Posts Tagged ‘Free Conference Call’
Wednesday, March 17th, 2010
So, you think you want free conference call services? Think again! Like most things in life, nothing really comes for free. And before you risk your reputation and business you will want to understand what free conference call services are all about.
When the first free conference call service was introduced everyone in the conference call industry kind of shrugged and figured everyone would understand the deficiencies with the service and steer clear of them. Well, free conference call services have survived because everyone likes something “free” so its attraction can not be underestimated. But, is it truly free? And what is the difference between free conference call services and paid conference call services? Here are the details behind free conference call services.
- Free Doesn’t mean No Cost- True, after the conference call is over you may not owe the free conference call service provider anything, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t cost you anything. That is because all free conference call service providers give you a local number to access your conference call. That “local” number is usually not local for anyone on the conference call which means you and you participants have to make a long distance call to connect to your conference. Do you want your customer or prospect to get long distance charges on their phone bill for attending your conference call?
- Will it be available when you dial in - The way a free conference call service company makes money is by getting the termination fee for having you call into a location where long distance providers pay the local telephone company to terminate the call. The amount they are paid is very small so they can’t afford the best conference call equipment and have a limitation on capacity. There is no guarantee that when you call in for your conference call that the capacity will be there for you. Do you want to chance having the conference call available?
- Toll Free at a Price - You can usually get a toll free access number for your conference call, but you will pay for it. And if you find that if you shopped around the competition you could find a better toll free conference call rate from a company with better features and more reliable conference call equipment.
- Support is Not Free - And if you need any support, how much support do you expect if the service is free?
So, if you want to make sure your conference call is there when you need and not get hit with hidden charges you may want to examine what it means to be a free conference call service.
Tags: Conference Call, Conference Call Service, Conference Calling, Free Conference Call, free conference call services, Toll Free Conference Call
Posted in Conference Call Service | No Comments »
Monday, February 22nd, 2010
I speak to many customers who come to Zip Conferencing after being “burned” by another Conference Call Service company. I guess it is a factor of the competitiveness of this business, but I can’t see how tricking your customers is going to help you in the long run. Here are a few ways you can be misled by a conference call service company.
- Access is not Toll Free - Many conference call companies including the Free Conference Call companies offer an attractive rate that may look good but actually have hidden charges. Any conference call service company that pushes a local or toll connection is making you pay long distance charges to connect to your conference calls. It doesn’t appear on your conference call bill but it will add to your bottom line cost for you and your participants.
- Long Term Contracts - Some conference call companies will make you sign a long term contract in order to get a good rate for the conference calls. If your business needs change or your conference call needs change you can find yourself paying a penalty to get out of a contract for services you no longer need.
- Hidden Charges - Make sure that all of the charges you will get for the service are spelled out ahead of time. Some conference call companies will fail to tell you about connection charges or set up charges that you did not expect when you signed up for the service.
- Per Moderator Charges - Some companies will charge you to add users to your account who can hold conference calls.
The bottom line is you need to ask lots of questions when you are investigating which conference call company to choose. Make sure your are doing an apples to apples comparison so that you can sort through all of the offers to determine who will provide the best conference call service at the best rates for your needs. Be sure to check out Zip Conferencing and you will find that the rates for the conference call services are straight forward. There are no set up fees, no contracts and you can cancel at any time.
www.zipconferencing.com
Tags: Apples To Apples, Apples To Apples Comparison, Attractive Rate, Bottom Line, Competitiveness, Conference Call, Conference Call Service, Conference Call Services, Conference Calling, Conference Calls, Conferencing, Connection Charges, Free Conference Call, Guess, Hidden Charges, Long Distance Charges, Participants, Term Contract, Term Contracts
Posted in Conference Call Service | No Comments »
Monday, November 23rd, 2009
As a business we sometimes get caught up in saving money on the things we use in the business and forget to think about how it will reflect on the image of our company. Let’s face it. We’ve all done it. Save a little money by replacing a reliable service or product with a cheaper one only to find that in most case, you really do get what you pay for. It is the same with a conference call service company. It is okay to switch to a new conference call vendor to save some money, but you do need to be careful about the service you are getting as the participants on the conference calls you run will see the conference call service you use as a reflection of your company.
You see, you are going to invite customers and prospects to attend meetings you hold via a conference call or web conference. And it is important that the meeting have the kind of quality and reliability you expect. After all, you would not invite your guests to a roadside motel where the lights don’t work for a meeting, right? With a conference call service company it is not always so apparent to see the differences in the companies, but if you know what to look for, at least you will have a chance.
First of all something for free is rarely free. In some way or another you are paying for the service. Many times there are advertisements associated with free conference call service that the company is putting in front of your audience. And invariably, the conference call service is not as good as a fee based service either. Free conference calls make the participants pay to connect to the conference call because they have to dial a long distance number to connect to the call. And the conference call service company can’t afford the latest equipment or services, or the best connections tot he telephone network either. And they might not even have the conference call capacity to support your call when you need it. All of these things cost money and free doesn’t pay for them.
Some of the conference call service companies are now offering unlimited capacity and rates that are less expensive than a long distance phone call. How do they do that? Well, they are probably offering a service based on VOIP technology. Don’t get me wrong, VOIP has come a long way in the past 5 years, but would you trust your business to it? Again, if it looks too good to be true it probably is.
