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.

Name: Janae
Title: Customer Care Representative
How Long Have You Worked at ReadyTalk: Long enough to love it!

Favorite sports team: Denver Nuggets
Hobbies: Hiking, biking, snowboarding, and I am just getting into running
Pets: One day I will own a beautiful dog.
Interesting fact about Janae: One of my first jobs was being the Easter Bunny at the mall.

Longest customer care call: 3 hours
One ReadyTalk tip to share with customers: As the chairperson, use your web controls when hosting a conference call. (Check out: Controlling your Audio Conference on the Web: a Painless Solution to your Audio Conferencing Woes)
Favorite thing about working at ReadyTalk: Everyone who works here is awesome!

Wonder what it was like to be the Easter Bunny? Think you can stump her with an audio and web conferencing question? Ask below.

Name: Toby
Title: Customer Care Representative

Favorite sports team: IU Hoosiers, Notre Dame Fighting Irish, Indianapolis Colts
Hobbies: Cooking
Pets: Two cats – Mia and Mo
Interesting fact about Toby: He collects pint glasses from different breweries. But more importantly, he and his wife are expecting their first child in February.

Longest customer care call: 3 hours and 36 minutes, which is a ReadyTalk record.
Favorite customer request: Help – I’ve forgotten my passcode.
One ReadyTalk tip to share with customers: Use our web controls for you audio calls also. Our interface interacts with the audio and it allows you to navigate the call more easily.
Favorite thing about working at ReadyTalk: The team!

Think you can stump Toby with a technical question? Want his favorite recipe? Share your questions in the comment section.

Checking out Toby enjoying some vacation time.

Name: Julie
Title: Customer Care Representative

Favorite sports team: CU Buffs!
Hobbies: Skiing, running, hiking, anything outside!
Pets:: Two great dogs – Paco, a lab mix, and Wiley, a golden retriever
Interesting fact about Julie: She’s currently training to run her first marathon.

Favorite customer request: Julie once had a customer ask her to send them a pizza from their favorite pizza place.
One ReadyTalk tip to share with customers: For important webinars, do a dry run ahead of time and feel free to ask questions and get some advice! The Customer Care team at ReadyTalk is a great resource not only for technical assistance during your webinar, but also as a shoulder to lean on for questions or concerns you may have about your upcoming meeting.
Favorite thing about working at ReadyTalk: The people!

Wondering what the customer wanted on their pizza? Think you can stump Julie with a technical question? Give it a try in the comments section.

Meet Julie's dogs - Paco and Wiley

Name: Kevin (aka KB)
Title: Director of Customer Care
Time at ReadyTalk: 9.5 years

Favorite sports team: Colorado State Rams
What keeps KB running?: KB enjoys spending time with Lucy, his Shepard-Chow mix. In December, KB and his wife will be busy keeping up with their new baby.
Hobbies:Volleyball, skiing, running and camping.
Interesting fact about KB: He played on the 2001 and 2002 USA Australian Rules Championship Football Team – the Denver Bulldogs.

Longest customer care call: KB once spent two hours on the phone with a customer to make sure her questions were answered and that technical issues were fully addressed.
Favorite customer request: Can you tell me what timezone I am in?
One ReadyTalk tip to share: Know what slides you have uploaded into your Chair controls. You never know who may come in as a co-presenter!
Favorite thing about working at ReadyTalk: The people – everyone really believes in helping each other as well as the customer.

Wondering what KB is naming his baby? Think you can stump him with a technical question? Tell us in the comments.

Meet KB, ReadyTalk's Director of Customer Care

Name: Keith
Title: Customer Care Representative

Favorite sports team: Chicago Cubs
Hobbies: If Keith isn’t at the office, you will likely find him fishing, hiking, enjoying poetry, dancing or reading.
Interesting fact about Keith: He once performed in Carnegie Hall.

Longest customer care call:To date, Keith’s longest customer care call was over an hour long, but he was able to solve the issue.
Favorite customer request: Keith loves requests for basic product training and walk-thrus.
Favorite thing about working at ReadyTalk: Great relationship with the people he works with.

