv.
ConvertKit supports tagging. This is just a fundamental function of e-mail listings that enables segmentation in an even more adaptable method than BeeHiiv currently does. I expect BeeHiiv to sustain tagging at some time quickly, frankly. It seems like an oversight that it is missing Beehiiv Chatbot Assistant.
ConvertKit does now supply the capability to market things via their very own platform. BeeHiiv does not. If that is necessary to you, it may be a big deal for you. For me, nonetheless, I would certainly always choose a much more straight choice anyhow. For me, I like to utilize my very own platform powered by WooCommerce.
ConvertKit has been about much longer and for that reason has way extra integration alternatives. Tons of web-based devices and WordPress plugins integrate with ConvertKit. ConvertKit even has their very own WordPress plugin that is rather effective. For instance, their plugin now also sustains member-gated web content along with auto-embed of your newsletter archives right into your site. Fundamentally, this a lot more closely places ConvertKit right into direct competitors by having you be able to publish to your website and your email checklist at the same time.
BeeHiiv is badly doing not have in these type of third-party integrations at the moment. It’ll get there. But, we’re not there yet with it.
ConvertKit is also hectic taking on the development devices of BeeHiiv. For instance, BeeHiiv has the referral program and the Recommendation Engine where you can not just incentivize people to share your newsletter with rewards, but you can additionally pay per lead within the internal ad network of BeeHiiv to grow your list. These are really awesome features of BeeHiiv. Yet …
Did you understand ConvertKit acquired Sparkloop? Sparkloop is just one of one of the most popular viral promo systems for newsletters … and ConvertKit bought it. You can see the creating on the wall for what this suggests for the system going forward.
Things BeeHiiv Is Much Better At … Beehiiv Chatbot Assistant
BeeHiiv is a lot earlier in it’s product cycle than ConvertKit. Part of that implies less features and much less integrations, which is all-natural for this phase of the cycle. Nonetheless, it likewise suggests that they are swiftly creating.
In the short time that I have actually been a customer of BeeHiiv, I have actually seen almost regular release of new features into the platform. And these aren’t weak little features … but huge features that are fairly important. Their rate of growth at this point has actually gone over.
I likewise quite appreciate just how receptive they are. As a matter of fact, one of their item news concerning some style enhancements to the website design features in fact contained a tiny problem with the web content width. I simply responded to that e-mail to tell them. I promptly got a reply straight from the chief executive officer:.
That very same day, the issue was repaired.
Few days later, I gave them one more idea …
Sure enough, in a little bit over a week of that exchange, the ability to activate automations based on the embed kind utilized was included in the system.
That kind of responsiveness and straight participation of the group is something I truly value.
One more major factor of differentiation right here is the rate. Both platforms offer complimentary plans, however the BeeHiiv free plan provides much more capacity and even more clients (2,500 vs 1,000) than ConvertKit.
Once you most likely to paid plans, the pricing of BeeHiiv is additionally FAR more positive. ConvertKit seems more affordable in the beginning glance due to the fact that their pricing page shows lower numbers, however the subscriber limitations are FAR lower and your cost swiftly boosts as your checklist grows.
With BeeHiiv, your very first degree paid plan begins at $42/mo (paid each year), nevertheless you can have up to 10,000 clients. That same size checklist is going to run you $100/month with ConvertKit.
If you upgrade to the “Range” plan with BeeHiiv (their best plan and the one I directly use), you can grow your checklist approximately 100,000. A checklist of that dimension 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, also. With BeeHiiv, you can get all that for simply $84/month if you pay annually.
BeeHiiv remains in an entirely various league when it concerns pricing (in an excellent way).
Will BeeHiiv eventually increase costs? They might as time goes on. But, I’m presuming people like myself that are currently in will be locked-in. We’ll see exactly how things proceed.
Points I Would Certainly Like BeeHiiv To Include
Among the important things you absolutely require to bear in mind is that BeeHiiv is fairly young. They do seem to evolve rather rapidly and make brand-new item announcements rather often, yet there are some fundamental features I actually wish they had that I require to simply wait for.
One is that they require to have a setup on registration types where I might choose an automation to run right at the form degree. That would certainly be AWESOME for numerous reasons. Currently, membership kinds look OK, however there’s very little setups for them to aid in segmentation.
It would certainly be nice to have labeling at the client level. This would be effective.
I assume webhooks must belong to automations to make built-in automations less complicated and decrease dependence on outside tools like Zapier.
There are also some small management interface modifications that would come in handy. For instance:
- Capacity to mass edit/remove clients.
- Capacity to mass edit blog posts (as an example, to tag a bunch of them at the same time).
- Having a few standard areas as basic on clients (like the name).
- Some more customization choices for the site (such as more flexible color choices, headline control, and so on).
So, yeah … there are some drawbacks. Points I hope they do with it in the near future. BeeHiiv is respectable, however it isn’t ideal and definitely not nearly as created as something like FluentCRM or any other actual CRM item.
It most likely never will certainly be, either. As I said, the objective is different so it wouldn’t a lot a great deal of sense for BeeHiiv to end up being a full marketing automation system. I guess you never ever understand, however.
Last Ideas On This BeeHiiv Review
I like BeeHiiv rather a whole lot. Sufficient where I chose to switch my own e-newsletters over to the platform regardless of my personal preference for digital sovereignty and owning my very own system.
Put simply, for the newsletter posting model particularly, I saw adequate value in their platform to warrant the adjustment.
Bear in mind, I do not make use of BeeHiiv as my exclusive e-mail list. I utilize BeeHiiv for what it is proficient at, yet I intentionally have points establish to make sure that I likewise maintain my checklist “in residence” within FluentCRM.
If you make use of BeeHiiv, I recommend you do the same. It is just an excellent insurance plan, for one. But, having a full-featured marketing automation platform for your listing will be of high use (FluentCRM is a complete marketing automation system and BeeHiiv is not and likely never ever will certainly be).
So, the concern is … should YOU make use of BeeHiiv?
In my point of view, if you are using Substack now, I ‘d certainly take into consideration switching over to BeeHiiv. It will just be more business-friendly. It is targeting various capacities and various demands. And also, BeeHiiv also has import devices for Substack, so the button should be pretty straightforward.
If you are on ConvertKit now, I ‘d possibly stay put unless you have a huge email checklist and are consequently being wooled with their high month-to-month expense. You will not (yet) have every feature of ConvertKit with BeeHiiv, however they are iterating promptly. There’s likewise a pretty good chance you’re not also using some of those fancier functions of ConvertKit and you do not even require them. Because of that, BeeHiiv can conveniently be a much better and more budget friendly fit.
Lastly, if you plan to be really willful regarding growing an e-newsletter, I think BeeHiiv is THE system to consider and maintain and eye on for you.
If you use BeeHiiv with eyes wide open regarding what it is designed to be, it is just one of the very best games in the area today. This is the system to view.
BeeHiiv supplies a 14-day trial on their paid plans. It deserves having a look at on your own. And if you end up not sticking with the paid plan, you’ll find the complimentary account to be fairly feature abundant.