Let’s talk about Cvent alternatives for online event registration and ticketing.
Event Smart is an awesome alternative to Cvent for your online event registration and ticketing management website needs. Below we’ve listed 23 of the more obvious ways Event Smart is the best of the Cvent alternatives, and there are even more reasons – but we’ll cover those later.
Previously we outlined 19 Ways Smart is Better than Eventbrite. There are are some similarities with how Event Smart is a great alternative to Cvent too.
1. Sell Paid Tickets Online for Free
We are talking about the fact that you can sell 1 million PAID tickets online for free, which you cannot do with Cvent. That’s right, you can use a free/Basic account on EventSmart.com to sell tickets or registrations to your paid events. You don’t even have to be a “non-profit” organization. Everyone gets this discount! Go ahead and ask if any other Cvent alternative can give you the same offer… in fact nobody else gives you that much for free.
Sell paid tickets online for free with Event Smart.
2. No Per-ticket Fees, Save 100%
You have the opportunity to save 100% of what you were paying to Cvent by using EventSmart.com for free. Other online event registration and ticketing websites could charge you up to $10 each to sell a ticket. Depending on the price of your ticket you could end up owing them money!
With Event Smart, you get:
- 100 Tickets = Free
- 1,000 Tickets = Free
- 10,000 Tickets = Free
- 100,000 Tickets = Free
- 1,000,000 Tickets = Free
- and so on…you get the idea!
With a free Event Smart account, you can sell tickets and collect an unlimited number of registrations at no cost to you.
You only pay for the advanced features beyond the core registration/ticket sales you need.
(Note: “tickets” in this context are synonymous with “registrations” and vice versa. Printable tickets are available as an upgrade, but there is no limit to how many printable tickets you can sell).
3. No Setup Fees
Cvent requires a very large deposit or that you sign an expensive contract before you can access their technology and use their services. Unless you’re ready to spend a lot of money before you start getting money, you should try using Event Smart; there is no cost to get started with Event Smart.
If you’re paying setup fees for a standard event website, you’re paying too much. Standard online event registration and ticketing websites can be setup programmatically (by computers), so there should be no real cost to setting up your event website.
4. No Contracts
Do you like the complications and pressure of reviewing and signing contracts? Do you enjoy the liability of contracts if your needs or plans change and you have to cancel or change your event? Event Smart is a modern online event registration and ticketing website and we do not require cumbersome contracts. In fact, we have no contracts! You can use Event Smart for free, and our paid subscriptions are month-to-month or on an annual basis. Your can start and stop your subscriptions at any time.
5. Stable Prices
Cvent will change their prices on you with very little notice. Would your audience approve if you changed their ticket price after they bought a ticket? With Event Smart, you know what your rates and fees will be forever. We won’t change your subscription fees, so you get the same rate you agreed to. This way we know what to expect and you know what to expect. That’s just a better way to do online event registration and ticketing.
6. Instant and Direct Payments, more Payment Options
With Event Smart, your ticket sales or registration fees go directly into your own payment account. We do not hold your money until your event is over, we do not charge commission fees from each ticket you sell. Instead, you get paid directly so you can collect your registration fees quicker.
Event Smart online ticketing and registration payment methods and gateways
We have two free methods:
We also offer upgraded payment methods for greater security, convenience, reliability and lower fees:
- Stripe
- Authorize.net AIM
- Authorize.net SIM
- PayPal Pro
- Braintree
- Sage Pay
- Vanco
- Mijireh
- Check
- Bank Draft
We don’t get in the way of your money. We’re adding more payment methods all the time to support more countries and help you be more profitable to power more great events.
7. Blogging Lets you Tell and Sell Your Story
Cvent offers you just a registration page. However, events sell out faster when the audience knows your whole story and the experience they will have; when attendees can get to know you and trust you. Can they do that very well with just a single event page?
With Event Smart you can do so much more than create an event page. You can cultivate and build an audience by publishing custom pages and a blog about your events, giving people an example of the experience they will have. Blogging can help sell your event and both set and meet expectations all at the same time. Now is a great time to start a blog about your events.
8. Pages Remove Distractions and Give all the Right Information
You will distract attendees from registering or buying tickets if you put all the information about your event on one big long page (the event details page). Help your audience maintain focus to register. You should only have the essential story and details on the registration page so that attendees can focus on buying tickets. Then have separate pages with greater detail, like maps/directions, lodging, itinerary, terms and conditions, policies, etc.
Event website blog and pages
9. Minimal Event Smart Branding
Compared to Cvent, your website on Event Smart is about you and your events. You are the one running your event, and we do our best to stay out of the way. Event Smart has very limited branding on your event website in order to have as few distractions as possible.
You can provide as little or as much information as you want, but Blogging and static pages (see above) help keep your site nice and tidy. Feel free to ask if any other alternative for Cvent if they will give you so many online event registration and ticketing features for free.
Event website, blog and pages
10. Pick Your Theme, Not Just a Header Image and Logo
Your events portray your products, your services, and your overall brand experience. With Event Smart you can do more than customize colors and change a picture on your event page. You can pick an entirely new theme to set the overall tone and layout of your event website to showcase your brand.
