Hosting an online event, from webinars to sales meetings and training sessions, is a wonderful way to improve productivity and reach the greatest possible audience. The underlying technology is deceivingly simple, and this simplicity often leads to the incorrect perception that an online event can be pulled off without any preparation. In fact, an online event may well need even more preparation than a face-to-face one.

Promoting your online event and getting the word out is of course, a major exercise in marketing, and part of that process is facilitating an easy registration process. Your marketing content will include a “call to action,” and that call should include a link to a registration page that repeats the basic information, reinforces the excitement and incentive of attending, and offers a single-click path to registering and paying for the online event. Eventbrite offers a very easy way to achieve this goal, without having to create an entire order and registration site from scratch. With the Eventbrite service, it is possible to manage and promote your online event, and sell tickets easily. There is also an Eventbrite Connector for importing the online event data and attendance list into Salesforce.

Eventbrite actually does quite a bit more than just putting up a registration page for your online event; it also delivers some additional tools for publicizing your online event. With it, you can intuitively create your registration page, and this is where you send prospective attendees when they wish to purchase tickets or register for the online event.

If you promote your online event through affiliates, Eventbrite can also manage your affiliate program, and help you create HTML code for web ads for your affiliates to use on their own sites. A full-fledged e-commerce infrastructure is not necessary, since Eventbrite provides the ordering system. You will however, need to have a Paypal account or a Google Checkout Merchant account. You are unable to use your own commercial merchant account, however. The fee for using Eventbrite is based on a percentage of the ticket price; there are no long-term licensing fees besides the percentage. You do have the option of arranging a free or donation-based online event; and there is no Eventbrite fee for a free online event.

The process is quite simple, and after signing in, all you need to do is follow the intuitive menu for creating an online event. You can add a Google map to the page to show the location of your online event. Furthermore, you can set the page to indicate whether it is publicly available, or password protected.

Eventbrite does offer a number of management features, such as importing contacts from external sources, sending out invitations, and compiling RSVPs. There is a facility for discount codes so you can create discount incentives, as well as creating a variety of promotions for your online event.