Posts Tagged ‘Place Of Business’

Discounted Conference Calling Services can be Reliable

Thursday, November 3rd, 2011

If you are looking at getting a conference call service provider for your business and you have looked at some of the long distance carriers and other providers that still charge 10 cents or more a minute you may be a little skeptical of discounted conference calling services.  But just because the service is less expensive does not necessarily mean that the service is of a lower quality or less reliable.  You do still need to be careful as some of the conference call providers have not taken the same steps to ensure quality and reliability like Zip Conferencing has done.  Here are some of the areas that any discounted conference calling services company needs to pay attention to in order to maintain high quality and reliability.

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    • Back Up Power - All of the equipment for conference calling services should be connected to to battery and generator back up power. This makes sure that no matter what power outages are experienced at their place of business your conference calls will not be impacted.  Zip Conferencing uses back up power systems on all of its equipment and can maintain power to these systems for an indefinite amount of time. 
    • Back Up Systems – A key component for conference calling services is the conference call bridge. This is the equipment that creates the conference calls from independent callers into the system.  It is an expensive proposition to maintain back up equipment so many discounted conference calling services companies do not take this step.  But if something happens to this equipment your conference call will be affected.  Zip Conferencing has designed their conference calling services with back up conference call bridges so that if there is ever an issue the traffic can be redirected to the back up system.
    • Telecommunications Redundancy – What happens if the long distance carrier used by the discounted conference calling services company has an outage?  If they do not have another carrier as back up you will not be able to get to your conference call.  Zip Conferencing uses multiple telecommunications carriers that insures that if one of the carriers experiences a disastrous outage they can still perform your conference call. 
    • Support – One of the areas that discounted conference calling services will differ is with support.  You may not need support very often but when you do you need it to be there for you.  Zip Conferencing offers conference calling services with an award winning support team. Our operators are monitoring our conference calling services 24/7 and can even join on your conference call if you need assistance.  No mater what time of day you can access support and get the help you need.

So, discounted conference calling services can be reliable but you need to investigate and make sure that discounted doesn’t mean your conference call quality or reliability will suffer.

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Rain, Rain Go Away

Thursday, September 8th, 2011

If you live in the Northeast you can certainly relate to the title of my blog today.  I have barely been out of the house it seems in the past two weeks as I have been on conference calls dodging the rain drops.  A hurricane followed by a tropical storm have spurred people to contemplate building an Ark.  My home and our conference call service offices have been spared any damage but many people have not.  And to them I send my thoughts and prayers for a speedy recovery from what is some of the worst flooding ever.    Especially my friends and customers in Vermont who really had no warning for some of the worst damage the storms could impart.

As devastating as the weather has been over the past couple of weeks, our customers have had the advantage of continuous communications throughout with our conference call service.  I have suggested many times on this blog to have conference call information at the ready in case of emergency and it has certainly come in handy for our customers.  We have customers in Vermont who literally could not get to their place of business if they wanted to and were ostensibly cut off.  But conference calls with their employees enabled them to maintain lines of communication and continue their businesses without interruption.  And with the Zip Conferencing Pay As You Go service there isn’t even any cost unless you use the service so there is no excuse not to have conference call information in case of emergency.

And the hurricane season is not over.  Another named storm is brewing in the Atlantic and could once again threaten the East coast with wind and rain.  We were lucky that Irene did not have the damaging winds that were possible but the rain certainly did its damage.  Next time we may not be so lucky so be prepared.  Also, when the hurricane season ends the next thing we get to deal with is the snow.  And if last year was any indication we can’t wait for global warming to get us out of trouble any time soon.  Several times in the Northeast last year we were paralyzed and could not get to office buildings.  Our business was not affecting thanks to careful planning, is yours?  Make sure you have a back up communication plan in place with conference calls and web conferencing just in case you need them.

So anyway, rain, rain, go away and help poor Texas anyway.

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Conference Calls can Help Gauge the Economy

Friday, November 6th, 2009

I heard that it is a good thing that the Yankees won the World Series because the stock market has an average gain of 10% in the year following a win by them in the World Series.  Well, as a Red Sox fan I have a hard time feeling good about them winning it all but at least there is a fringe benefit.  And we can’t win it all every year after all.  ;)  The point I wanted to talk about today was how you can get a read on the economy by the usage of conference calls as well.  And it is probably a little more reliable than the connection between a baseball game and the economy too. 

Over the eyars of being in the conference call industry I have noticed a couple of interesting things that can help indicate how my day is going to go.  The first thing I notice is the traffic on the way to work.  If it is a busy traffic morning there are going to be a lot of conference calls held that day.  Now, in some respects you would think just the opposite.  If people stay home they would need to hold meetings remotely and a conference call is a sure bet.  But actually, most of the conference calls are being attended by people in their place of business and when people are staying home they are probably on holiday and are not doing conference calls.  So, as business traffic picks up, so do the number of conference calls.

The other thing I notice is the type of businesses that sign up for a conference call service is a good indicator of the health of that segment of the business.  And when I see a greater number of sign ups than business in that area is probably picking up.  Lately I have seen a number of real estate offices and associations signing up for our service.  And after speaking to some Realtors I know it appears that the real estate market is picking up some steam after a tough couple of years.  That is good news for all of us since that is one of the leading indicators in the economy. 

Beyond the signing up for a conference call service I also notice the amount of conference calling done by my customers in general is a good indicator of the economy.  And certainly over the past year the financial sector has been especially hard hit.  So, companies that do mortgages for instance, just aren’t writing as many mortgages so they are not doing as many conference calls with their offices and vendors to talk about mortgages.  And so forth.  But again the good news is that the volume of conference calls is starting to pick up in a number of industries that have suffered over the past year or two.  It has a ways to go, but in general based on the number of conference calls being done it appears that the economy is on the mend.  Maybe we can thank the Yankees and conference calls for the good market over the next year!  

www.zipconferencing.com

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