When you’re just starting out with writing your newsletters, the hardest part might be deciding what email marketing platform to actually use. What fits your business, your budget, your tech ability, and your personal style for creativity and ease of use.
Likely you’re hearing people say you need to start a newsletter list right now. But what does that mean, and how do you even start?
Trying to work out which email platform is "the one” is likely tripping you up, stopping you from the next step. From starting to whole process. Let me know that you’re not alone. Nearly every small business owner I know is feeling this.
I’ve found that there’s quite a lot of info out there - most of it is actually coming from the individual marketing platforms themselves. And many of them aren’t actually similar to your business, your creative work, your needs.
The most important that I want to say is that there is no one perfect right option for your email marketing platform. What your business needs right now is what you should be determining your choice on. You can change when and if you need.
So, what I want you to remember is that it’s best to simply just start somewhere and stop overthinking it!
Before you read further, if you’re still not sure if or why you need a newsletter please read my blog post Why you should start a newsletter list today.
What actually matters when you're choosing an email marketing platform
I’m going to share the platforms that I’ve personally used, but I want you to consider that the 'best' platform is really just the one that matches your list size, tech understanding and ability, automation needs, sales goals, design preferences, and website integration.
Here’s some things to think about when looking at the email marketing platforms that work for you:
1: How big is your list, and how quickly do you expect it to grow, or even at all?
Understanding whether a platform scales smoothly from 500 to 5,000 subscribers helps you choose a sustainable solution.
Some newsletter platforms jump massively in price when you grow your subscriber numbers, while others allow you to move to the next tier at a viable rate.
So, even if your list is small now, do keep this in mind as you’re looking around at the options.
2: Do you need automations, or just to send a weekly newsletter?
If you want to set up automatic emails like 'someone signs up and gets a welcome email sequence,' choosing a platform with easy-to-implement automation features becomes essential.
Most newsletter platforms allow you to create that first automatic welcome email, but some make it easier to set up, while others are a bit fiddly and tedious.
If you know that you only need one very simple first welcome automatic email you won’t need to worry about the automations as much.
As an example, I have multiple ways for people to join my list, and these all give different automations depending on if someone signed up for a free download, a course, or to join my main weekly newsletter list.
I use Flodesk* and it easily allows me to create these automations for different segments of readers.
3: Are you selling anything directly through email?
If you’re selling digital downloads, bookings, courses, or physical products will likely change which platform makes sense. Some email marketing platforms connect directly with an ecommerce platform, while others are more limited. Some actually have their own inbuilt checkout features, so this might work for you if you don’t have your own website.
Make sure to check the integrations before you sign up. Perhaps you have your shop checkout on Squarespace, so you need to know which platform will connect with it more easily. Each newsletter platform will have the ‘integrations’ for you to look through. While some will be direct, others might need something like Zapier or Pabbly to connect them.
I’ve written about how Squarespace connects easily with Flodesk here, but you can also connect Squarespace with Mailchimp.
4: How much design control do you want?
Some platforms hand you beautiful templates out of the box; others need more effort to make things look intentional. You can add your brand colours, fonts and logo, but some design features and layout will be limited, while others more easy to customise to suit your business feel.
I suggest to create a free trial to the platforms that suit most of your requirements and have a play with the template and email builder, to see how design friendly it is.
5: Do you want a community or way to share and be shared?
Believe it or not, some of the email marketing platforms actually have built-in tools so that you can recommend and share other people’s emails, and they can share yours. This is an excellent way to grow your list, while also (potentially) earning some affiliate income, depending on the platform and newsletters.
Substack, Beehiiv, and Kit* (formerly ConvertKit) have recommendation options so that you can share someone else’s newsletter and they can share yours.
Substack also offers inbuilt commenting, so that you can build a community and conversation directly inside your published newsletters - similar to comments on a blog post.
Not sure how to start ? Grab my FREE ebook that will guide you on growing your newsletter subscriber list.
This is just a round up of a few of the platforms available. You’ll likely come across more in your research, but I’ve found some have more features than I need to even consider, and don’t suit the requirements of a small simple business structure.
Pricing that I have written is current at November 2026. Please confirm all prices on the individual platform before committing to the plan.
