Once upon a time, there was this new-fangled ‘World Wide Web’ that would allow people from across the world to find, access and share information in a central area.

It started with limited access, because we were all on Dial-Up (cue sounds of a phone line takeover, in order to connect to the interwebs).

At first it was really boring –yet quite novel. The more people who jumped onto it, the more it grew and evolved.

There were no data restrictions! Things loaded a bit slowly, but we began to love it!

Around Y2K, teenagers all over the US were coming home from school to jump into online chatrooms in AOL, Yahoo Messenger and Hotmail to meet people from across the country and their own friends from school to talk to each other in new ways.

Then there was MySpace, and Facebook. And now? Even family members of mine in their mid-80’s are online, checking & sending emails, and even my mother-in-law (who is not very tech savvy) has learned to use Emoji’s in her text messages! (I’m so proud!)

So how has this drastic change over time affected the way businesses have to show up online?

I’ve tried several email marketing apps: ConvertKit first, MailChimp, MailerLite, Squarespace Email Campaigns, and now FloDesk.

There’s a lot to be said for pretty emails these days. It can make you stand out from the crowd, for sure.

But what’s the cost? If there is any.

If you’re in the entrepreneurial space at all, you may have heard about FloDesk: the beautifully style email marketing tool that doesn’t limit you to a subscriber amount. It’s one flat fee no matter how many subscribers you have, which sounds great. So what’s the catch?

Feel like maybe I’m about to give ya some negative feedback? I am, actually! And it doesn’t seem to be the popular opinion, but here goes.

Let me start by saying to all of you, as I write this on Thanksgiving morning while my husband sleeps in & I’m feeling particularly happy & grateful:thank you for following along and being part of this journey with me. I love & appreciate all of you!

Rebranding for yourself is so tough, especially for designers. Why?!

You’d think, because we have the capability, the software, the hardware, the knowhow, –and yet? It’s still so damn hard.

But why is it so hard for us? Why did I make the decision to change my branding or my brand colors (so many times)? Let’s investigate.

I’m a solopreneur & that means it’s just me around here. I don’t have a VA or any other team members, so it’s a do-it-all-myself kind of routine around here, which I actually don’t mind, for now.

That being the case, I write the blogs, I schedule the emails, I write & schedule social posts, I update the website, I do all my own graphics, I do all of my client work, etc. etc. etc.

For my newsletter, I started (back in 2016) with ConvertKit. While I could plainly see how robust it is, it was WAY more juice than I needed with just 12 people on my list. 😂

So I switched to MailerLite, which I used for free until early 2019 when they changed their pricing structure. I built my list with MailerLite, and I do still like their platform, …but it was just lacking some design-y features I wanted.

Cue FloDesk. Y’all. It is effin’ gorgeous!

Easy to use. Simple, clean UI and the site is mobile friendly too! I tried it out with the free trial and liked it, even though it’s missing a few things MailerLite does, but FloDesk is still in Beta. So it’s new & it’s still evolving, which I actually like.

Then I found a coupon for 50% off and I decided to jump in, head first. Why? Let’s dive in!