At ReadyTalk, we are constantly looking for new and various ways to make our products and services easy-to-use while providing excellent customer service and support.  So what have we come up with now?

A new and improved online request form for operator-assisted services! How does this benefit you (and the ReadyTalk Events Team a bit too?)

• Requesting a Gold or Platinum Webinar package? Or operator-assisted audio?  Now there is a single  form for all your Event Services needs
• A step-by-step and user-friendly process that lets you know what information we need for your upcoming event
• Easier navigation and increased accessibility so that finding the form is…easy

Need some reminders on what qualifies for an operator-assisted service?  Visit our products and services section.

This week, we rolled out some new hold music on ReadyTalk’s audio conferencing bridges. You would think choosing the perfect hold music would be an easy task. Just pick the music that fades into the background, annoys people the least, and sounds neutral…right? That’s not always the case.

Picking hold music is tough. There are limitations around music available to us. There’s a world of musical tastes, general annoyance around being on hold in general – the decision of what hold music to choose becomes monumentally hard!

We’ve heard some surprising feedback, including someone who threatened to bite their own forehead if we didn’t change our hold music (I’m not exactly sure how that works)! We don’t want our customers hyper-extending their jaws or causing any unnecessary bodily harm/property damage, so we are trying to mix up our hold music a little bit more. We hope you enjoy the latest choice. I find it somewhat uplifting, not at all grating, and a little hopeful. Most importantly, i think it fades in the background sufficiently allowing you to wait for your next ReadyTalk meeting in peace.

If you have any feedback, please let us know in the comments!

Paul was formerly an Account Executive at ReadyTalk gaining valuable experience with competitors and the state of the web and audio conferencing industry. Currently in his role as Product Marketing Manager, he is in charge of the competitive landscape, on-demand audio products, and the web meeting interface. Paul loves the outdoors, his pup Huck, his wife Jess, and getting to the ski slopes as much as possible.

Accidents happen. At ReadyTalk we’re committed to helping our customers prevent accidents and mistakes. Each month, ReadyTalk’s Account Specialist Team shares a recent accident and tips for how to avoid it in the future.

On the web conferencing interface, a chairperson can maintain and control the audio conference by muting and un-muting the conference or more specifically, muting, un-muting, disconnecting, and renaming individual audio lines.

In smaller conferences, many chairpersons will decide to leave all the lines un-muted in order to provide a more collaborative platform. In these instances, it is helpful if the chairperson renames each phone number to display the participants’ names instead of numbers. This feature is extremely helpful because it will inform the chairperson who is speaking throughout the conference.

I received a call from a chairperson who left the audio lines un-muted during her conference; however, she did not rename each participant. One of the participants had to leave the conference early because he was driving to the airport. The participant forgot to hang up his phone, and on the way to the airport he expressed extreme road-rage. Because his line was still in the conference, everyone was interrupted and silenced by his colorful language.

In this case, if the chairperson would have renamed each audio participant, she would have seen exactly which line to disconnect before the participant’s road-rage disrupted the entire conference.

Even if you are only hosting an audio only conference, the web interface is a great way to control all the sound and participants during your meeting. Learn more about Using the Web to Manage Your Audio Call.

Today, we are excited to announce the launch of ReadyTalk Quick Launcher – a tool available on your desktop that makes it easier and faster to start, join, and invite others to meetings. This tool will be a favorite for people who would like a quicker, persistent way to connect to their ReadyTalk accounts. If you are tired of logging into ReadyTalk through the browser to gain access to your account then this is definitely the tool for you. Quick Launcher gives you the ability to:

• Start an On-Demand Meeting with a single click. The Quick Launcher stores your account credentials eliminating the need to type in any numbers or codes.

• View a list of Scheduled Meetings in Conference Center and choose the meeting you’d like to start.

• Skip all audio prompts with the Start Audio Meeting feature. The Quick Launcher will dial you and immediately connect you to your Audio Meeting. It remembers the last 10 numbers you dialed so you can quickly select connect to your cell phone, desk phone or conference phone. Check the option to “Launch web controls on connect” to open up the web meeting controls for managing your audio meeting or for running an On-Demand Web and Audio Meeting.

• Instantly create an email invite with Invite Others. All the login information is included giving your participants a quick and easy way to join your ReadyTalk meetings.

• Join a Web Meeting faster when you’re colleague hosts a ReadyTalk meeting. Simply enter the 7 digit access code of the On-Demand meeting you’d like to join and the Quick Launcher will drop you right into the meeting, bypassing the registration process.

The Quick Launcher can be opened by double clicking on the optional desktop icon, left or right clicking on the tray ico. The goal of this tool is to be available for you anytime you need it, but to not be in the way when you don’t.

The ReadyTalk Quick Launcher is available today free of charge and can be downloaded for Mac or Windows here: http://www.readytalk.com/support-training/downloads. If you have any questions about the Quick Launcher or are having any issues downloading please contact ReadyTalk Customer Care at 800.843.9166. As always, if you have feedback, feature enhancements, or questions give us a call at any time or leave them in the comments below.

Paul was formerly an Account Executive at ReadyTalk gaining valuable experience with competitors and the state of the web and audio conferencing industry. Currently in his role as Product Marketing Manager, he is in charge of the competitive landscape, on-demand audio products, and the web meeting interface. Paul loves the outdoors, his pup Huck, his wife Jess, and getting to the ski slopes as much as possible.

Accidents happen. At ReadyTalk we’re committed to helping our customers prevent accidents and mistakes. Each month, ReadyTalk’s Account Specialist Team shares a recent accident and tips for how to avoid it in the future.

When scheduling an upcoming meeting in Conference Center, John set up his meeting for web and audio. For the audio portion, he selected Operator Assisted instead of On-Demand because it was an important, high profile webinar and he wanted it to be flawless. When you select the Operator Assisted option, you are asked to provide a telephone number for your participants to call.

Because John had not scheduled an Operator Assisted event with ReadyTalk, he inserted the US & Canada Toll-Free number in this blank field. When this option is selected the number is inserted into the invitation or confirmation e-mail excluding the access code.

About 30 minutes before his meeting was to begin there were 250 confirmed participants who didn’t have an access code when they dialed in. A participant called in for help and ReadyTalk’s Customer Care Team came to the rescue. They helped John send out a meeting update e-mail including the access code. They also helped John insert a welcome slide into his presentation including the access code for dialing into the audio conference.

There are a few things that John could have differently:

• If he wanted to schedule an Operator Assisted event, he could schedule it 24 hours in advance of his meeting here. Once the ReadyTalk Events Team generates a dial-in number, they will give that to John who can insert that special number into his scheduled meeting.
• If he wanted to use standard audio with no Operator, he can select that audio option when scheduling his meeting and it will auto-fill the invitation or confirmation e-mail with both the dial-in number and the access code.
• If he wanted to send out his own e-mails with the dial-in information he could have included both the US Toll-Free dial-in number and his access code.

Do you have a webinar or web conferencing gaffe that you’d like to share? Share it below.