If you’re currently running your business remotely, you know that having team meetings, especially ones involving presentations and sharing of data and information, can be difficult. Webcast platforms are here to help make this aspect of remote work easier for you and your team.
Benefits of Using Webcast Platforms
These are tools to broadcast to an audience over the internet. They have a variety of advantages for you and your business, including:
- It’s cost-effective. Instead of hosting an event or a meeting in person, you can save yourself money on the venue, food, etc. and just stream your presentation to an audience from any location.
- It’s available to a larger audience. Where an in-person meeting would require people to come and meet at a certain time in a specific location, you can now reach people at any distance. For remote work or distance learning, this means that your team or classroom can access your presentation from wherever they are.
- You can often save the presentation for later, replay it, send out the link, etc. If you’re using the platform to host a webinar, discussion, or presentation, you can record it as it happens, then make it available to anyone who wasn’t able to join, or for future reference. This is especially useful for trainings or lessons.
3 Platforms Options
Now that you know how useful webcast platforms can be for your remote presentations, webinars, lessons, and conferences, here are our three favorite platforms to choose from.
ClickMeeting
ClickMeeting is our favorite platform at S-FX and we highly recommend it. We use it for all of our client webcasts. We’ve found that ClickMeeting is best for web-based presentations or automated webinars. You can record your presentation and then have it available for your audience to watch it on demand.
Features
ClickMeeting goes beyond the basics, though. The platform has a variety of robust features to support all your webcast needs, including:
- Great ways to customize your webinar, including waiting rooms with agendas, customized invitations, and your logo and colors on the webinar
- The ability to stream on YouTube or Facebook
- A whiteboard feature where you can illustrate your presentation/lesson in real time
- The ability to integrate slideshow presentations, polls, surveys, and screen sharing
Pricing
- Free for 30 days
- Live plan for $25/month
- Automated plan for $40/month
Compare the plans here.
Zoom
If you’re looking for a platform to hold remote team meetings, Zoom is the platform for you. It’s the best option for video conferencing with multiple people. Although you do have to install it, the installation is quick and easy. Zoom offers a free option that can host up to 100 people for an unlimited number of meetings — plenty for a small business working remotely. Though meetings are limited to 40 meetings, this platform is a great option for daily sync-ups and team meetings.
Features
- The ability to record meetings and save them or upload them to the cloud
- Integration with any of your standard calendar apps (e.g. Google, iCal, and Outlook), browsers, Slack, and a variety of other apps
- Auto-generated transcripts that you can search after
- Virtual hand-raising — especially useful for virtual classes or trainings
- The ability to call in with a phone number
Pricing
- Basic for free
- Pro for $15/month — great for small businesses
- And a few more extended plans. Compare them here.
GoToMeeting
GoToMeeting is a more globally known platform and brand. Used by universities, corporations, and small businesses alike, it’s great for enterprise businesses because it can do it all. GoToMeeting offers GoToWebinar, and GoToTraining, and OpenVoice for a variety of uses, from webinars to conference calls. It’s especially good if you want to record and refer back to your team meetings.
Features
- Unlimited meetings, no time limits, screen sharing, and a phone number to call into the meeting
- Transcription, note taking, drawing tools, and cloud recording (on plans above Pro)
- Integration with Slack, Salesforce, Office 365, and Google Calendar
Pricing
- 14-day trial
- Pro for $12/month if you have less than 150 participants
- Business for $16/month if you have more than 150 participants
Compare their plans here.
If you’re working or teaching remotely, you should be communicating often with your team or classroom — and even more importantly, communicating well. Take advantage of these webcast platforms to maintain excellent communication within your business, organize distance learning, or even to continue engaging with your customers at a distance.
S-FX.com Small Business Solutions is a boutique web design and technology consulting agency geared towards start-up businesses, small businesses and non-profit businesses. We specialize in implementing low cost technology solutions to maximize efficiency and reduce business operating costs.