Flodesk
Flodesk* built its reputation on gorgeous, editorial-style templates and a women-owned intentional business plan. That's genuinely part of why so many creative and heart-led businesses fell in love with it.
Best for: visual creatives, florists, yoga teachers, reiki practitioners, boutique owners and anyone whose brand relies heavily on visuals. The templates genuinely look expensive with very little effort on your part.
Worth knowing: Some larger businesses with more moving parts do find that Flodesk isn’t as robust as they’d like. You can ‘segment’ your audience into different folders (to send certain emails to one group only), but there isn’t move granular tagging like in Kit.
As a note: Flodesk is a female-owned start-up business. Their aim is to offer solutions for business owners that make writing and sending emails easy, streamlined. The platform is always adding new features, and has excellent support help from real people.
Flodesk is my preferred newsletter platform, and the one I recommend to my clients.
Squarespace Email Campaigns
If your website already lives on Squarespace, this is worth a proper look at Squarespace Email Campaigns before you go elsewhere. It's a simple tool that pulls your site's fonts, colours and branding straight into your emails, so everything feels cohesive without any extra design work on your end.
Pricing is based on "how many emails do you send" rather than subscriber count, starting at around $8/month for a low-volume plan and rising to roughly $110-120/month for the highest tier, which allows up to 500,000 sends. Subscriber numbers themselves are unlimited on every paid plan.
Best for: Those who already have a Squarespace website and want to have less login platforms, have a very simple email system, and / or sell things through Squarespace as the ecommerce follow-up emails as the most powerful aspect of Squarespace Email Campaigns.
Worth knowing: automation is fairly basic compared to dedicated platforms, and there's no sophisticated segmentation. If your business grows to the point where you need an "if this, then that" style automated journey, you'll likely outgrow it.
I prefer Squarespace Email Campaigns for very simple business set up. I have a few clients who use it and they find it’s easy to access and send emails, once they have a template set up. Often they’re not looking too deeply at their analytics and using newsletter marketing for simple touch points with their audience.
Kit (formerly ConvertKit)
Kit rebranded from ConvertKit a couple of years ago, and it's built specifically with creators and course sellers in mind, meaning that selling digital products, running paid newsletters, and building automated sequences are all baked in rather than added on.
The free plan is genuinely generous, covering up to 10,000 subscribers with unlimited landing pages and forms (though automation sequences require a paid tier). Paid plans start at around $33–39/month for 1,000 subscribers on the Creator tier, rising to around $66–79/month for the Creator Pro tier, which adds advanced reporting and subscriber scoring.
Worth flagging: Kit increased its prices substantially in September 2025, so if you've heard it described as "cheap," that's a little out of date now.
Best for: Business owners who want or need lots of automation emails that offer very in-depth ‘this vs that’ options, who have more complicated systems, and need a more robust tool for integrations and audience control. The automation and tagging tools are built for exactly that kind of journey.
Worth knowing: the design templates are more minimal and text-forward than Flodesk's. I’ve found the learning curve for using Kit to be high - which is fine if you’re happy to dive in and make it work. You can start with templates and go from there, but you won’t have your system set up easily within the day.
Mailchimp
Mailchimp is the name almost everyone has heard of, which is both its strength and, honestly, part of the problem. It was built years ago as an all-purpose marketing tool. That broad focus shows in how fiddly the interface can feel for something as simple as a newsletter.
I started with Mailchimp when I first began sending newsletters back in 2008, as it honestly was the only one I could find. I’m tech savvy so was able to work it out, but my newsletters and whole system at that time was very basic.
The free plan was significantly cut back in January 2026 and now only covers 250 contacts and 500 emails per month, which isn't enough for most businesses. Paid plans start at $13/month for Essentials (500 contacts) and $20/month for Standard, which unlocks multi-step automation, and then climb steeply from there as your list grows.
One thing to watch closely: Mailchimp counts your unsubscribed and inactive contacts toward your total, not just active subscribers, which can push you into a more expensive tier without you even realising it.
Best for: businesses that want a well-known, familiar tool and don't mind a steeper learning curve in exchange for a deep feature set.
Worth knowing: for a solo health practitioner or artist just wanting to send a warm monthly newsletter, Mailchimp's complexity is often more than you need. You may find yourself paying for (and wading through) features you'll never touch.
