Adobe Connect Blog

Creating a fun and NOISY lobby for your webinar attendees to ‘sit’ in while they wait for your webinar to begin will reduce the panic and allow your attendees to relax and eagerly await your presentation.

First, create a unique layout that you’ll use as your webinar lobby when you open your room. Labeling it ‘Lobby’ makes it easy to find later. Then start adding fun and interesting elements to it.

Here are some ideas:

- Play music in your lobby

• Simply upload an MP3 into a Share pod just as you would do with a PPT. You’ll want to make sure it’s long enough (for example, if you typically open your webinar room to attendees 15 minutes prior to the event start time, you’ll want your music to be 15 minutes long – or just pay attention and press play again when the music runs out). Don’t forget to keep music royalty laws in mind – check with your legal department if you are unsure about what songs you can play.

- Upload a welcome slide(s)

• Use a Share pod to upload one slide with the title and associated image for your webinar or create a deck of rotating slides. Use Adobe Presenter to set a welcome lobby slide deck to rotate and loop continuously.  This deck could include the title side, a sponsor(s) slide, announcements, instructions, etc – the sky is the limit!

- Add instructions on how to join the audio portion of the conference

• Using a simple Note pod to let attendees know how they can join the audio portion of your webinar should do the trick.

- Include a Q&A pod

• A Q&A pod will allow attendees to submit technical questions as needed while they get ready for the event to begin. Re-labeling it Technical Questions will help attendees understand where they can go to receive help (especially if you have a Chat pod open for another reason). Just remember to re-label it when you switch layouts if you have the Q&A pod in other layouts for a different purpose.

- Provide an open Chat pod

• A Chat pod that allows for free flowing conversation among the attendees is a great way to break the ice before the event beings, warm up the audience for interaction and let everyone know they are not alone in the virtual world. Kicking things off with a simple question like ‘what is the weather like where you are?’ or ‘tell us where you are joining us from’ is a nice way to get the audience started.

- Consider incorporating a custom pod or game

• There are several games and custom pods available on the Adobe Connect Extensions page that you can download for free and upload into your room using a Share pod. In particular, there is a countdown timer you might consider that visually indicates how much time is left before you begin. Keep bandwidth and expected audience size in mind before selecting this option.

- Display your company logo

• Upload your company logo (jpg or png) into a Share pod and place it somewhere on your layout. Or perhaps you’d like to display a sponsor or partner logo.

- Make the slides or handouts available for download

• Use a File Share pod to make your slides or a handout available for attendees to download prior to the event. This is useful for those attendees that would like to follow along with the speaker and take notes.

Be creative and have fun with your Lobby.  You will appreciate the experience as much as your attendees! I promise.

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Adobe Connect has won the “Silver” and “Excellence” awards in the webcasting category of TopTenREVIEWS, an online publication that conducts side-by-side comparisons of products and makes them publicly available.

The review begins by calling Adobe Connect 9 “a vibrant new version that invites considerable attendee participation, offers helpful and sophisticated tools to build webcasts, and gives presenters the option of hosting a webcast completely from a mobile device.” Among the features highlighted are the ability to integrate various extensions into meeting rooms, to completely host meetings from a mobile device, and the ways Adobe Connect lets users promote webinars and measure audience engagement.

The review concludes by stating, “Whether you want to generate interest in a new product, drum up new customers, meet privately with fellow employees scattered around the globe or conduct continuing education, Adobe Connect 9 is certain to have the tools and capabilities you need.”

It is terrific to see this kind of validation of our webinar solution, enabling our customers with the tools, services, and support they need to drive successful events including webcasts across large audiences.

Read the full review here: http://webcasting-services-review.toptenreviews.com/adobe-connect-review.html

There is no such thing as an instant webinar.

In the age of instant gratification and technology, I have run across many a webinar producer that has made the mistake of assuming their webinar technology platform will read their mind, set itself up according to their requirements, and instantly produce a flawless event to a virtual audience of hundreds or thousands.

This is a dangerous assumption.

