Posts Tagged ‘Desks’

An Audio Conference is Easy and Affordable

Monday, July 11th, 2011

I still get people who ask me about the basics of an audio conference so I thought I would spend today describing just how easy and affordable a conference call can be. 

  • Ease of Use- An audio conference was not always as easy to use as they are today.  It used to be that you had to get the names and numbers of the people you wanted on an audio conference to an operator who would schedule the conference call and when the time came call out to all the parties.  There was work up front for the moderator to assemble this information and then call a conference call service and relay that information to them so the audio conference could begin.  And then for the participants on the conference call you had to be at the phone number you supplied at the time of the call or you were not going to get on the audio conference.  Of course this was before cell phones were real prevalent and most people had to stay at their desks a little more than today anyway but still I can tell you that many calls were missing participants because people just were not always where they were supposed to be when the audio conference began.  As a conference call service provider we spent a lot of time chasing people down or putting them into the correct conference calls when they called back into our service center.  Now it is much easier for everyone.  Zip Conferencing provides you with a toll free dial in number that never changes and pass codes for you and your participants that never change.  There is no need to schedule your audio conference now.  You simply tell your participants when you want to meet and supply them with the toll free dial in number and pass code.  At the time of the conference call you and your participants simply dial the access number and put in the pass code and you are joined in the conference call.
  • Affordable- Over time just as the audio conference has gotten a lot easier to use it has also become more affordable.  The average rate per minute of a toll free conference call in 1995 was $.50 per minute.  Today Zip Conferencing has toll free conference call rates as low as $.024 per minute.  The combination of ease of use and price has resulted in explosive growth for conference calls.  You can meet with a large group of people for a small amount of money and it cost nothing for your participants to join. 

An audio conference is the easiest and most affordable way to meet with a group of people.

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Conference Call Applications – Sales and Marketing

Monday, June 29th, 2009

Conference calls have been adopted by business as a great way to save money on travel, improve communications and shorten business life cycles.  One of the areas where the technology has been widely adopted is in Sales and Marketing.  While it is widely accepted that face time is important to the sale in many cases, getting in front of the customer with conferencing technology can help qualify prospects, perform product demonstrations and ultimately shorten the sales cycle. 

Audio Conferencing

The same basic principles that assist all businesses when they use audio confernecing apply in Sales and Marketing.  Why they have so widely adopted conferencing technology is understandable because in this area of business you will see an immediate impact to your bottom line.  Travel costs to present the materials to the customer are eliminated.  A conference call can be scheduled much quicker than a face to face meeting.  Many prospects are much more willing to make time for a conference call because it takes less time out of their day than an in person meeting.  Sales Managers can have daily calls with their entire sales force even when the people are located across the country.

Web Conferencing

Web conferencing has revolutionized the way companies sell their products and services.  It is now commonplace to get an initial demonstration of a product or service over the internet using web conferencing.  Especially for software and web services this is more the norm than not.  Customers have now grown used to sitting comfortably at their desks and watching a webinar or demonstration.  The web confernece eliminates the need to travel to a customer premise and set up the projector, get an internet connection and everything else that goes with getting an in-person sales demonstration in place.  Instead sales demonstrations can happen ad hoc or scheduled using a web conference and a telephone.  And beyond being more convenient for salesperson and customer, the statistics prove that using web conferencing services in the sales process is a very effective way to do business.  You can do more presentations in less time for less money than anyone doing in-person sales.

For Sales and Marketing applications the path is clear.  Audio conferencing and web conferencing provide a quicker more effective way to do business.

www.zipconferencing.com

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