Beacons vs. Snipfeed: Which Link-in-Bio Creator Store Is Better?

If you’re interested in selling digital products online, then you’re likely familiar with Beacons and Snipfeed. The two platforms share similar features and have a proven track record of supporting creators in successfully selling digital products. But if you’re on the fence about which creator store platform is best for you, you’re in the right place.

In this article, we explain the key differences between Beacons and Snipfeed so you can decide which platform works best for you, or if you should consider an alternative altogether.

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Beacons vs. Snipfeed: Key differences

Beacons and Snipfeed are both user-friendly creator store platforms with similar feature offerings, like the ability to build a link-in-bio storefront quickly and sell digital products. However, there are some key differences to consider, such as their pricing and payment options.

Platform	Pricing and key features
Beacons	Price: $0-$90/month Digital product builder: lets you build online courses only Link-in-bio store: ✅ Generative AI: ✅ Email marketing automation: ✅ Flexible payment options: ✅
Snipfeed	Price: $9-$20/month Digital product builder: lets you build online courses only Link-in-bio store: ✅ Generative AI: ✅ Email marketing automation: ✅ Flexible payment options: ❌

What is Beacons?

In a nutshell, Beacons functions as both a link-in-bio tool and an online store. With Beacons, you can easily create a link-in-bio page to house all your important links and sell your digital products. The platform also offers plenty of other features for creators, like a sponsored content pricing calculator and a pitch email generator.

With Beacons, you can:

Create a customizable online storefront and link-in-bio landing page
Sell digital products, 1:1 calls, and more
Build and sell online courses
Accept a broad range of payment methods in multiple currencies
Track audience analytics
Use AI to generate product descriptions, images, and newsletters
Create a media kit for managing brand sponsorships

It’s important to note that while Beacons is an easy-to-use creator store platform with some robust features, it also comes at a cost. Beacons offers a free plan, but to benefit from its features, you’ll need to upgrade to its Creator Pro plan, which is $10/month with a 9% translation fee on all sales.

What is Snipfeed?

Snipfeed is designed to help creators monetize their social audience through selling digital products like online courses, ebooks, and templates. The platform also provides users with a calendar booking tool to sell one-on-one appointments, video integrations for hosting calls and livestreams, and the ability to offer subscriptions and memberships.

With Snipfeed, you can:

Create a customizable online storefront and link-in-bio landing page
Sell digital products, 1:1 coaching sessions, consultation calls, subscriptions, and memberships
Build and sell online courses
Automate workflows
Track audience analytics
Add a tip jar to your online storefront

Beacons vs. Snipfeed: Comparison

Trying to decide between Beacons or Snipfeed as your online storefront? While both platforms are popular options, they both come with their own pros and cons. Read on for a comparison of different aspects of the two platforms, from their pricing to their key features.

1. Pricing

The biggest difference between Beacons and Snipfeed is their pricing structure. While Snipfeed has no free plan in sight, its paid plans are slightly more affordable than Beacons’: the Starter plan costs $9/month (with 10% transaction fees), and the Pro plan is $20/month (zero transaction fees).

snipfeed pricing — Snipfeed’s pricing plans.

On the flip side, Beacons has a free plan, but it comes with limited features and 9% transaction fees. If you want to access Beacons’ more advanced features and 0% transaction fees, you’ll have to pay at least $30/month for its Store Pro plan.

beacons pricing plan — Beacons’ pricing plans.

2. Digital product builder

While you can sell a variety of digital downloads on Beacons and Snipfeed, both platforms’ digital product builders are limited to creating online courses only. That means if you’re interested in offering other types of products, you’ll need to create them using other tools.

It’s also important to note that you must pay to use the online course builder on both platforms. For Beacons, users will need to subscribe to the Store Pro plan ($30/month) to build and sell courses. Meanwhile, for Snipfeed, users must pay for the Pro plan ($20/month) to use its online course feature.

3. Creator store functionality

Both Beacons and Snipfeed come equipped with mobile-optimized link-in-bio storefront tools, which both offer intuitive interfaces.

However, each platform’s online store has certain unique features. For example, Beacons’ Media Kit feature places an emphasis on helping out creators who are interested in pursuing brand sponsorships as a source of income.

Snipfeed offers the ability to sell livestreams, subscription and membership-based services and video calls, one-on-one consultations, and more.

4. Flexible payment options

Both platforms offer mobile-optimized checkouts, but only Beacons offers more flexible payment options like Buy Now, Pay Later payment plans and multi-currency support.

Snipfeed doesn’t offer tons of flexibility when it comes to payment options. However, it does offer a unique tip jar feature that creators can embed on their creator store.

5. Generative AI

In this day and age, AI features are expected in most online creator platforms. But not every platform compares to the next. While both Beacons and Snipfeed incorporate basic AI tools into some of their feature offerings, neither platform is super advanced in this department.

For example, Beacons uses generative AI for text and images, but this feature is only available with its paid plans starting at $10/month.

Snipfeed has generative AI (via ChatGPT) for text exclusively. The platform also reserves its AI features for its Pro plan users, meaning you’ll need to pay $20/month just to access these tools.

