I have made use of a lot of various email list systems over the years. In the last couple of years, I’ve been a huge supporter of digital sovereignty and having your own platform. Therefore (and the awesome features), I have actually been using Beehiiv Facebook Ads.
So, it is without a doubt a weird move for me to choose to utilize BeeHiiv. Nevertheless, it is a hosted application and I am paying regular monthly for it.
Why did I do this?
In this BeeHiiv review, I wish to go over why I made the switch to BeeHiiv for my newsletters. I want to attend to the issue of digital sovereignty while utilizing the platform and I ‘d additionally like to resolve why I picked to use it over Substack.
Allow’s dive in …
BeeHiiv: Developed For Newsletters
In Problem # 435 of my e-newsletter called My Pastime + A Big Shift In Strategy, I spoke about exactly how and why I determined to turn my recreational vehicle blog into mainly an e-newsletter. I determined that was the business version I wished to go after with that said residential property.
However, to deliberately 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 Gladly motor home, however FluentCRM is not a newsletter system. It is developed to be a CRM and marketing automation device and, honestly, using it for e-newsletters is a little a waste. A lot more on that particular in a bit.
As I stated in that issue of the newsletter …
Put simply, BeeHiiv is a platform with tools built into it particular to my function. Things such as:
- Ability to release (to the blog) and send the e-mail concurrently without having it be 2 separate activities.
- Constructed in e-newsletter referral program. FluentCRM doesn’t have that and I would certainly require a third-party device like Sparkloop.
- Built-in capacity to do cross-promotions with other e-newsletters on the BeeHiiv system.
- ” Magic Links”, which are basically one-click membership web links. Great for promo in various other newsletters. FluentCRM has Smart Hyperlinks, however, so there are ways to do that.
- Capacity to do paid “boosts” on the BeeHiiv network to advertise your newsletter.
- Integrated ad network, if I choose to monetize with ads in the newsletter. And I may.
- Built-in capacity to run a paid newsletter upgrade and basically run a premium newsletter. And BeeHiiv doesn’t take a cut.
Primarily, BeeHiiv is purpose-built for newsletter publishers with features targeted at development. The platform was essentially developed by the individuals that developed the modern technology for Early morning Brew. They recognize what they’re doing.
That is the factor here. BeeHiiv is developed from scratch for the function of running an e-newsletter. FluentCRM has a various objective.
And I finished off with this:.
I may certainly be moving The Edge over to BeeHiiv as well. A minimum of, I’m highly considering it.
Well, I didn’t consider it for long. As a matter of fact, I simply went for it. And as a matter of fact, The side was re-branded over to The Morning WP, set off as it’s very own building so that I can grow it more deliberately as well.
The goal is that each newsletter has the capacity to be branded as it’s very own media entity and expanded separately. Happily motor home was young, so very easy to change. However, The Morning WP (formerly The Side) was buried in a sea of things below at the Blog Marketing Academy. By separating it off, I can do what I can to expand it on it’s own. It will clearly always be closely linked with the Blog Marketing Academy, yet does not have to belong of it.
I changed to BeeHiiv since it was constructed for this function. FluentCRM was not.
E-newsletters Versus Just A Normal Email Checklist
There’s a distinction in between an e-newsletter system and just an e-mail listing.
You can organize your email checklist just about anywhere you want and there are a variety of them out there, from Aweber, ActiveCampaign, Drip, ConvertKit … over to self-hosted alternatives like GroundHogg and FluentCRM.
What’s the distinction?
The key difference is that, with a newsletter platform, the act of publishing implies that it is mosting likely to your website and to your email subscribers concurrently.
With both BeeHiiv and Substack, you have a web site. You are releasing to that website. Yet, you are likewise sending off to all clients at the same time. The internet site and it’s clients are done in one. This makes management of the system much simpler.
With many e-mail systems, any type of e-newsletter you set up is done as an email campaign. It is developed completely independently from your site. So, as an example, you could release an article to WordPress yet after that you would need to independently build and send out an email to your checklist to send it to customers. These are after that 2 different sets of archives and 2 different activities since blog posts and your e-mails are not naturally linked.
The closest thing that transforms WordPress right into a real e-newsletter platform is E-newsletter Glue.
It is a suitable name due to the fact that it virtually “adhesives” your newsletter to your WordPress blog posts and allows them to be the exact same thing. Absolutely, something like Newsletter Glue would certainly be a solid option if I wanted to remain to self-host everything. However, you would certainly lose the development tools that include a platform like BeeHiiv.
