I have utilized a great deal of various e-mail list systems throughout the years. In the last number of years, I’ve been a huge proponent of digital sovereignty and possessing your very own platform. For that reason (and the incredible features), I have been making use of Who Owns Beehiiv.
So, it is certainly a weird move for me to determine to make use of BeeHiiv. After all, it is an organized 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 wish to deal with the concern of digital sovereignty while using the system and I would certainly additionally like to attend to why I chose to utilize it over Substack.
Allow’s dive in …
BeeHiiv: Built For E-newsletters
In Issue # 435 of my newsletter called My Hobby + A Large Shift In Approach, I spoke about just how and why I determined to turn my RV blog into primarily a newsletter. I determined that was the business model I wished to seek with that residential or commercial property.
But, to purposefully pursue it as an e-newsletter, I wanted a system that was purpose-built for that. I was utilizing FluentCRM for the email listing for Gladly recreational vehicle, but FluentCRM is not an e-newsletter platform. It is constructed to be a CRM and marketing automation tool and, honestly, utilizing it for e-newsletters is a bit of a waste. More on that in a little bit.
As I claimed because issue of the newsletter …
Simply put, BeeHiiv is a system with devices developed into it particular to my objective. Things such as:
- Ability to release (to the blog site) and send the email at the same time without having it be 2 separate actions.
- Constructed in newsletter referral program. FluentCRM doesn’t have that and I would have needed a third-party device like Sparkloop.
- Built-in capacity to do cross-promotions with various other newsletters on the BeeHiiv platform.
- ” Magic Links”, which are primarily one-click membership web links. Great for promotion in other e-newsletters. FluentCRM has Smart Links, though, so there are methods to do that.
- Capability to do paid “boosts” on the BeeHiiv network to promote your newsletter.
- Integrated ad network, if I select to generate income from with advertisements in the e-newsletter. And I may.
- Integrated ability to run a paid newsletter upgrade and generally run a costs newsletter. And BeeHiiv doesn’t take a cut.
Basically, BeeHiiv is purpose-built for e-newsletter publishers with features aimed at growth. The system was essentially developed by the people that accumulated the innovation for Early morning Brew. They recognize what they’re doing.
That is the point right here. BeeHiiv is built from scratch for the function of running a newsletter. FluentCRM has a different objective.
And I ended off with this:.
I may indeed be moving The Side over to BeeHiiv as well. A minimum of, I’m strongly considering it.
Well, I didn’t consider it for long. Actually, I just went for it. And actually, The EDGE was re-branded over to The Morning WP, set off as it’s own home so that I can grow it more intentionally also.
The goal is that each e-newsletter has the ability to be branded as it’s own media entity and grown individually. Happily recreational vehicle was young, so very easy to shift. Yet, The Morning WP (previously The Edge) was hidden in a sea of things here at the Blog Site Marketing Academy. By separating it off, I can do what I can to expand it on it’s own. It will undoubtedly constantly be very closely linked with the Blog site Marketing Academy, but doesn’t have to belong of it.
I changed to BeeHiiv due to the fact that it was constructed for this purpose. FluentCRM was not.
Newsletters Versus Simply A Normal Email Listing
There’s a difference between an e-newsletter platform and just an email list.
You can organize your e-mail checklist everywhere you desire and there are a variety of them available, from Aweber, ActiveCampaign, Drip, ConvertKit … over to self-hosted options like GroundHogg and FluentCRM.
What’s the distinction?
The key distinction is that, with an e-newsletter platform, the act of posting suggests that it is mosting likely to your website and to your e-mail subscribers at the same time.
With both BeeHiiv and Substack, you have a site. You are releasing to that website. However, you are likewise sending off to all clients at the same time. The website and it’s subscribers are all in one. This makes administration of the platform much simpler.
With a lot of email platforms, any kind of e-newsletter you set up is done as an email campaign. It is built entirely individually from your site. So, as an example, you may publish a post to WordPress yet then you would certainly need to separately build and send out an email to your listing to send it to clients. These are after that two different sets of archives and two separate actions since blog posts and your emails are not naturally connected.
The closest point that turns WordPress right into a true e-newsletter system is E-newsletter Glue.
It is a suitable name due to the fact that it basically “adhesives” your e-newsletter to your WordPress blog posts and permits them to be the same point. Absolutely, something like Newsletter Glue would certainly be a solid option if I wished to remain to self-host everything. However, you ‘d lose the growth tools that come with a platform like BeeHiiv.