A mission critical event to a large audience should never be left to the last minute. For example, a producer of a live in-person event will visit the physical event venue for a site inspection in advance of the event and then show up early for the event to make sure everything is correctly set up according to specifications before the event begins.

The same is true with a virtual event.

At a minimum a virtual event producer should spend time in the virtual room setting it up ahead of time, hold a rehearsal with all speakers, moderators and hosts, and, finally, build in a 30 minute pre-conference for speakers and hosts immediately prior to the event.

Take some time to avoid virtual event disasters.

8 Reasons to Prepare, ‘Site Inspect’ and Rehearse your Virtual Event

- Test audio integration

• There are many audio options for your webinar, including universal audio integration. You can simulcast both the phone audio conference and VoIP, use the phone only, or use VoIP only. The universal integration needs to be done well in advance of the event. For audio options and integration how-to tips, please see.

- Check the speaker’s audio quality

• There are many things that can reduce audio quality. Be sure to have all speakers use the exact same equipment during the rehearsal as they will use during the live event – this includes the computer and the actual phone or headset. Wireless is not recommended for either computer or phone and, of course, using a speakerphone is a big no-no.

- Ensure speaker understands how to use the platform

• If your speaker is new to the particular webinar platform technology you are using, take the time to give him a tutorial, even if he is experienced at webinars in general. Just like it’s always awkward to drive someone else’s car, it can be equally awkward finding all the right buttons to push in a webinar room that is unfamiliar.

- Upload and flip through all slides

• Uploading slides 15 minutes prior to your event is risky to say the least (especially if it’s a big file that may take some time to upload). Take the time to upload them during the rehearsal and flip through all of them to check for any misaligned text or images. Make any necessary changes to the deck and re-upload them before the pre-conference and re-check.

- Confirm all parties know how to get to your event

• The rehearsal will give all your speakers, hosts and moderators a chance to ‘find’ the location – locating their login info, practice logging in, download the presenter add-in, and overcome any other technical issues related to browsers, etc. The last thing you need on the day-of is a missing speaker!

- Review the flow of the event and room set up

• Prepare any polls, chats, quizzes or multiple slide decks you’ll be using ahead of time using the layout functionally and arrange the layouts in order of your agenda. This will ensure a smooth flow and avoid having to ‘fish’ for polls during the live event.

- Prep your backstage and familiarize all hosts, speakers and moderators with it

• Your Presenter Only Area is your private backstage area for hosts and presenters. This is a great place for the Attendee pod, a Presenter chat (so you can coordinate amongst yourselves without interrupting the event flow), the Presenter view of the Q&A pod and any notes or reminders you might have for your speakers or moderators. Remind your speakers to keep an eye on the backstage in case you need to communicate with them while they are presenting.

- Have an emergency plan and communicate it to all hosts, speakers and moderators

• Virtual events are subject to things going wrong just like physical events. Think through what you will do if… your audio conferencing provider experiences an outage… if your speaker’s computer crashes… if your speaker accidently hangs up on herself… if you lose your internet connection… etc, etc. And, yes, with 7 years of experience running upwards of 30 webinars a quarter, I have run into all of these and more!

So, don’t leave the details of producing your mission critical virtual event to the last 15 minutes, because treating webinars casually will get you into big trouble.

Good luck and may your next webinar run flawlessly!

During a recent Adobe Connect webinar titled ‘Virtual Conferences for Government’, Dean Pianta of Envolve Media discussed how the Adobe Connect platform is being used within government organizations for virtual classrooms, online meetings and seminars. He reviewed several benefits of moving meetings, conferences, trainings and events online, such as cost savings and archived recordings. The benefit of having the recordings of these sessions to view after an event is for those that may have missed the event, or for those that would like to review the session for reference.

Adobe Connect has advantages like the event management tool that can be utilized to design landing pages using a template or built from scratch. With this feature organizations can setup registration for an event with custom landing pages and forms. The advantage of a powerful registration system is also the tracking of attendee information pre- and post-event.

Watch this recording to learn more details on how virtual conferences are being created and used across the board by government agencies and organizations: http://onlineevents.adobeconnect.com/p2d3iegluqo/