HN Explorer

Poll: Best site to use to run a public event

6 points by Urgo ↗ HN
I'm currently organizing a public event (a YouTube gathering) and I was wondering what the community thought the best single site was for promoting the event & gathering an attendee list (i.e. let people rsvp in one way or another).

I was using facebook events but another post on HN today (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2637291) made me wonder if I should try something different.

I'd like to know both what people are most comfortable RSVPing with (end user) and also as an organizer what site provides the best tools for keeping guests updated.

I've listed some of the popular ones below but please comment on any better choices I might have missed. Thanks!

6 comments

[ 3.0 ms ] story [ 20.6 ms ] thread
mikeleeorg
There is also http://plancast.com and http://lanyrd.com (though the latter is aimed more at conferences). I haven't found either to be that effective in promoting an event, but since it's free to create an event, it may not hurt.

Facebook Events may have its drawbacks (the login wall), but I've found that sharing an event via Facebook - as opposed to email with Evite, Eventbrite, Meetup, etc - can be slightly more effective. That's just my experience though.

a3_nm
A website dedicated to the event?
chromic
The referenced post brings up a good point, but for many purposes (including your event) it's irrelevant. If your guests are likely to be on facebook, then facebook is a perfectly valid choice.
janesvilleseo
We use eventbrite for managing and running our seminars. It works exremely well. There are multiple options to promote the event within the system (email, dedicated page, etc) and the ability to embed the event or just ticket info into your website(s).

Attendee lists are all managed with in the system, the ability to set attendance limits, create attendee lists, badges/nametags etc are all provided and well executed.

If the event is free then there is no cost, but there is a fee if people are signing up using the system.

All in all, it works extremely well and we are very happy with the system. The also offer real human customer support via the phone.