Posts Tagged ‘Web Services’

Web Conferencing Services should be Easy to Use

Tuesday, November 1st, 2011

Web Conferencing Services have helped companies save millions of dollars and are here to stay.  The use of web conferencing services is expected to continue to grow rapidly over the next 5 years as more and more people adopt them for their own use.  And the inclination of many of the web conferencing services providers is to add more and more features to try and attract customers.  But the one thing that you really need to have in your web conferencing services is their ease of use.  Zip Conferencing has gone to great lengths to create a web conferencing service that is powerful and yet easy to use.  Here are some of the features that make our web conferencing service one of the easiest to use services in the market.

  • Outlook Integrated Invitations- One of the complications of getting a web conference meeting going is inviting your participants.  Different web conferencing services do this in a variety of ways but all offer some type of email confirmation or a web page you can send your participants to in order to join the meeting.  These methods certainly work but why should you have to cut and paste and try to pull together the information for your participants.  With Zip Conferencing you can use our Outlook scheduling tool and integrate your web conference details right within Outlook.  That way you are able to put out a meeting request just like you would any other meeting, from within Outlook.  Invite participants and have them accept the meeting and have the meeting appear on your calendar all using the same steps you would take to schedule any meeting.  Now that is Easy!
  • Intuitive Control Panel – The actual functionality of a web conference is not that different across providers but what is different is that way that you access the functions from within the service.  With all of the different features now packed within the web conferencing services out there you sometimes have to navigate a maze of controls to find what you are looking for.  Zip Conferencing has put the most widely used features front and center using intuitive controls available with the touch of a button.
  • No Software Downloads – One of the hardest things to overcome with a web conference is getting on the meeting.  Many times participants who have not used the web conferencing services before will have to download software in order to join the meeting.  Many times adding software to a computer is prohibited by companies and participants are unable to join.  With Zip Conferencing there are no software downloads for the participants.  Our web conference service uses Flash which is already widely installed on people’s computers so there is no waiting for participants to download software. 

If it isn’t easy to use you probably won’t use it.  So if you are just starting out doing web meetings or you have struggled in the past to have a successful web conference give Zip Conferencing a try.

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Hasn’t Congress heard of Conference Calling Services?

Friday, August 12th, 2011

I would not describe myself as a political activist, but like many people the latest display of ineptitude of our elected officials in Washington, DC I find myself wondering how these people can afford to take a 5 week vacation when their business (our country) is struggling like it is today.  Maybe they need some time back in their home states but haven’t they heard of conference calling services?  At least make it look like you are attempting to do something about the mess we are in by working a little while you are on vacation like the rest of us.  Seems like conference calling services would enable these people to keep things moving and maybe get something done.  After all I have never been able to take a 5 week vacation and I don’t know anyone who has in my lifetime.  I have been working since I was 14 years old and I have not had 5 weeks off ever.  In fact I took a two week vacation once and it felt like I was retired.  It was tough to get back into things when I returned and I have not taken a vacation that long since then.  Now when I am even out for a few days I use conference calling services to stay in touch with things at work.  It helps me to relax to know that things are running smoothly and I won’t be blindsided when I return.  If things at work need to be addressed I won’t even go on vacation let alone for 5 weeks!

Conference calling services are one thing but these people work for the government after all and have every means of communication imaginable available to them.  They could absolutely work from home and continue to accomplish things.  Many businesses now rely on a good portion of their employees working from their homes and it doesn’t slow them down.  Conference calling services and web conferencing services allow people to work from anywhere and still hold meetings and collaborate on projects.  So how about it Mr Congressman?  What do you say?  Can you possibly cut your vacation down to 2 – 3 weeks and get back to getting this country put back together?  We working stiffs who pay your salaries would surely appreciate it.

Zip Conferencing would be happy to provide conference calling services and web conferencing services to any elected officials who would like to keep working.  Drop us an email and we will set you up.

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Interactive Web Conferencing

Thursday, April 15th, 2010

As web conferencing has become more popular chances are that you have attended an online seminar where the presentation has been done via web conferencing.  Usually you are simply sitting in the audience on a conference call listening while watching the presentation on the web conference with little or no interaction with the speaker.  Although this is the most used method of web conferencing, the people who first came up with the idea had much bigger plans for web conferencing.

When web conferencing was first invented a lot of effort was made to make the service a collaborative tool where people could work on a document together from great distance.  This ability to collaborate was seen as the the killer application.  The adoption of web conferencing services is more and more widespread but interactive web conferencing is still lagging in its use overall.  Here are some of the features that allow for interactive web conferencing.