Publication-style newsletters:
These are both a little more like a blog post on a website, but sit on the platform’s site. This is for writing content only, rather than a full portfolio, about or contact page, or having ecommerce options.
Substack
You’ve likely heard of Substack and are even subscribed to some newsletters written in this app. What started as a platform for mainly writers and authors to share their work, has now expanded to a space where almost anyone can write and publish an article.
While you have your own separate publication / newsletter that sends directly to your subscriber’s inbox, you also have a dedicated home page where past newsletters can be read.
There is no monthly fee to have a Substack account or set up your own page of published content.
Worth mentioning: Substack offers the opportunity to have a paid newsletter, which means people sign up for a monthly or yearly subscription to receive your writing. This is excellent if you want to invest time in deep research, your own writing and stories, or offer more content to your audience. Substack seems particularly popular with food bloggers who are now able to earn an income from their recipes.
The recommendation community can be a powerful way to grow your subscriber list. There’s also a feed for writing quick notes and reposting someone else’s publication or note. This becomes a community space for writers.
Worth knowing: When you do upgrade to selling subscriptions Substack takes a whopping 10% of the income. You also, ultimately, don’t own your email list like other dedicated newsletter platforms; but you can download a file copy of them periodically.
While I don’t write there regularly, you can follow me on Substack here. I occassionaly write about personal life, rather than business or craft.
Beehiiv
Beehiiv has become a serious contender over the past couple of years, particularly for anyone thinking of their newsletter as content in its own right rather than purely a marketing channel.
Its free plan is one of the most generous currently available, covering 2,500 subscribers with unlimited sends. It's worth a look if you're planning to build a newsletter people genuinely look forward to reading, separate from your product or service promotions.
Similar to Substack, you can start charging a monthly subscription fee, but only with a paid tier.
You have a home page with all your previous publications, and the paid articles are locked until your subscriber upgrades to a paid fee.
I haven’t ever used Beehiiv, but it’s not something I would discount as I love the layout and feel of the few that I do subscribe from others.
So, which one is right for you?
Honestly? There isn't a universal answer, and I'd be doing you a disservice if I pretended there was.
My suggestion is always to start a free or trial plan with the site that most appeals to you on the features and price. Then jump in and see how hard / easy it is for you to write your first newsletter.
If it feels overwhelming at the beginning, do keep in mind that there’s a learning curve for any new tech. But if it feels ‘wrong’ and you’re not enjoying it, then I suggest that it’s the wrong platform for you.
You want to feel like it’s easeful writing and sending your newsletters. There’s no use paying a fee or even collecting addresses when you feel irritated before you’ve even starting writing that email.
Whatever you choose, remember this: the platform is just the vehicle. What actually grows your business is showing up consistently and writing in your own voice. Don't let the decision paralyse you; you can always change platforms later, and most of them make exporting your list painless.
If you came to me and asked me to set your newsletter system up, I’d always recommend Flodesk because I know that once you have the templates and opt-in forms created, you’ll love the back end, find it easy to write and send newsletters, as well as have all the analytics you’d ever need to see how the sends are going.
If you really wanted an in-built system, then my second option would be Squarespace Email Campaigns.
Do you need help setting up your newsletter platform? Did you know I offer done-for-you services. I can create a whole setup for you and your business. I use either Flodesk or Squarespace Emails, and will honestly offer the best solution for your business needs.
I set it up so it has your colours, branding, and templates so you can keep writing and sharing your news. You’ll be handed off with a complete ‘how-to’ for your email writing.
Done-for-you email setup created specifically for your creative business needs. Focussed on making the whole process of writing and sending newsletters easy, streamlined, and joyful.
Everything for your emails - all the parts you don’t see (or perhaps even know that you need) set-up and ready to go. A calm, connected system behind your newsletters.
You won’t have to even think about the tech stuff, and can get straight into connecting directly with your community through heart-felt, honest emails.
I can work with whatever newsletter platform you prefer, but can also guide you on the options available.
*Some links in this post are affiliate links. I do only share things that I personally use, or know to be useful and helpful for you. As always take the time to find out the best solution for you.
Pricing listed is correct at November 2026.
Choosing an email marketing platform can feel overwhelming when you're just starting out. With so many options available, each offering different features, pricing and promises, it's hard to know which one is right for your business.