Beacons vs. Snipfeed: Which creator store should you use?

Both Beacons and Snipfeed share the same primary goal: helping creators set up their online store quickly and easily, so they can monetize their audience through selling digital products and services.

Both platforms come with some pretty sweet monetization features, like the ability to sell digital products, an online course builder, customization options, and more.

However, there are some key differences to consider, especially their pricing structure. While Beacons offers a free plan, its features are limited and it comes with a steep 9% transaction fee. For more advanced features, you’ll need to pay a minimum of $10/month. To upgrade to more features plus waive transaction fees, you’ll have to pay $30/month.

On the other hand, Snipfeed does not offer a free plan. Users must subscribe to either its Starter plan ($9/month, with 10% transaction fees), or its Pro plan ($20/month, no transaction fees).

That being said, with the right strategy and quality digital products, you could find success on either platform. Ultimately, the choice between Beacons or Snipfeed should be based on your business objectives, your budget, and your most desired features.

TL;DR

Long story short: Beacons is a good option for creators who already have a leg up in the digital products game and don’t mind paying a 9% transaction fee on sales (or shelling out bigger bucks for transaction-free paid plans).

Thanks to its media kit feature, Beacons is particularly useful for creators who are focused on brand sponsorships as a form of income.

Meanwhile, Snipfeed does not offer a free plan, though its paid plans are slightly more affordable than Beacons’. The platform offers a plethora of features for selling digital services like one-on-one consultations, subscriptions, coaching sessions, memberships, and more.

So, if you don’t mind paying a monthly fee, and you’re in the business of digital services, Snipfeed might be a better option for you.

Beacons is best if…	Snipfeed is best if…
You’re willing to pay $$$ for premium features. You need tools to help you source and manage brand deals. You want to seriously customize the look of your online store or website.	You already have proven success in digital product sales and can justify paying a montly fee. You want to focus on 1:1 consultations, subscriptions, and membership-based digital services. You want to incorporate a tipping feature into your creator store.

Not so sure about all those monthly subscription costs and transaction fees? Read on for the best (free) alternative on the market!

A free alternative to Beacons and Snipfeed: The Leap

The Leap is an all-in-one creator store that boasts an easy-to-use, time-saving digital product builder. With The Leap, you can quickly build your own link-in-bio store, where you can create, market, and sell digital products all in one place.

The Leap also helps you capture leads and grow your email list (i.e. own your audience), set up automated email flows and send email broadcasts, and transform your availability and expertise into a high-value product through its Book My Time feature.

The best part? The Leap is totally free to use with zero transaction fees.

The Leap’s AI-powered digital product builder doesn’t just give you content suggestions, it can actually generate mini-courses, guides, tutorials, and more in minutes. In a nutshell, it helps creators like you bring your product ideas to life way faster.

You can also use The Leap’s super-smart digital product builder to create effective lead magnets (aka freebies) to grow your email list, which in turn helps you grow your income.

The Leap offers creators an array of audience analytics including sales and leads reports, giving you the insights you need to create digital products that will fly off the (digital) shelves. Not to mention the array of built-in email marketing tools like pre-made email templates for setting up email flows and sending email broadcasts to leads and customers.

If you’re a creator looking to jumpstart your monetization journey, then The Leap is for you. Looking for an alternative to Beacons and Snipfeed? Try The Leap for free today.

Build, market, and sell digital products all in one spot with The Leap!

Beacons vs. Snipfeed FAQ

What is Beacons used for?

Beacons is a content creator toolkit that’s part link-in-bio tool, part online storefront, part email marketing tool, and more. Creators can use Beacons to offer digital products and one-on-one calls, build and sell online courses, send nurturing emails, and even manage administrative tasks like creating invoices and tax forms.

How much does Beacons cost?

Beacons offers a Free plan with limited features and a 9% transaction fee on each sale, which basically means you get a chance to try out the platform before subscribing to a paid plan. Its Creator Pro plan is $10/month (9% transaction fee), its Store Pro plan is $30/month (0% transaction fee), and its Business Pro plan is $90/month (0% transaction fee).

Is there a free alternative to Beacons and Snipfeed?

While both Beacons and Snipfeed are great options for a creator store tool, if you’re looking for a free alternative with even smarter features, look no further than The Leap.

Brought to you by Thinkific, The Leap is an all-in-one creator store with an AI-powered digital product builder that can help you generate mini-courses, guides, tutorials, and more in minutes — and it’s free to use, with zero transaction fees! Additionally, The Leap offers many of the same features that Beacons and Snipfeed have — like audience analytics, simple payment and order fulfillment, and built-in email marketing tools for nurturing your leads.

With The Leap, you can easily upload your digital products to your storefront or create one from scratch using the platform’s AI-powered product builder. Simply answer a few questions, like what your expertise is and what type of product you’d like to build, and The Leap will generate digital product ideas and build out comprehensive, customizable drafts in seconds.

Create and sell mini-courses in minutes using The Leap!

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