WebConferencing - Features on Offer

What Can It Offer?

Web Conferencing is available to anyone using a broadband enabled PC and offers a rich combination of features such as integrated audio with video. It also allows access to capabilities such as sharing of desktops, applications & browsers. People can therefore see and talk online to one another with real functionality as if round a table.

Those participating are able to interpret facial expressions & body language, just as they would in a normal face to face meeting. It's great too to be able to put a face to the voice when you've not previously met up. A good solution should operate over any PC type platform in terms of operating system, browser, & PC or MAC.

Each of the systems out there is unique in its own way and offers a feature set which you as a potential user must consider when deciding on the most effective solution to utilise. These features should include:


Basic Installation

• Software Downloads - is it a simple matter for attendees joining the meeting to do so using only their browser or must they download and install a client application?
• Meeting Invites - can meetings be scheduled and set up from within the likes of Outlook with meeting invites generated automatically?

Online Collaboration

• Desktop Sharing - is it possible for users to present and share their desktop documents and applications with each other?
• Presenter Role - can the presenting and sharing role be passed between users in a meeting?
• File Transfer - how easy is it to transfer files and documents between users without leaving the online meeting environment?
• Annotation Tools - will it be possible to highlight points or overwright notes on shared content for all users to see simultaneously?
• Whiteboard & Notepad - what capability is there to take notes or to layout ideas during a meeting and which can be referred to later?
• Breakout Meeting - can larger meetings break down temporarily into multiple smaller meetings to strategise before coming together again into the original meeting?

Communication

• Text Chat - what facility is there for users to put questions without verbally interrupting the presenter and can users keyboard chat privately between one another?
• VoIP or AudioConferencing - can users speak without the necessity of using a chargeable audio service and can a mix n' match approach be taken to verbal comms?
• Video - it may not always be necessary for all users to see one another but is it a standard feature that is always available?

Other Considerations

• Session Recording - can online meetings be recorded for later viewing, or as minuted versions of events?
• Payment Options - is payment on the basis of Pay as You Go or by subscription, and if there is a setup charge what are you paying for?
  

WebConferencing - Collaboration Aspects

How to Enhance Collaborative Working in Online Meetings

Video & audio communications are at the basis of online and web meetings. However, it's the added-value to those basics that is currently pushing WebConferencing to the fore in the evolution of business communications. So it is that most WebConference applications feature capabilities to assist with workgroup collaboration when meeting online:

Desktop & Screen Sharing
A common feature of WebConference applications is the ability of participants to be able to share the contents of their desktop with meeting colleagues, whether screen-based or actual application-based. This can be done in full screen mode or limited to a portion of the presenters screen. This sharing role is not limited to the meeeting host and should be an option for all participants of an online meeting.

Multiple Presenters
It is anticpated that online meeting participants might be both passive & active. Indeed those active participants will have expertise to share with their colleagues and so the Desktop & Screen Sharing role should be available to all participants of an online meeting. Not all WebConference applications allow this so it needs to be a consideration when assessing your needs.

Breakout Meeting Rooms
In larger multi-participant WebMeetings, as in larger meetings generally, there may be the need for splits into smaller submeetings or breakout sessions. Again, when assessing your needs this needs to be a consideration at the outset to ensure the chosen application allows this capability.

Drawing & Annotation Tools
When taking the role of Presenter in a WebMeeting by presenting the likes of a document or web page to colleagues it can be helpful to underscore certain points or to note ideas raised. Many applications offer annotation tools that allow the presenter to share hand generated additions by simultaneously making them visible to colleagues. These iterations can be archived and shared with colleagues later as a visible reminder of important points noted.

Whiteboards & Notepads
When attending a presentation or in a meeting it is often the case that Interactive Whiteboards can be used to make a point and indeed attendees will often use notepads as aid-memoires. Online whiteboards and notepads allow online neeting participants a dedicated space for noting or outlining adeas as they arise - indeed combined too with the anotation tools to enhance effectiveness. This of course takes the capability of WebMeetings beyond the simple presentation of imformation.

Sharing of Specific Collaborative Applications
As a participant in a Webmeeting you might have the role of project manager and it might be particularly effective to share an application such as Microsoft Project or Visio as an extension to a project meeting and to, for example, effectively update a Gannt Chart online with the visible agreement of those other team members online.

WebConferencing - Current State of Play

Where it's reached

From a commercial standpoint it all seemed to start a while back with Video Conferencing which was exhorbitantly expensive and favoured by large corporations and academia. Now, whilst relatively speaking, a little more affordable that world is morphing into something called Telepresence and promoted by serious blue chip providers such as Cisco and Vidyo.