In the end you should be looking for a conference call service company that uses the latest conference call equipment, solid connections to the telephone network, back up network provisi0ns and provides service to back up their conference calls like Zip Conferencing. Because when you hold an audio or web conference, the conference call service company you choose will reflect on your company.
www.zipconferencing.com
Tags: Advertisements, Audience, Best Connections, Conference Call Service, Face, Free Calls, Free Conference Call, Free Conference Call Service, Image, Long Distance, Participants, Prospects, Reflection, Reliability, Reliable Service, Roadside Motel, Saving Money, Telephone Network, Web Conference
Posted in Conference Call Service | No Comments »
Monday, October 19th, 2009
There have been many predictions ofValue the conference calls’ demise over the years. First, the video conference was going to be on everyone’s desktop and people wouldn’t bother with regular conference calls anymore. Then services came along that purported to provide free conference calls. Then everyone was going to be speaking into their PCs and wouldn’t use a phone anymore. And on, and on. The fact that conference calls done over the telephone are not only still here but doing so well is the basic fact that there is no better value if you want to have a high quality connection and be able to speak to a group of people at a distance.
Video conferencing has been around for a long time. So why aren’t we all looking at each other during our calls already. There are probably many reasons. But first and foremost it is not as easy as a conference call and not necessarily available to everyone. I mean these days it is hard to buy a PC without a webcam attached, but many people don’t use them or know how to use them. And the quality of the connection still has a lot to be desired. If anything, the call can be more distracting than anything. And then you have the whole social aspect. The fact that most people don’t feel comfortable having their image in front of themselves and broadcast to many people. It will be quite a while before video conferencing is as easy to use as a telephone.
I’ve addressed the concept of the free conference call in other posts, but in short nothing is really free. You simply can’t get a high quality conference call with toll free access for nothing. And toll free access for your participants is simply the right thing to do. And if you want to make sure the call is there when you need it to be and want a good sound would you trust it to a free service?
And we are also still a long way away from having an integrated device on our desktop that does all of our phone tasks as well. Can you do it today? Of course, but the complexities of getting it done is worse than getting the video camera to work and if you still have to connect to people using a telephone you still have to connect to the telephone network to do a conference call so you really aren’t gaining anything unless you eliminate that aspect.
One of the big drivers for new technology is saving money. Today, the costs of conference calls have come down to the point where it is difficult to justify putting up with any inconvenience to try to save a little money. Let’s face it, everyone has a telephone and that is really all you need to have and know how to use in order to join a conference call. And you will get a clear, high quality connection without any issues.
So, given all the choices that are out there, conference calls continue to grow because they still deliver the best value for the money.
www.zipconferencing.com
Tags: Buy A Pc, Demise, Fact That Most People, Free Access, Free Calls, Free Conference Call, Group Of People, High Quality, Integrated Device, Long Time, Lot, Many People, Participants, Quality Conference, Quality Connection, Social Aspect, Video Conference, Video Conferencing, Webcam
Posted in Conference Calls | 1 Comment »
Thursday, September 10th, 2009
I am sure you have seen them if you have done a search for conference calls on the internet. Free conference calls. So what is the deal? Are they really free? How do they afford to do that?
Well I am sure you have also heard the saying, “There is no such thing as a Free Lunch” and with free conference calls it is all too true. First of all who had the idea in the first place and how do they make money? A number of years ago someone had the idea to give away conference calls in order to generate traffic to a carriers’ network, because the carrier gets paid by the long distance carriers a small amount of money to terminate the call on the local network. So, even though to you the conference call is “free” the conference call service provider is paid by the carrier for the traffic they are generating. So, then it is a Free Conference Call, right? Not exactly.
The problem with the free conference call is that you have to pay a long distance charge to whoever your long distance provider is in order to get to the location where their conference call equipment is installed. Let’s say that their equipment is in Kansas City for instance. You and all of your participants have to pay the long distance charge, per minute to connect to Kansas City. Now that rates for toll free conference calls have come down, why would you want to have hidden charges for you and your participants?
There are other problems with many of these free conference call services. Some are using VOIP to connect the call resulting in poor quality. Many will have capacity issues because they really can’t afford to have lots of equipment sitting idle because their financial model is so thin. Many of the conference call features you will get with a toll free conference call service provider are not available with a free conference call service provider. In order to compensate for some of these shortfalls some of the free providers started offering toll free conference calls as well. But the pricing for these services is higher than some of the conference call service providers that are built to provide a high quality service like Zip Conferencing. So, you end up paying a higher price for a lower grade of service.
So, why would anyone use a free conference call service? Because its “free”. In the end, like so many other things in life, with conference calls you get what you pay for.
www.zipconferencing.com
Tags: Amount Of Money, Conference Call Service, Conference Call Service Provider, Conference Call Services, Financial Model, Free Conference Call, Free Conference Call Service, Free Lunch, Free Providers, Hidden Charges, Internet Free, Kansas City, Local Network, Long Distance Carriers, Long Distance Provider, Participants, Poor Quality, Shortfalls, Toll Free Conference Call, Traffic
Posted in Conference Calls | No Comments »
