Conference Calling and
Web Conference Meetings

The content of this page was developed by Rodney Denno for the HPL
(High Performance Leadership) portion of his Toastmasters DTM.
Contact him at rodney@ewoliving.com

If I asked you to set up a conference call (wikipedia entry) or a web conference meeting (wikipedia entry) with 10 people for one hour from now, and the conference call or meeting had to be free of charge for all 10 people…….would you be able to do it?

While you may answer ‘No’ right now, your answer can be “Yes I can!”

You may be asking why you would even want to use conference calling or hold a web conference meeting.  Here are two major reasons:

1 - District 21 is the largest Toastmaster District in the world (includes all of British Columbia) with over 1,000 Club, Area, Division and District officers.  Officers perform a wide variety of tasks including administration,  strategy development, sharing information, discussing options and making decisions, etc.  Some of these tasks can be accomplished with email or a one-on-one phone call while others would benefit greatly with a group meeting.  Face-to-Face group meetings are not always possible because of time, distance or weather constraints - this is where a conference call or a web conference meeting can make these meetings possible and productive.

2 - Educating and training over 1,000 officers is a daunting task.  While many officers are able to attend face-to-face officer training sessions some - because of time, distance or weather constraint reasons - are not.  Effective leadership training can still be facilitated by leveraging conference calling and web conferencing.

The companies that offer conference calling and web conferencing over the Internet have matured significantly over the past few years and the technology has become very reliable.  

~

What you should know before you start:

1 - Broadband vs. Dialup:  If your Internet connection is broadband (Cable or DSL) then you should have no problem with either conference calling or web conferencing.  If you have a dialup Internet connection you should not have problems with conference calling voice quality but you may have problems receiving the rather large amounts of information that are sent during a web conference meeting.

2 - Conference calling: Companies like 'Skype' and 'Basement Ventures' offer only conference calling.

3 - Combined conference calling and web conferencing:  Most companies offer a combination of conference calling and web conferencing.

4 - Free vs. 'Free': When a conference calling or web conferencing company says its services are free they are telling you the truth.  Free web conferencing is usually limited to less than 25 participants --- this should be sufficient for most Toastmaster purposes.  'Free' conference calling means that its free to use the service (sometimes with as many as 250 participants) however, long distance charges must be paid by the callers participating in the conference call.  Company specific details are included below.

Free Conference Calling

Skype

To use skype you must have a microphone connected to your computer (laptops usually have one built in already) or you can purchase a skype phone.  Skype software is easy to download and install. 

Skype has various calling options:  1 - You to call anyone in the world for free if it is computer to computer (ie. both computers have the skype software installed).  2 - You can purchase (for $2.95 per month) a long distance plan that allows you to call any phone (including cell phones) anywhere in North America.  No additional per minute charges.  3 - You can purchase a 'Skype Out' long distance plan for calls outside of North America that will charge you a per minute fee (fees are usually just a few cents per minute).

Skype has a built in conference calling feature that allows you to conference call up to 25 phones or computers.  If the people you call are within North America then all the calls are covered under your $2.95 per month long distance plan (no additional per minute charges).  If some of the people are outside of North America then you will be charges per minute for those calls.

NOTE 1: Skype allows you to use up to 10,000 minutes per month BUT only up to 3600 minutes per day.  So.....when you are using skype to conference call please remember that each person on the call is accumulating minutes.  For example - if you have 20 people on a skype conference call the 3600 daily minutes maximum will be used up 3 hours.  If you go beyond the maximum skype will cancel your service (they consider you an abuser of the system) and you will have to spend a few days emailing them to get them to reinstate you.  (I know this from personal experience).

NOTE 2:  Skype call quality is usually very good if you have a few people on your conference call but once you get above 10 callers it can be hard to hear.

Basement Ventures (BV) offers free conference calling for up to 250 attendees for 6 hours.  You also have  the option of recording your call to MP3 format.

The BV conference calling service is the opposite of Skype conference calling.  With Skype you have to call each person you want included in the conference call whereas with BV you provide each person with a phone number and access code.  At the designated time each person calls the number, enters their access code and can then participate in the call.

You, as the host, will need to set up the call in advance.  This can be done on the BV web site in a few minutes.  Once you have performed the setup you will be given an access code and long distance phone number that you will send to each participant.

Using the BV service is free but the long distance phone charges have to be paid by the participants.  This can be done in three different ways.  1 - Each caller uses skype to call the long distance number (they will have to pay skype $2.95 per month for the North American wide long distance plan but then there will be no per minute fees)  2 - Each caller can pay their own long distance charges. 3 - You can request that BV setup a toll-free 800 number for all callers to use (then one person pays the long distance charges for all callers).

Free Conference Calling & Web Conferencing

The companies below offer integrated conference calling and web conferencing services.  The conference calling portion of the service is more-or-less the same as I've already described above (see Basement Ventures).  The web conferencing portion of the service can be a little daunting at first with many features to choose from ( whiteboards, desktop sharing, upload powerpoint presentations, collaboration features, webcam, user permissions, invite users on the fly, private and public chat, session recording, etc.)  My suggestion - use the desktop sharing portion to begin with and then include the other features if they add value to the web conference meeting.

DimDim

I've used DimDim a number of times with success.  It has a relatively easy and straight forward setup process - set up an account (takes a few minutes) and then set up a meeting.  Setting up your first meeting may take 10 or 15 minutes (you need to learn a little about the different settings) but after the initial learning you should be able set up a meeting in a few minutes.

To set up a meeting you will need to set up the conference call portion (whether its audio and video or just audio), the time and date of the meeting (make sure you pick the right time zone) and enter the email addresses of all the participants (I suggest you have a list of email addresses you can cut and paste). 

DimDim will send an email to each participant inviting them to join the meeting at the designated time.  The email will also contain a link that the participant can click on to join the web conference portion of the meeting and a phone number to call so they can participate in the audio portion of the meeting.

Here are three more that you may want to check out:

FreeConference  - Yugma - Vyew

You can help:

Share your thoughts and experiences on how conference calling and web conferencing help make Club, Area, Division and District business meeting more effective?

How can conference calling and web conferencing be used to effectively deliver online interactive officer training?

What are the best services available and why?

What experiences, positive or negative, have you had regarding the effectiveness of conference calling and web conferencing?

Click here to email suggestions.