Report Card on Evite and Its Alternatives

When it comes to planning large events (1000+ people invited, 200+ people attending), Evite just doesn't cut it. Heck, it's never great, but it really suffers on large, paid events. So, what are my options?

I've evaluated the following: Evite, Socializr, MyPunchBowl, Zoji, Renkoo,

Problem Description: I'm looking for an invite application for planning large events. These events have 1000+ people invited, and around 200 people can buy tickets. Guests need to be able to respond and invite more people with minimal hassle, and they need to be able to easily view who's actually coming (eg, paid). It also needs to be easy for me, as the organizer, to be able to copy the invite list over to the next one.

Evite: It's a bit buggy, but it works fine for smaller events. For large events, it's pretty weak. Guests can spam all other guests. There's a cap on the number of guest you can invite. You can't easily export and import guest lists. Slow and buggy.

Disclaimer: Evite is the standard in invite apps, which both helps and hurts its assessment. I know its negatives better than anything else, which hurts its grade. However, I'm also accustomed to Evite's features and expect every other service to have the same things.

Pros:

• Templates: Large selection (although fairly mediocre design)
• No forced registration: Guests can RSVP and invite others without registering
• Guest List Management: Supports exporting as a .CSV, I can edit guest responses,
  
• I can set a public url for people who aren't on the invite
  
• I can add a field for payment (which is really just a link to paypal)
  

Cons

• Lacks security on the guest list: guests can spam other guests. Unacceptable with 1000+ people.
• Guest list cap of 750 - too small for me.
• Description field: max character counts of 3000 - the count is buggy and include HTML characters.
  
• Unable to importing guest list
• Garbles links inserted into invite.
• Invite email doesn't provide date or time.
• Annoying banner ads
• Painfully slow

Grades

• Ease of Use for Guests: A. (It doesn't require registration for RSVPing or inviting people).
  
• Guest List Management: B (You can export guest lists, but you can't import them).
  
• Elegance: B- (Lots of mediocre templates, and a lot of ads).
• Final Grade: B-
  

Socializr: It does almost everything evite does, and is actually better in a few ways. It's an invite service, plain and simple. However, it requires guests to register in order to invite more people. That's a deal breaker for me.

Pros:

• Supports closing the guest list to future RSVPs. Awesome feature!
• Templates: elegant, and you can save your own template or use other people's.
  
• Description field: sufficiently long, and you can edit the HTML directly.
• Good guest list management: guests can remove themselves from the invite, and you can export and import guest lists. Organizer can edit guest responses.
  
• Can redirect users to another website to pay after RSVPing.
• Invite email provides the date and time.
• Registration is not require to RSVP.
  

Cons:

• Not enough templates
• Requires guests to register an account in order to invite more people. So close....

Grades

• Ease of Use for Guests: C+. (Docked for requiring guests to register to invite people).
  
• Guest List Management: A+
• Elegance: B
• Final Grade: C
  

MyPunchBowl: Slick design for invitations, but the invite email is pretty ugly. It does little more than evite does, and it doesn't have a way for guests to reply "maybe". Well, that's just crazy!

Pros:

• Very slick designs!
• You can load guests lists from previous parties
• Invite email provides the date and time.
• Organizer can change guest's display names after inviting them.
• You can edit guest responses (sort of - you can move yes -> no or no -> yes), and you can do this quickly.
  
• Registration is not required to RSVP or to invite more people.
• People who respond "No" can't leave a public comment with their response (instead this gets emailed as a private response to the host). I'm not totally sure if this is actually a good or bad thing, but I'll put this as a pro.
  

Cons:

• Invite email is pretty ugly (or I just don't like the gray background).
  
• RSVPing is a multiple page / tab process. (1) Click yes, no or maybe. (2) Are you bringing anyone with you? (3) Comment. I prefer being able to do all of these at once - it's easier.
• Guests can't view the comments unless they RSVP. (This might be a pro for a lot of people, but not for me.)
• There's no "maybe" option. There's a "decide later" option, but that's just a way for someone to send themselves a reminder.

Grades:

• Ease of Use for Guests: C (there's no maybe option)
  
• Guest List Management: B (you can copy invites, but you can't move guests to "Decide Later")
  
• Elegance: B+ (Slick invites, but ugly emails)
• Final Grade: C-

Zoji.com: A worthy competitor to evite which doesn't try to force guests into registering. It's missing a few guest management features that I'd like, but the groups ideas shows a lot of potential.

Pros:

• Registration is not required to RSVP or to invite more people.
• Payment info: provides field for this info.
• No cap on invite lists. Yay!
• People can comment on your response. Cool!
• Contact groups: you can invite people as a group. These can be public groups which anyone can add themselves too. This is potentially very useful for me.
• Guests can remove themselves from the invite.
• Founders are very responsive to feedback. (Thanks Dan and Kevin, who will no doubt be reading this ;-)).
  

Cons:

• Display names: tedious to set. You can copy and paste email address with display names (but I hear they're working on this).
  
• It appears to not accept "+" signs in email addresses - even though that is a valid character.
• Templates: limited options.
• Messaging guests: I can't message the "no response"s without message the "no"s too.
  
• Organizer can't edit guest responses.
• Exporting guest lists is not supported.

Grades:

• Ease of Use for Guests: A (It never forces people into RSVPing)
  
• Guest List Management: B
• Elegance: B+
• Final Grade: B+ (with high expectations for the future)

Renkoo: Slick and elegant invitation system with one awesome feature: guests can reply directly from the invitation email. But... guests can't invite people. Importing guest lists is a pain. And guests have to RSVP to register.

Pros:

• Guests can reply directly from the email invitation. That's awesome!
• Slick, AJAXy at points.
• Provides a message board for guests
• Default theme is pretty, but a bit girly

Cons:

• No bulk adds for guests - I can only import from address books.
• Invite email: text is garbled, and it doesn't provide date or time.
• Template: none.
• Registration required to RSVP.
• Guests can't invite more people.
• Organizer can't edit guest responses.
  

Grades:

• Ease of Use for Guests: D (you have to register to RSVP. You can't invite more people.)
  
• Guest List Management: C (difficult to import guest lists, you can't edit guest responses.)
  
• Elegance: B+ (some slickness and pretty default, but you can't customize the design.)
• Final Grade: D+
  

And our winner is... Zoji. It doesn't quiet do everything I need it too, but it'll work well for my guests - and that's the most important thing.

I can't take the risk of using Zoji for my huge events of 1000+ people, much as I do like the service. I'll probably start by using Zoji for a smaller event - you know, test the waters and see how it goes. Then... just maybe :-)