That need to differentiate is necessitated by the fact that a newer kid-on-the-block caled Web & Desktop Conferencing has moved in at a more affordable price, enabled by the all proliferating world of Broadband Internet, and generating a revolution in uptake offering Audio, Web and an altogether more attainable variety of affordable Video conferencing solutions.

Audio Conferencing: also known as Teleconferencing and widely available from a wide range of providers offers multi-participant voice meetings over any combination of landline, mobile and internet connectivity. Some of these services are chargeable (on top of service connection charges) and some are arguably "no cost" ........ Skype being a well known such service with millions of worldwide users but with limited features compared to other solutions.

Audio Conferencing offers an effective solution to "virtual" meetings and is a comfortable and low-tech application that business becomes increasingly accustomed to using.

Web & Video Conferencing: a newer phenomena currently coming to the fore and increasingly driven by the need to cut operating costs, the need to work smarter and more effciently, and the undoubted need to embrace a green working culture.

Web Conferencing promotes online meetings by offering effective audio & video presentation. Integrated work tools enable users to effectively collaborate by sharing each other's desktop resources. The result offrers a High Return on Investment.

Face to Face Meetings will always be an essential element of business culture and will continue to be so but the drivers offered by Web & Video Conferencing mean that we can use the technology to achieve so much more. As is always the case improvements in technology will continue and improved quality will drive things forward. Where we are today allows us to consider the particular strength of Web & Video Conferencing as an enabler to uptake and success.

It's generally understood that we retain 20% of what we hear ...... offering something of a low return from the effort put into organising an Audio Conference type service. It's believed too that we retain some 20% of what we see. However, combine the two and retension levels increase to something in excess of 50%. Add audience participation & interaction into the equation and retension levels rise even further. This is where Web & Video Conferencing offers measurable success.

By adding Web Conference techniques to the accepted success of Audi & TeleConferencing you should be able to measure the increased return. Try adding some poling or survey questions, ask participants to show what they mean on an integrated whiteboard or by sharing their desktop resources. Meeting interaction can be used to measure particpant attentiveness and to judge when a meeting needs a break. Thought needs to be put in to planning a successful meeting and, of course, user etiquette is a major consideration.

If you're already using Audio or TeleConferencing it may well be worth taking a trial with a Web Conferencing service to see what might be achieved. The results will vary depending upon whom your audience is and what the subject matter might be. You just need to look around at the some of the solutions available and judge which best meets your needs. They all vary but you need to make your decision from an informed point of view.

WebConferencing - Online Eventing

How to extend your reach more effectively

Imagine the scenario ....... you've arranged an important seminar or annual conference at an excellent location and everyone's due to arrive. You get a call from someone who really needs to be there but something critical has intervened; worse, a main speaker to the meeting is unable to travel. Well, postponing the meeeting isn't an option and so you just have to come up with a solution.

Is there a way that those who can't make it can be enabled to be there? Well, "beam me up Scottie!" isn't yet a realistic option but Web Conferencing is today's reality and could be the solution. What if those absent could truly attend, able to watch, listen and generally participate? That missing speaker could be shown live on a large screen able to deliver that all-important presentation to the main meeting just as effectively as if there in person, even able to use those necessary presentation tools such as PowerPoint.

Th speaker's backdrop could be something more in tune with the presentation, rather than just the backdrop of a venue platform. Video & audio content can be integrated into the presentation and other presenters might also be faded in and out. An interesting website could be be brought up in real time to illustrate a point.

The remote presenter can effectively field audience questions too, or chair a Q & A session. In fact crucial experts can be drafted into the meeting from anywhere in the world. And all this without losing what many consider to be such an important part of such gatherings, the element of "at the event" people networking.

Ok, so those joing in remotely will have to provide their own refreshments but what flexibility! And all at an affordable cost.

Apply this technology to your organisation's AGM and no-one needs to miss out, no matter how far from the actual meeting. And guess what? ..... not only can those remote attendees put important questions "from the floor" but it is possible too for them to vote on important issues such as whether agreeing or not to the previous meeting minutes or to adopt the current financial statement. Indeed that financial statement can be shared with and seen by those connected to the meeting just as effectively as the hard copy handed out to those coming in through the door.

On top of all this the entire proceedings can be recorded for later viewing over a secure Internet connection, or indeed archived as a minuted record of proceedings.

All that's needed to make Online Eventing a reality is to ensure that all participating locations have an adequate broadband feed, and access to PC resources with the usual audio & video capabilities. Then you have the ingredients to make that carefully planned meeting an even more rewarding and inclusive event.