  • Application Sharing – Application sharing provides users the ability to share their desktop with the other participants on the web conference and permits any participant to control another computer.  This means that participants can actually control a document or spreadsheet and input or edit data on it.  Much like you would pass around a piece of paper in an in person meeting for people to mark up, you can actually change the document on the fly while on the web conference.
  • Whiteboarding- This application permits participants to mark up a virtual whiteboard seen by all participants while on an interactive web conference.  Much like someone would go up to a whiteboard to discuss things while in a conference room, participants can easily do the same on the web conference.
  • Polling/Q&A – Even a presentation can be an interactive web conference through the use of polling and Q&A features.  By engaging the audience you will have a more stimulating meeting and have better retention of the material.  Polling permits you to survey your audience during an interactive web conference and the Q&A feature allows you to conduct an orderly Q&A session for the presentation.

It seems that maybe people don’t work in a collaborative manner and allowing someone to control your PC is a little scary to some people as well.  But even if you are only doing a presentation using a web conferencing service you can make it an interactive web conference by adding polling and Q&A to your web conference.  You will find that the more you can make it an interactive web conference the more your participants will stay engaged with your presentation.

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Our Conference Call Service offers Service Beyond the Call

Monday, November 16th, 2009

I am sure there are several conference call service companies that offer a good conference call from a technical point of view.  What I mean is that you can call into the conference call without too many problems and the conference call quality once connected is decent and so forth.  But what happens if you need help?  Is the conference call service company there for you when you need them to be?

At Zip Conferencing we pride ourselves on not just providing the highest quality audio conferencing and web conferencing services available, but we also want to make sure that your needs are taken care of as well.  That is why we provide customer service 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.  And, because we know that people like to communicate in different ways we have supplied many different ways to communicate with us.  You can call us on the phone to speak to a representative or if you prefer, you can also chat with one of our representatives 24 hours a day as well.  The representatives that are available by chat are the same representatives that answer the phones and are well schooled in all of services and features of Zip Conferencing.  Or you can send us a Support Request Form via the web site to get an answer to your conference call question if you do not need an immediate answer.

In addition to the people behind the scenes at Zip Conferencing that are ready to assist you, you will find a helpful knowledge base of important conference call and web conferencing information.  The information is organized between conference call FAQs, How Tos and Billing questions.  You can even search the plentiful knowledge base or ask a question. 

We believe that just providing a conference call is not enough.  Standing behind the audio and web conferences that we provide with service is one of the important differentiators between us and other conference call service companies.  And if you ever have a questions about your conference call service I am sure you will agree.

www.zipconferencing.com

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An Introduction to Web Conferencing

Wednesday, July 29th, 2009

It may be hard to imagine, but there are still a good amount of potential customers that don’t understand the basics of holding a conference call.  We frequently get questions about how it works, how many people can you have on a call at once and what they need to do to host a conference call.  So, it is no wonder that many people out here have not have not been on a web conference and in fact don’t even know what it means to hold a web conference.  Today, I would like to talk about the general principles of web conferencing and what it means to hold a web conference.

When the industry first invented the web conference it struggled with what to call it.  Is it an online meeting, a web conference, a webinar or just a conference call?  Well, you will still hear it called a variety of things but a web conference has kind of stuck as a term to refer to any conference call that has a visual element you view over the internet.  Web conferencing has also become somewhat standardized in the functions that you can perform on a web conference no matter what brand you choose to use.  Basically, a web conference allows you to share what is on your computer with the participants on the conference call in addition to being able to speak to them.  And, just like any in person presentation, the ability to share images during your web conference has a positive impact in engaging your audience and improving their retention of the materials.

The web conferencing services have gotten pretty sophisticated in their feature set, but most people are still just using about 10% – 20% of the software’s ability.  This is not unlike any piece of “software” and you can still hold successful web conferences jus tusing the basics.  In fact, I know many users that have always simply used the application sharing abilities of the web conference alone no matter what they are doing.  This feature simply shows everyone what is on your computer screen as you see it.  Since the concept is simple and the web conferencing service does this with a single button it is understandable why people have gravitated to using this function.

A couple of the other standard features available are the ability to share a whiteboard on your computer with your participants while on a web conference, and the other feature used by most people is the ability to share a Powerpoint presentation.  Again, this functionality is familiar to anyone who does a presentation and once you start the web conference, showing your Powerpoint slides is as easy as doing it in person.  It is no wonder that web conferencing is expected to grow dramatically over the next five years.   www.zipconferencing.com

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