Posting an e-newsletter naturally features a various set of demands than a normal e-mail list.
You don’t typically need much marketing automation. You do not typically need autoresponder sequences, event monitoring, and all the bells and whistles of a marketing automation system.
What you DO requirement, though, is one seamless publishing experience and development tools to aid you build your client base that specify to newsletters.
BeeHiiv vs Substack
When I announced to my subscribers that I was mosting likely to switch over the e-newsletter over to BeeHiiv, I had many individuals ask me why I was choosing it over Substack.
To be clear, even besides the reality that I selected to go with BeeHiiv, that doesn’t suggest I believe Substack sucks. In fact, since Substack has actually been about much longer, it is more mature and has more features.
Despite the fact that BeeHiiv is more youthful, there are a couple points that originally obtained my focus:.
- BeeHiiv is specifically tailored to newsletter publishers. As a matter of fact, it is actually developed by the exact same people that built the innovation behind Early morning Brew. On the other hand, SubStack targets writers. In the real world, does not matter. Yet, the apparent positioning of BeeHiiv towards e-newsletter development called me out over the even more generic positioning of being a “maker”. Development is what I’m interested in here.
- That branding and differentiation also implies that BeeHiiv has some fairly huge brands and huge magazines using it. Whereas SubStack is intended more at solo designers. Once more, it just tells me the customer character distinction in between the two firms.
Sending our my newsletter via FluentCRM really did not precisely suck. The only reason I would ponder shaking things up is if I assumed I could expand the listing faster. And BeeHiiv talked exactly to that objective.
Because of the targeting, I actually don’t view BeeHiiv and Substack as straight competitors. I believe BeeHiiv is targeting a various type of consumer. As a matter of fact, if anything, I see BeeHiiv and ConvertKit being much more direct rivals.
Yet, allow’s dive deeper than just the placing right here.
Points That Make BeeHiiv Better Than Substack
On the whole, BeeHiiv feels like it was developed by people that recognizing email marketing. On the other hand, SubStack appears a lot more geared toward developers.
For example, BeeHiiv provides personalized fields on subscribers. Now, it isn’t as created as something like FluentCRM. However, it has it. Substack doesn’t.
BeeHiiv offers Automations. Actually, it is a visual 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 fairly limited in triggers and the only activity is the ability to send out an email. Nonetheless, enhancements are coming. Soon sufficient, automations will have new triggers as well as brand-new activities, such as modifying personalized fields, sending out webhooks, and so on. I have actually already seen improvements to their automations simply considering that I started utilizing the system. For example:
- Capability to cause automations based on which particular embed kind they can be found in on.
- Capacity to immediately do re-engagement (and manage individuals based on opens and non-opens).
- Capability to do fundamental conditional logic branches.
Substack does not have automations such as this. Likely, it never will. Substack just can’t do this because the target market of Substack simply would not think to approach this like an e-mail marketing expert.
When it concerns creating your newsletters, the writing user interface of BeeHiiv is just much more geared towards e-newsletters. As a matter of fact, it in fact has resemblances to the WordPress block builder in how it works. I locate it to be more user-friendly, personally.
Substack’s creating user interface behaves and clean, but it would certainly be more equal to the classic editor for WordPress. Toolbar on top.
This difference is greater than simply kind. For instance, with BeeHiiv you can insert a “Area” and afterwards put anything you want in it. After that, you can place Visibility choices on that section to show it just to paid clients, conceal it from e-mail, conceal from customers, show only to clients, and so on. Substack uses nothing such as this.
And when/if the time comes that I start a costs registration model, BeeHiiv doesn’t take any kind of revenue. As a matter of fact, you literally connect as much as your very own Stripe account and it charges straight to it. With Substack, they will take 10% of your revenue. Relying on the number of subscribers you get, that 10% can be quite a bit more money than the regular monthly cost of BeeHiiv.
Last but not least, BeeHiiv has an API. This could seem unpopular, but what it means is that there are integrations with BeeHiiv. You can in fact make BeeHiiv work with the outside using devices like Zapier or Make.com. This is HUGE. Substack literally has … nothing. No integrations in all.
Generally, I simply felt like BeeHiiv was a lot more constructed towards genuine email marketing. It was developed by people that “get it”. Also the opt-in types and the landing page makes seem much better constructed for conversions. Development is the name of the game with BeeHiiv.
