Do you remember how painful the registration for the last retreat you went on was?  What about when you were asked by your pastor to make sure that nobody tried to sneak into last year’s Church play?  Well, horrendously unorganized retreat registration, and cheapskate parishioners will soon become a thing of the past.  Thanks to the power of web 2.0, you can create, organize, and even sell (or not sell) online tickets to your next church function using Eventbrite.

Keep it Clean

Eventbrite is a web application that takes the hassle out of organizing ticket sales for events by giving you – and your participants – the opportunity to get their tickets online.  The great thing about that is, if your parish has an up-to-date website that promotes community driven content (i.e. it doesn’t suck and gets more than 50 hits a month), then you can not only advertise your event in the Church bulletin, but also on the web.  That means that parishioners won’t just hear about your event one day out of the week, but potentially every day – depending on your parish’s web acumen.

Keep the Promotions Coming

Once someone has registered, you can configure Eventbrite to send them reminder emails as the event gets closer.  This is a great way to ensure that your number of registrants equal the number of actual people that show up.  Also, on those reminders you can embed a map to the location or even promote future events.  The possibilities for getting the word out on what your parish has to offer is endless.

To Pay, or Not to Pay

The best thing about Eventbrite is that it is absolutely free if you schedule an event that is free for participants.  However, if you want to charge for entry, that is easy too.  Currently, you can charge folks up to $9.95 per ticket, and Eventbrite takes a small percentage of whatever you sell.  The cool thing is that you can easily set it up to let participants pay by credit card online – this makes it so easy that it borders on sloth.

Give It a Try

If you have an upcoming event, I highly recommend Eventbrite.  It’s way too easy to use, and makes you look oh so professional.  Plus, it beats creating and folding black & white pamphlets that nobody ever reads anyway.