Event Wax - the Web based event organisation lubrication (their words, not mine) has announced today that it will be shutting down the service down completely on Thursday 16th July.

Whilst I signed up for Event Wax a few months back, I’m a keen Google Calendar user and have never really had any reason to stray from the Big G’s offering. That said, I have had brief flirtations with Meetup.com and have been known to use Facebook to organise private events.

Taking a closer look at Event wax, it was actually a really solid tool offering:

• Customisable, hosted web site for your event
• Alternatively, hook up the registration pages with your own site
• Versatile ticket types allowing free, limited, early bird, bulk discounted, and numerous other options
• Accept payments through your PayPal account
• Quick, searchable, sortable access to attendee details
• Keep track of activity through RSS feeds
• Comprehensive help, accessible externally, or within your admin area
• Dynamic mailing lists that can be targeted at attendees, or groups of attendees
• Export data as spreadsheets or XML
• Send out invites and collect RSVPs

In addition to these features, Event Wax were planning to provide users with:

• Customizable registration forms
• Automatic addition and updating of your event on Upcoming.org
• Multiple themes for your event site
• Full integration into your own web site using a powerful API
• The ability to use your own payment gateway (via the API), PayPal, NoChex, or Google Checkout
• Sending out of invoices and track payments

Ho-hum.

What event tools have you used?

1. EventBrite

Eventbrite is a San-Fran based provider of online event management and ticketing services. I like the way that Eventbrite makes it easy for anyone to organise an event of any type and size. The service is free if your event is free. If you sell tickets to your event, Eventbrite collects a small fee per ticket.I recently used EventBrite to secure my tickets for the forthcoming SocialMediaCamp London 09 event.

2. Meetup

Commoncraft has made a great video which describes Meetup much better than I ever could, so click here to chck it out. I will say however that I am a big fan of this website – particularly as it acts as an effective event search engine as well as a logistical tool for event organisers. The legendary London Bloggers Meetup events are organised via this platform.

3. Facebook events

Most people on Facebook have at some point or other either organised a meeting/party via the native Events application or have attended an event via Facebook. It’s great because it taps into the Facebook newsfeed, giving your event maximum visibility within your social network.

4. Twtvite

Set up by Felipe Coimbra, Twtvites is part of the Twtapps portfolio which really simplifies organising Tweet-ups via Twitter. The Shortditch Twit events successfully use this mechanism to draw a decent crowd.

5. Google Calendar

Google Calendar has always been my calendar of choice – even when I was locked into Outlook when I worked at various agencies. I love the way Google makes it really easy to embed and share calendars, making them easily accessible within Gmail, iGoogle, etc. The invitation distribution is very cool – particularly as it enable automatic integration with Google Maps.

What about you? Have you anymore tools which you’ve used to manage an event? If you think of any similar platform that’s worthy of a mention – drop me a comment below.