Posting a newsletter inherently features a various collection of demands than a typical e-mail list.
You do not typically require much marketing automation. You don’t normally need autoresponder series, event tracking, 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 construct your customer base that are specific to e-newsletters.
BeeHiiv vs Substack
When I introduced to my subscribers that I was mosting likely to switch over the newsletter over to BeeHiiv, I had lots of people ask me why I was selecting it over Substack.
To be clear, even besides the fact that I chose to opt for BeeHiiv, that does not suggest I think Substack draws. Actually, since Substack has been about much longer, it is elder and has even more features.
Despite the fact that BeeHiiv is younger, there are a pair points that initially obtained my focus:.
- BeeHiiv is particularly customized to newsletter authors. As a matter of fact, it is literally constructed by the exact same individuals who constructed the technology behind Early morning Mixture. On the other hand, SubStack targets writers. In the real world, doesn’t matter. However, the obvious positioning of BeeHiiv toward newsletter growth called me out over the more common positioning of being a “creator”. Development is what I want below.
- That branding and differentiation likewise indicates that BeeHiiv has some rather big brand names and large publications using it. Whereas SubStack is intended even more at solo creators. Again, it simply tells me the client avatar distinction between the two companies.
Sending our my newsletter through FluentCRM didn’t specifically suck. The only factor I would contemplate drinking things up is if I believed I could GROW the listing quicker. And BeeHiiv spoke exactly to that goal.
Due to the targeting, I in fact don’t watch BeeHiiv and Substack as direct rivals. I assume BeeHiiv is targeting a different kind of consumer. In fact, if anything, I see BeeHiiv and ConvertKit being a lot more straight competitors.
But, let’s dive deeper than just the placing here.
Points That Make BeeHiiv Better Than Substack
In general, BeeHiiv feels like it was built by individuals that comprehending email marketing. On the other hand, SubStack seems more tailored toward designers.
As an example, BeeHiiv offers personalized areas on customers. Currently, it isn’t as established as something like FluentCRM. But, it has it. Substack doesn’t.
BeeHiiv offers Automations. In fact, it is a visual automation builder that works a lot 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 ability to send out an email. Nonetheless, improvements are coming. Quickly sufficient, automations will certainly have new triggers along with new activities, such as modifying personalized fields, sending out webhooks, etc. I’ve already seen enhancements to their automations simply given that I began using the platform. For instance:
- Capability to set off automations based on which specific embed type they came in on.
- Capability to automatically do re-engagement (and deal with 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 ever will. Substack just can not do this because the target market of Substack just wouldn’t think to approach this like an email online marketer.
When it involves writing your e-newsletters, the writing user interface of BeeHiiv is simply a lot more geared toward e-newsletters. As a matter of fact, it in fact has similarities to the WordPress block builder in exactly how it works. I locate it to be extra intuitive, personally.
Substack’s creating interface is nice and tidy, but it would be extra comparable to the traditional editor for WordPress. Toolbar at the top.
This distinction is more than just form. As an example, with BeeHiiv you can put a “Section” and then put anything you want in it. Then, you can put Visibility options on that section to reveal it just to paid clients, hide it from email, conceal from customers, show just to customers, etc. Substack supplies nothing such as this.
And when/if the time comes that I start a premium subscription model, BeeHiiv doesn’t take any kind of revenue. In fact, you actually link as much as your own Stripe account and it charges directly to it. With Substack, they will certainly take 10% of your income. Relying on how many clients you obtain, that 10% can be a fair bit even more money than the regular monthly cost of BeeHiiv.
Last but not least, BeeHiiv has an API. This could seem unpopular, but what it indicates is that there are integrations with BeeHiiv. You can actually make BeeHiiv work with the outdoors using devices like Zapier or Make.com. This is HUGE. Substack actually has … nothing. No integrations whatsoever.
Generally, I simply felt like BeeHiiv was much more developed towards actual email marketing. It was built by people that “get it”. Even the opt-in forms and the landing page creates appear better constructed for conversions. Growth is nitty-gritty with BeeHiiv.
Despite the fact that there are still features I would like to see BeeHiiv include, I such as the instructions it is going greater than Substack.
Things That Make Substack Better Than BeeHiiv
As I have said, Substack settings itself toward “creators” greater than e-mail online marketers and newsletter owners. Because of that, you see some points tailored a lot more toward people that just believe in terms of material development.