You can also make some adjustments to the theme layout and styling with custom CSS code.
11. Mobile Friendly
Feel free to look at your event website on a mobile phone, and you’ll notice that we work hard to make it accessible and nice for small devices. Incomplete or inaccessible event pages lend to having incomplete or abandoned registrations.
12. Multiple Occurrences of an Event Within Each Event
Cvent requires that you configure separate events and separate event pages each time the same event happens. With Event Smart, you can use Advanced Event Editor’s multiple datetimes to save time when creating your event(s) and eliminate confusion for attendees. You can configure the same event to occur multiple times and attendees can see it all from one page. In fact, audiences can register for the same event on multiple dates at once (see Multiple Event Registration).
Create multiple occurrences of one event (admin)
Multiple datetimes (occurrences) of the same event (front-end)
You can create tickets that grant access to one, multiple or all occurrences of your event. This allows you to configure perfect ticket options that have access to one event (datetime) or many events (multiple datetimes).
Tickets assigned/approved for a datetime
13. Responsive Self-service
We subscribe to the idea that you are capable, and we can give you the tools and resources to be successful. Cvent admittedly is a little different in this respect. Cvent is more full-service where they remove the work from you entirely, whereas we are more about empowering and strengthening you. Depending on your situation, one level of service will be better for you. We are continually improving Event Smart so that you can operate your own event website without assistance. But if you do ever need assistance, feel free to contact us. We are always open to discussing the level of service you need to be successful.
We’ve also had customers tell us that even if Cvent is more full-service, it can still take them several days to respond to support requests.
We have great support ratings:
- On average, we reply to customers in about 1 day (including weekends).
- We resolve issues usually within 2 replies so you get your answers quickly.
- We have an 89% satisfaction score.
We know we can’t help everyone, but we help a lot of people be successful with their event registration and ticketing needs.
14. Familiar User Interface
Cvent has powerful technology, but Event Smart is powered by the most popular open source technologies that you already know and love:
- Event Espresso—the most popular open source event registration and ticketing platform that powers more than 250,000 events and $100,000,000 ticket sales each year.
- WordPress—the most popular online publishing platform that powers more than 20% of the web including NASA, Vogue, Time Inc., TechCrunch, and many more.
You should feel comfortable and be confident with Event Smart, but we’re never settled; we’re always working hard to make the interface even better and improve your experience. And we always welcome your feedback.
15. Customize the Layout of Your Event Tickets
With Event Smart you can express your brand in your own way. Your brand has a certain character and personality. It could be simple, fun, complex, professional, or cutting-edge. With Event Smart you can customize your ticket to reflect your brand experience. Why not make your ticket a collectible item?
Online event registration ticket editor
Moderately customized ticket
Fully customized event ticket
16. Customize the Confirmation Emails
Just like tickets, you can customize the layout of your confirmation emails to provide all the necessary details and make each point of contact a way to reinforce your brand. You don’t have to have an expensive contract to get things changed. You can also change the default messages or use a custom message for every event. Event Smart makes communicating with your attendees easy and efficient.
17. Events Calendar (showcase multiple events)
Cvent may boast that it handles major events, but Event Smart is also powerful for organizations that have lots of events. If you’re a professional event organizer or your organization hosts multiple events, you will want people to find every event you offer. You can showcase your entire event schedule with a simple calendar, plus options to add some style and character.
Online events calendar
18. Events List (showcase multiple events)
Just like the calendar, if you’re a busy event organizer, a list of upcoming events and the calendar (above) can make it easy for your audience to find and register for your events. Think about how Cvent will let you show all your different events in one place and even let attendees register for more than one event at a time (see Multiple Event Registration).
19. Search Engine Optimization
The Event Espresso architecture (pages, posts, event pages, etc) is pre-optimized for search engines. We also provide SEO optimization tools (such as XML sitemaps) for each event, page and post to help your events get found and sell out quickly.
Event website search engine optimization
You will have your own dedicated site where you can have dedicated content and rich event pages that search engines can locate and index to show as results for internet searches. Feel free to compare your search result ranking for your Event Smart event page compared to your Cvent event pages.
20. Private Domains (coming soon)
Want to take branding your event website to the next level? Event Smart will soon be able to offer custom domains with just your brand name. Instead of https://example.eventsmart.com, you can use https://example.com.
21. Third-party Integrations
We know you use other services too, so we have integrations with marketing platforms and payment gateways to connect your event data to other services that can help you be successful. Integrations with Infusionsoft and MailChimp are just two examples where we connect you to other powerful tools.
22. Syndicate Your Events via RSS
Attendees like to stay connected in a lot of ways. You can share your events with your audience with event RSS feeds. Anytime you post a new event online or publish a blog post, your audience can be alerted to your new event or news.
Event Smart event rss feeds (premium reader shown)
23. Scaling Up to Pro Services
When was the last time that any other Cvent alternative was able to offer you your own ticketing platform for your own events? Are you getting serious about your event website? Do you need more control and dedicated resources for something special? We offer VIP services including: your own server(s) optimized for your event website, dedicated support resources (technical support, design and programming). Contact us about our VIP services for more information.
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