Despite the fact that there are still features I wish to see BeeHiiv add, I such as the direction it is going greater than Substack.
Points That Make Substack Better Than BeeHiiv
As I have actually claimed, Substack placements itself toward “developers” more than email marketers and newsletter owners. Therefore, you see some points geared much more towards people that just believe in regards to web content production.
As an example, Substack sustains podcasts. BeeHiiv does not.
Also, while BeeHiiv does sustain several magazines, they are dealt with fairly individually. Whereas Substack does have the capacity to cross-post to multiple magazines at the same time. This isn’t something I need, yet … trendy for individuals who might require it.
Substack additionally has more social capability built-in. As an example, it has a conversation feature to host talks with customers. It additionally has a “Notes” function which functions sort of like a social networks newsfeed where you can share things from other “Stacks” you’re reading. Intriguing. Generally, Substack is established to be much more like a social media network which sustains long-form material.
Overall, Substack is also more … minimalist. You either look after that or don’t. Personally, I don’t. However, if the goal is simpleness of interface and, honestly, features … Substack functions rather well.
Yet, I’ll be clear here …
When it involves actual marketing, I do not think there’s much doubt that BeeHiiv is much better fit. I tried to find more factors that make Substack much better than BeeHiiv, however frankly … I have a difficult time locating them.
BeeHiiv Vs ConvertKit
While BeeHiiv and Substack are typically via to be the closest competitors, I actually see BeeHiiv and ConvertKit being the closer opponents. Both are going after the very same target market and have comparable capacities.
ConvertKit is also positioned at designers (like Substack), yet it is much more highly satisfying people who do it for business. ConvertKit has good visual automation building, it’s own business system, and more. ConvertKit is a really nice platform.
I’m not going to bore you with a complete feature-by-feature failure below. ConvertKit is popular already. Yet, here’s how I really feel BeeHiiv and ConvertKit contrast …
Points ConvertKit Is Better At …
As of now, ConvertKit has much more versatility when it pertains to it’s automations. I will additionally state that I discover ConvertKit’s automation builder to be a little bit more user-friendly than that of BeeHiiv.
ConvertKit supports marking. This is just a fundamental function of e-mail lists that makes it possible for division in a much more versatile means than BeeHiiv currently does. I anticipate BeeHiiv to support identifying at some point quickly, frankly. It feels like an oversight that it is missing Beehiiv Facebook Ads.
ConvertKit does currently supply the ability to offer things via their very own system. 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 an extra straight option anyway. For me, I favor to utilize my own system powered by WooCommerce.
ConvertKit has been about much longer and for that reason has way more integration alternatives. Lots of online tools and WordPress plugins incorporate with ConvertKit. ConvertKit also has their own WordPress plugin that is quite effective. As an example, their plugin now also supports member-gated material along with auto-embed of your newsletter archives right into your site. In essence, this a lot more very closely places ConvertKit right into direct competitors by having you have the ability to publish to your site and your e-mail checklist at the same time.
BeeHiiv is significantly lacking in these type of third-party integrations presently. It’ll get there. However, we’re not there yet with it.
ConvertKit is also active taking on the development tools of BeeHiiv. For example, BeeHiiv has the referral program and the Referral Engine where you can not only incentivize individuals to share your e-newsletter with rewards, however you can likewise pay per lead within the internal ad network of BeeHiiv to expand your checklist. These are really incredible features of BeeHiiv. Yet …
Did you recognize ConvertKit obtained Sparkloop? Sparkloop is among one of the most well known viral promo systems for newsletters … and ConvertKit bought it. You can see the composing on the wall surface for what this means for the platform going forward.
Things BeeHiiv Is Better At … Beehiiv Facebook Ads
BeeHiiv is a lot earlier in it’s product cycle than ConvertKit. Part of that means less features and much less integrations, which is all-natural for this phase of the cycle. Nevertheless, it likewise means that they are quickly developing.
In the short time that I have actually been a customer of BeeHiiv, I have seen practically regular launch of brand-new features right into the system. And these aren’t puny little features … but large features that are quite important. Their rate of advancement at this point has been impressive.
I also very much appreciate how responsive they are. As a matter of fact, among their item announcements regarding some layout enhancements to the website design features really contained a small issue with the material size. I simply responded to that email to tell them. I quickly got a reply directly from the CEO:.
That very same day, the problem was fixed.
Couple of days later on, I provided another idea …
Indeed, in a little bit over a week of that exchange, the capability to cause automations based on the embed form made use of was included in the system.
