This article discusses affordable ways for small business to incorporate web conferencing into their marketing efforts, customer service, or employee training processes. As small businesses grow in their use of contractors that are not local, the use of web conferencing and webinars becomes a key part of maintaining contact with these service providers.
Theoretically speaking, meetings and conferences done over the
Internet are a great concept. Web conferencing allows you to
save a bundle on business travel and still keep far-flung
clients and employees engaged and up to speed. But once you
place this concept into practice, you will find that most of the
web conferencing tools available at there are still too
expensive for small businesses to afford. What’s worse, many of
these involve complicated set up procedures and systems that are
just hard to master, thus contributing to increased frustration
with the product.
And this is where affordable web conferencing tools come in. The
term “cheap” might cause you to be skeptical as most “cheap”
products available are either bootlegs of other highly
successful commercial products or only include the bare
essentials of a decent conferencing tool. However, it is
important to realize that besides the industry giants in web
conferencing, such as WebEx, Macromedia, and Microsoft, there
are other developers out there that are dedicated to providing
you with affordable web conferencing solutions.
One of these companies is Citrix Online, introducing its
GoToMeeting software application. GoToMeeting is an affordable
web conferencing solution hosted on a server which is managed
and controlled by Citrix Online. If you notice, Citrix Online is
the same people who brought you the extraordinarily effective
and simple GoToMyPC that is a program that lets you access your
PC from any Web browser. Using basically the same technology,
Citrix Online allows you to access affordable web conferencing
tool that is as cheap as it is simple.
Another very affordable web conferencing solution is the very
Popular “Hot Conference” This software is quickly becoming the
web conference software of choice for the small biz on-line en-
trepreneur, as well as business people who need a way to
communicate with their colleagues, because it is easy to use,
and so affordable that even the smallest on-line entrepreneurs
can take advantage of bringing their websites live to the net.
You can get more details about Hot Conference at
http://www.hotconference.com/members/myhomebizprofits/
What does affordable Web Conferencing Software do?
Most people use affordable web conferencing software for
presentations, product demonstrations (i.e. software) and
collaboration. But besides these stated uses, a majority of
affordable web conferencing system’s potentials remain largely
untapped.
A study conducted by the Yankee Group found that 89 per cent of
affordable web conferencing solutions are used for application
sharing, 12 per cent of annotation, and four per cent for white
boarding. That doesn’t even remotely touch the wide array of
uses that affordable web conferencing has. It can be used to
facilitate distance learning, assist in training sessions,
present ideas to the board, etc. etc.
“When it comes to web conferencing, less is more,” says senior
vice-president of products and services, Brian Donahoo of Citrix
Online. “We’ve stripped out the non-essential bells and
whistles, making GoToMeeting easier to use.” The simplicity of
their affordable web conferencing products allows for more
customer confidence building because they can now master the
service quickly, allowing for less frustration and letting them
use it more.
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Debbie Gragg is owner and operator of
http://www.homebizprofits.com
a Crafts Home-Small Biz On-line Community since 1998
You may use this article in your e-zines, websites, or blogs as
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[tags]web conferencing, citrix, gotomeeting, hot conference[/tags]