As an example, Substack supports podcasts. BeeHiiv does not.
Additionally, while BeeHiiv does support several publications, they are dealt with fairly independently. Whereas Substack does have the ability to cross-post to numerous publications at the same time. This isn’t something I need, yet … awesome for individuals that could require it.
Substack likewise has even more social capability built-in. As an example, it has a chat feature to host talks with customers. It also has a “Notes” feature which functions type of like a social networks newsfeed where you can share points from various other “Stacks” you read. Intriguing. On the whole, Substack is set up to be more like a social network which sustains long-form content.
Overall, Substack is also extra … minimal. You either look after that or do not. Personally, I do not. Nonetheless, if the goal is simplicity of user interface and, honestly, features … Substack functions rather well.
Yet, I’ll be clear right here …
When it comes to actual marketing, I do not believe there’s much uncertainty that BeeHiiv is much better suited. I searched for even more points that make Substack far better than BeeHiiv, however honestly … I have a difficult time discovering them.
BeeHiiv Vs ConvertKit
While BeeHiiv and Substack are commonly through to be the closest competitors, I really see BeeHiiv and ConvertKit being the closer competitors. Both are going after the very same target market and have similar abilities.
ConvertKit is likewise positioned at designers (like Substack), but it is much more strongly satisfying individuals that do it for company. ConvertKit has nice aesthetic automation building, it’s very own commerce system, and more. ConvertKit is a truly good system.
I’m not going to bore you with a complete feature-by-feature failure right here. ConvertKit is well known already. But, below’s just how I really feel BeeHiiv and ConvertKit compare …
Points ConvertKit Is Better At …
As of now, ConvertKit has more versatility when it comes to it’s automations. I will likewise say that I find ConvertKit’s automation builder to be a little bit extra user-friendly than that of BeeHiiv.
ConvertKit sustains marking. This is simply a standard feature of e-mail listings that enables division in a much more versatile way than BeeHiiv currently does. I expect BeeHiiv to support identifying at some time soon, honestly. It feels like an oversight that it is missing Who Owns Beehiiv.
ConvertKit does now give the capacity to offer things by means of their own platform. BeeHiiv does not. If that’s important to you, it might be a big deal for you. For me, nevertheless, I would certainly constantly choose a more straight choice anyhow. For me, I prefer to use my own platform powered by WooCommerce.
ConvertKit has actually been about much longer and therefore has way much more integration alternatives. Tons of web-based devices and WordPress plugins integrate with ConvertKit. ConvertKit even has their very own WordPress plugin that is quite powerful. For example, their plugin now also sustains member-gated web content as well as auto-embed of your newsletter archives right into your site. In essence, this a lot more carefully places ConvertKit right into direct competitors by having you have the ability to release to your website and your e-mail list at the same time.
BeeHiiv is significantly lacking in these kinds of third-party integrations currently. It’ll arrive. But, we’re not there yet with it.
ConvertKit is even active taking on the development devices of BeeHiiv. For example, BeeHiiv has the referral program and the Referral Engine where you can not just incentivize individuals to share your newsletter with rewards, but you can also pay per lead within the inner advertisement network of BeeHiiv to expand your checklist. These are actually incredible features of BeeHiiv. However …
Did you recognize ConvertKit obtained Sparkloop? Sparkloop is among one of the most popular viral promo systems for newsletters … and ConvertKit bought it. You can see the composing on the wall of what this implies for the system going forward.
Points BeeHiiv Is Much Better At … Who Owns Beehiiv
BeeHiiv is much earlier in it’s item cycle than ConvertKit. Part of that indicates less features and less integrations, which is all-natural for this phase of the cycle. Nonetheless, it likewise implies that they are rapidly creating.
In the short time that I have been a customer of BeeHiiv, I have observed almost regular launch of brand-new features right into the platform. And these aren’t puny little features … but huge features that are quite crucial. Their speed of advancement at this point has actually been impressive.
I likewise quite appreciate just how receptive they are. As a matter of fact, among their product news about some style enhancements to the web design features actually included a little issue with the content size. I just replied to that email to tell them. I rapidly got a reply straight from the CEO:.
That same day, the problem was dealt with.
Few days later on, I gave them an additional suggestion …
Certainly, in a bit over a week of that exchange, the capacity to cause automations based on the embed type used was included in the system.
