Eventbrite Alternatives: How to Market an Event Online

It's not uncommon for many business owners to turn to event planning as a way to market their business, whether it’s a grand opening, a pop-up shop, or a promotion for the Super Bowl or NBA Playoffs. Websites like Eventbrite have done such a wonderful job at marketing their platform that it almost feels like a no-brainer to utilize it to market and sell tickets for your event.

But all in all, it’s not a good strategy, and here’s why. Websites like Eventbrite benefit from you, the event planner and business owner, to help market and grow their business while they essentially do nothing for your growth. Their platform collects fees from your ticket sales that you will not have access to until the conclusion of your event—what if you need those extra funds to put towards your event to help make it more memorable or spectacular?

They could obviously care less, plus there is no method of promoting your event on their platform besides advertising or boosting. If you’re going to be subjected to fees—whether you’re paying them or they’re being rolled into the ticket price for your guests—you want to ensure that it's being promoted.

Lastly, and most importantly, backlinks. When you use websites such as Eventbrite, Facebook, Ticket Spice, or even Google Events, you are not earning a backlink to your website or blog, and this can have a negative effect on your SEO and the way you rank in search engines. If you were getting backlinks, then sure enough, you would rank higher for the same keywords you are using on your Eventbrite promotion page.

Meanwhile, when you add that promotion page to your website and link out to theirs, they are earning a backlink off of you. So not only are you paying them fees, promoting their platform (aka your event), but you are also giving them an unearned, organic backlink, helping them rank higher on Google, Bing, etc. This means other people who have their events on Eventbrite are being showcased due to your efforts, and you’re not being paid for it.

The concept of marketing is simple but has become convoluted with YouTubers making content for clickbait and websites such as Eventbrite misleading their customers. Not only that, but they do not protect their users. Many solicitors or sales reps will take your information and pitch you other services or products to buy or other platforms to use—don’t fall for it. Ticketmaster is already feeling the burn from consumers, and other platforms will too as more and more people wake up to their deceptive practices.

WHAT IS MARKETING?

Marketing Coordinator, Amelia Taylor from Branndet Marketing Group shares, “If you’re hosting an event and you design a flyer to post, that is advertising. If you take that flyer and place it on a bus or billboard, that is promotion. If that bus happens to ride through a parade or fair and goes off course and the newspaper writes about it, that is publicity. If the organizers of the fair get upset and talk about it to anyone who will listen, that is public relations. Now, if you start to tell people about the event, booth rental opportunities, and how much fun they will have, that is sales. Planning the entire event, however, is marketing.”

Marketing an event online is a process that involves many steps—create the flyer, post the flyer, promote the flyer, do something newsworthy, and share it with your local news media outlets. If you want to take it a step further, you can also look into generating buzz around the event itself through the use of one service or product. Companies like Branndet Marketing Group specialize in helping businesses achieve their event planning goals from start to finish. Speaking of which, here are some Eventbrite alternatives to consider:

STRIPE – Yes, this payment processing platform is number one because you can simply build a landing page using hosting platforms like Wix or Hostinger for around $28/month or less and add a payment link to the website. The same places you’re going to promote the EB link are the same places you’d promote this website. Stripe payments are cleared to go to your bank account in as little as 3 days.

GUEST POSTING/LINK BUILDING – Once you have your landing page website, you want to generate a list of websites in your event’s niche and contact them, asking if they’re open to link insertions. Many of them will say yes, and for as little as $20, you can add your website's page to theirs, making it easier for your website to rank higher in Google for that particular keyword.

MARKETING AGENCIES – There are a number of marketing agencies that will help you promote your event and market it from start to finish without you having to do any of the legwork. This does require an upfront fee, sometimes as low as $499 to $10,000 on the higher end, for around a 3-month contract.

FACEBOOK GROUPS/REDDIT – If you’re low on funds and need a way to promote your website and that Stripe link, then of course you can use Facebook Groups or Reddit Communities, which are usually free. Again, once you have a niche, you should stick to it and be sure to add relevant information to these spaces and make the checkout process easy and straightforward. Make sure responses to your FAQ are readily available.

All of this may seem like a lot or may seem tedious, but the truth is if you’re a business owner with a limited number of resources, you will need to spend as much time as you possibly can building your business and getting in front of as many people as possible. While event planning or event management websites can be effective, in the long run, they are just taking and giving you nothing in return.

You want to always maximize your profits by minimizing your expenses, and this means time as well since that is a non-renewable resource. Why spend hours promoting their platform and helping them make a ton of money when they are giving you tangible in return? Take matters into your own hands.

by Riley Cook