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I have been reviewing the potential for using online invitation systems for scheduling and managing invitation for a workshop on EndNote, EndNote Web, and Zotero at my institution and I thought I would share my thoughts....such as they are. I googled online invitation systems and got evite and a few others right away and since evite didn't fit my needs, I looked further. The best comparison I found of services was from squidoo, entitled "Free Online Invitation Comparison and Evite Alternatives". After looking at the sites listed, I choose Pingg - http://www.pingg.com/.
The reason for my choosing is the layout options, the ability to customize as well as the fact that it contained the key elements I needed. These essential elements included (1) ability to e-mail invitations, (2) a web page for non-invited people to sign-up and register, (3) the ability to limit the number of registrations to the room size, and (4) the ability to communicate with the invited and registered attendees (to thank attendees, use surveymonkey for evaluation, or in case I have to change date or cancel.)
There are several which had these features and some that didn't. A brief overview.
Evite didn't create a web page unless you were invited so it was out of the running... You could use it and say you weren't the person invited and then put in your name and e-mail but I couldn't figure out how to gather the e-mails and also explaining this seemed problematic...
PurpleTrail -- had to pay to limit the number of RSVPs -- so that's out
My Punch Bowl -- their e-mail went into my spam filter so this was a problem, plus it's name didn't seem professional. Had all the other features -- probably my 3rd choice...
Man Vites -- not professional
Made It -- Doesn't work
Good Invitation -- Interesting might use sometime due to being able to used customized flash -- but no way to limit RSVP"s.
Events Listed -- Ticketing Service -- NA
Socializer -- My 2nd Choice -- probably better in functionality than Pinng but not as artsy or clean looking. Had all the features and more and could be customized to make it look like I think I want it....
Invitastic - Not working on sending when I looked.... so I didn't look further.
Zoji -- Can't limit number of guests/RSVP's
Enclude -- Doesn't work
Shindigg - No limiting number of attendees and no website
Sendomatic -- Need to pay for more than 10 invites...
So Pingg (http://www.pingg.com/) is my choice -- I will let you know how it works out and if I switch to another system... If you know of any e-vite or ticketing systems that are free that have my criteria that I missed let me know.
Thanks -- Stephen