That sort of responsiveness and direct involvement of the group is something I truly appreciate.
Another significant factor of differentiation below is the price. Both systems provide free plans, however the BeeHiiv free plan provides a lot more capability and more customers (2,500 vs 1,000) than ConvertKit.
When you go to paid plans, the pricing of BeeHiiv is additionally FAR more favorable. ConvertKit appears less costly initially glimpse since their pricing web page reveals reduced numbers, however the customer limits are much reduced and your price promptly enhances as your list expands.
With BeeHiiv, your initial level paid plan begins at $42/mo (paid annually), nevertheless you can have up to 10,000 subscribers. That exact same dimension list is going to run you $100/month with ConvertKit.
If you update to the “Range” plan with BeeHiiv (their finest plan and the one I directly use), you can grow your listing as much as 100,000. A listing of that dimension would run you $566/month with ConvertKit. If you desire their referral network, as well, that puts you at the $733/month plan. That’s if you pay every year, also. With BeeHiiv, you can get all that for just $84/month if you pay yearly.
BeeHiiv is in a totally different league when it involves pricing (in a great way).
Will BeeHiiv eventually enhance prices? They might as time takes place. But, I’m presuming individuals like myself that are already in will be locked-in. We’ll see exactly how things proceed.
Things I Would Like BeeHiiv To Add
Among the important things you definitely need to keep in mind is that BeeHiiv is fairly young. They do appear to evolve rather promptly and make brand-new product news rather usually, but there are some standard features I really desire they had that I require to just wait on.
One is that they need to have a setup on registration kinds where I might choose an automation to run right at the form degree. That would be AWESOME for numerous factors. Currently, subscription types look OK, but there’s really little setups for them to aid in segmentation.
It would behave to have identifying at the subscriber level. This would be effective.
I believe webhooks need to be part of automations to make integrated automations much easier and minimize dependence on outdoors devices like Zapier.
There are additionally some small administrative interface changes that would be handy. For example:
- Capacity to mass edit/remove subscribers.
- Capability to mass edit blog posts (for example, to identify a number of them at the same time).
- Having a couple of basic fields as standard on clients (like the name).
- Some even more modification choices for the site (such as more flexible shade selections, headline control, etc).
So, yeah … there are some shortcomings. Points I hope they finish with it in the near future. BeeHiiv is respectable, however it isn’t perfect and absolutely not almost as established as something like FluentCRM or any other actual CRM item.
It probably never will certainly be, either. As I claimed, the objective is various so it would not much a lot of sense for BeeHiiv to become a complete marketing automation platform. I presume you never recognize, though.
Last Ideas On This BeeHiiv Review
I like BeeHiiv rather a whole lot. Enough where I chose to switch my very own e-newsletters over to the system regardless of my individual preference for digital sovereignty and owning my very own platform.
Put simply, for the newsletter publishing design especially, I saw adequate worth in their system to warrant the adjustment.
Bear in mind, I do not utilize BeeHiiv as my special email checklist. I use BeeHiiv of what it is efficient, yet I intentionally have things establish so that I likewise keep my list “in residence” within FluentCRM.
If you use BeeHiiv, I suggest you do the very same. It is simply an excellent insurance policy, for one. However, having a full-featured marketing automation system for your list will be of high use (FluentCRM is a full marketing automation system and BeeHiiv is not and likely never ever will be).
So, the question is … should YOU use BeeHiiv?
In my viewpoint, if you are using Substack now, I ‘d certainly think about switching to BeeHiiv. It will merely be more business-friendly. It is targeting various capabilities and various demands. Plus, BeeHiiv even has import devices for Substack, so the switch should be pretty uncomplicated.
If you are on ConvertKit now, I ‘d most likely stay put unless you have a large e-mail listing and are for that reason being fleeced with their high regular monthly expense. You will certainly not (yet) have every feature of ConvertKit with BeeHiiv, but they are iterating swiftly. There’s additionally a pretty good chance you’re not even utilizing a few of those fancier functions of ConvertKit and you don’t even require them. Because of that, BeeHiiv could conveniently be a far better and a lot more cost effective fit.
Last but not least, if you plan to be very willful about 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 concerning what it is created to be, it is among the best games in the area right now. This is the platform to view.
BeeHiiv offers a 14-day trial on their paid plans. It deserves having a look at for yourself. And if you end up not sticking with the paid plan, you’ll find the complimentary account to be quite feature rich.