Delivery Tools
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Ease of Use Scale: Easy ---> Moderately Easy ---> Moderate ---> Moderately Difficult ---> Difficult
Free Conference Call
Basic tele-conference service |
Free, basic conferencing service that ncludes call muting and free call-recording.
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Free Conferencing
Full-featured tele-conference service |
Free, full-featured conferencing service that includes a web-based interface to manage participants, creation of up to four breakout groups, and free call-recording.
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Maestro Conference
Upscale, full-featured tele-conference service |
Full-featured conferencing service that includes call-recording, breakout groups with the ability to "stroll the groups," participant polls, and the ability to manage background noise.
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Instant Teleseminar
Upscale, full-featured hybrid tele/web conference service
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Part marketing tool and part tele/web conference service, this premium service is expensive, but is said to be worth it if you hold a lot of teleclasses and the purpose of your teleclasses is to market other services. You can offer your courses by phone or by web, which gives long-distance and international callers a no-cost way to attend. For the regular service, you can instantly record your event, making it available for playback, and you get access to promotional tools. For the Pro service, you get more control over your attendees. The service does everything except design your course for you.
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SkypeInternet-based telephone, video, and chat service with optional add-on services |
Skype has its limitations (most commonly, it can create electronic noise on conference calls), but it does allow people to call-in for free or very low rates, even international calls. The add-ons can turn a conference call into a video presentation, web-conference, or document-sharing session, and can enable you to record the call. This service requires a software download.
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TalkShoeInternet-based tele-conference and "talk show" service |
Create an online “talk radio” show that you can archive and share with anyone. Attendees can listen via internet or phone. Other features include live chat, public calls or private calls, and a web interface to manage the "show."
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SavorChat and TweetChat
Private chat rooms for live events |
These add-on services expand the use of Facebook and Twitter by adding a chat component that you can use during your live event. While they may take the attention off of what you are saying, they can also be used effectively to enhance interactivity, participation, virtual discussions, and learning. They can also be helpful if your participants are muted or if the group is particularly large.
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Audio AcrobatCall-recording and sharing |
Digitally record your teleclasses and share them with anyone.
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DimDim, Webex, GoToMeeting, Adobe Connect, Zoho Meeting, and Others
A suite of features that enable interactive, visually appealing, web-based meetings |
Each web-conferencing tool has its own feature set and pricing, but what they all do is bring a strong web-presence to your virtual events. They enable you to demo software, visit websites, use a virtual whiteboard, work within applications on your desktop, and so on. Most will let you record the session. Caution, though - web-conferences are more technologically complicated than most other forms of training. You must practice using the interface before you unleash a web-conference on your audience. And you must be prepared for your audience to struggle getting signed in to your conference.
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ScribLinkVirtual Whiteboard |
Collaborate or demonstrate your ideas by using this online whiteboard. You can easily share the link with your audience so that they can view it. It also allows you to save the whiteboard for future reference or sharing.
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PDF Creator
Convert documents to PDFs |
Easily share your workbooks, handouts, and other documents by delivering them as electronic PDFs. Most everyone can open this type of file from their computer.
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Drop.io, YouSendIt, and DropBox
File-sharing services |
These are just a few of the many file-sharing services available today. The benefit of a file-sharing service is that you can store your documents in one place, and send your audience to that site to fetch the documents. Some of the services, like Drop.io, also offers other features, which are worth looking at. If you are working with corporate clients, though, many corporations block emails that contain links to these sites.
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SlideShareSlideshow-sharing service |
Create online slideshows and easily share them with your audience.
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