That sort of responsiveness and straight involvement of the team is something I really appreciate.
An additional significant point of distinction below is the rate. Both systems supply cost-free plans, nonetheless the BeeHiiv free plan offers extra capacity 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 much more favorable. ConvertKit seems less costly at first look due to the fact that their pricing page reveals reduced numbers, nonetheless the client limitations are much reduced and your price quickly increases as your listing expands.
With BeeHiiv, your initial level paid plan starts at $42/mo (paid every year), nevertheless you can have up to 10,000 subscribers. That exact same size checklist is mosting likely to run you $100/month with ConvertKit.
If you upgrade to the “Scale” plan with BeeHiiv (their ideal plan and the one I personally utilize), you can expand your listing as much as 100,000. A listing of that size would certainly run you $566/month with ConvertKit. If you want their referral network, as well, that puts you at the $733/month plan. That’s if you pay annually, also. With BeeHiiv, you can get all that for just $84/month if you pay annually.
BeeHiiv is in a completely different organization when it involves pricing (in a good way).
Will BeeHiiv at some point boost rates? They could as time takes place. But, I’m thinking individuals like myself who are currently in will certainly be locked-in. We’ll see exactly how things continue.
Things I Would Certainly Like BeeHiiv To Include
Among the things you most definitely require to remember is that BeeHiiv is reasonably young. They do seem to advance rather swiftly and make brand-new item statements somewhat 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 kinds where I can pick an automation to run right at the kind degree. That would certainly be amazing for a lot of factors. Currently, registration kinds look OK, however there’s really little settings for them to help in division.
It would behave to have identifying at the customer level. This would certainly be effective.
I think webhooks need to be part of automations to make integrated automations simpler and lower dependence on outdoors devices like Zapier.
There are likewise some minor administrative user interface modifications that would be handy. For instance:
- Capability to bulk edit/remove subscribers.
- Ability to bulk edit posts (as an example, to identify a lot of them at the same time).
- Having a few fundamental fields as common on subscribers (like the name).
- Some more personalization options for the web site (such as even more adaptable shade choices, heading control, and so on).
So, yeah … there are some drawbacks. Things I wish they perform with it in the future. BeeHiiv is respectable, but it isn’t ideal and certainly not almost as established as something like FluentCRM or any other real CRM item.
It most likely never will certainly be, either. As I said, the function is various so it wouldn’t much a great deal of sense for BeeHiiv to end up being a complete marketing automation system. I think you never know, though.
Final Ideas On This BeeHiiv Review
I like BeeHiiv rather a great deal. Enough where I made a decision to change my own newsletters over to the platform in spite of my individual choice for digital sovereignty and having my own system.
Put simply, for the e-newsletter publishing design especially, I saw adequate worth in their system to call for the modification.
Keep in mind, I do not use BeeHiiv as my special email checklist. I utilize BeeHiiv wherefore it is efficient, but I deliberately have things establish to ensure that I likewise keep my listing “in house” within FluentCRM.
If you use BeeHiiv, I recommend you do the same. It is just a good insurance plan, for one. But, having a full-featured marketing automation platform for your checklist will certainly be of high use (FluentCRM is a full marketing automation platform and BeeHiiv is not and likely never will certainly be).
So, the question is … should YOU use BeeHiiv?
In my opinion, if you are making use of Substack today, I ‘d absolutely consider switching to BeeHiiv. It will simply be extra business-friendly. It is targeting various capabilities and various demands. Plus, BeeHiiv also has import tools for Substack, so the switch needs to be pretty simple.
If you are on ConvertKit now, I ‘d possibly stay unless you have a large e-mail checklist and are for that reason being wooled with their high month-to-month bill. You will certainly not (yet) have every feature of ConvertKit with BeeHiiv, however they are repeating promptly. There’s additionally a respectable possibility you’re not even utilizing several of those fancier features of ConvertKit and you don’t also need them. For that reason, BeeHiiv might easily be a far better and a lot more inexpensive fit.
Finally, if you plan to be extremely deliberate regarding growing an e-newsletter, I assume BeeHiiv is THE platform to consider and keep 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 best games in town right now. This is the system to enjoy.
BeeHiiv offers a 14-day trial on their paid plans. It is worth having a look at for yourself. And if you end up not sticking with the paid plan, you’ll discover the totally free account to be quite feature rich.