Have a question for Keith? Think you can stump him with a technical issue? Tell us in the comments section.

Check out Keith's catch from a recent fishing trip!

Since Ken’s post, we’ve fielded a lot of questions about our own recording functionality. ReadyTalk users can rest assured that (as always) their recorded content is safe and accessible. I also wanted to take this opportunity to highlight a few things that make ReadyTalk’s recording and playback functionality unique:

Immediate Access – With a few clicks of the mouse or commands on the telephone keypad, your ReadyTalk recording is initiated and stored to our servers. As soon as your conference ends, you can immediately access your recording file through the Manage Recordings interface in Conference Center. No waiting around for your conferencing vendor to make the recording available for use.

Easy (and Undo-able) Editing– With our easy-to-use recording editor, you can quickly cut out unwanted content from the beginning, middle, or end of your recording to create a polished and professional playback. Uh oh … made a mistake? Don’t worry – it happens! We always keep the original version of your recording so you can undo one or more edits with the push of a button.

Industry-Standard File Formats – What good is a conference recording if it’s locked away in a proprietary file format? At any time, you can download your ReadyTalk recordings in up to four industry-standard formats (Flash, high-resolution .MP4, .MP3, and .WAV). Once you download, you can edit your recordings using your favorite third-party editing tool, store them on your own servers, and distribute them as you wish.

No Downloads for Viewers – Unlike some conferencing services, ReadyTalk doesn’t make your audience download a special player to view your recordings. Whether you embed your ReadyTalk recording in a blog, social media site, or other website or simply share the playback link, viewers can watch a high-quality replay of your recording with a single click. No downloads required (as long as they have Flash 9.0.28 or higher).

ReadyTalk knows how important your recordings are and we’ll make sure they are always there where, when, and how you need them. We’re also committed to making our recording and playback features even better. Tell us what else would you like to do with your ReadyTalk recordings …

The recording interface makes it easy to edit and share recordings immediately after a webinar.

As Director of Product Marketing, Anita is focused on talking to customers about their needs and translating these into priorities for the ReadyTalk product roadmap. Before joining ReadyTalk, she gained first-hand experience with the challenges of running a webinar program while serving as director of marketing at an IT analyst firm. When she’s not thinking about conferencing, she likes to do yoga and spend time with her dogs.

But, how do you get prospects to think about customer service before they make a decision?

ReadyTalk’s audio and web conferencing is supported by some of the best customer service in the industry. We make it really easy to connect with a real, live person:

• 800-number answered by a live person (no automated systems) within 60 seconds
• Live chat (IM) between 8 a.m. and 7 p.m. ET
• Email with a response guaranteed within 24 hours
• Online form with a 24 hour response time
• Account managers assigned to every account

There are lots of things to consider when buying audio and web conferencing services—features, reliability, compatibility, price. While all of these elements are important, what happens when you have a question about recording five minutes before the webinar begins? Being able to ask someone quickly and having questions answered in real time can be crucial and is what ReadyTalk’s Customer Care team strives to do.

How do you encourage prospective customers to also consider customer service and future support? What’s the best way to market customer service to an audience that may not yet appreciate its value?

Once you’ve started producing your podcasts, you’ll need to “Publish” them so they’re available for listening. Publishing consists of three main steps:

1. Host: Your podcasts need to be available for downloading via the Internet. You can either host them on your own website or use a podcast hosting service.
2. Feed: Set up an RSS feed so that everyone who subscribes to your feed will automatically receive new podcasts as you make them available. The easiest way to set up a feed is through a service provider.
3. Read: Your listeners will need a podcast reader (iTunes, for example) to subscribe to your feed and download the podcasts. They’ll also need a media player (RealPlayer or an iPod, for example) to listen to the podcasts.

Of course, publishing your podcasts doesn’t do any good unless your audience knows about them. “Promote” your podcasts by advertising them through your company’s website, blog, emails, department meetings, client meetings, direct mailers, etc. Explain what the podcasts are about and how your audience will benefit from them. Many potential listeners may be new to podcasting, so give them instructions for subscribing and listening to your podcasts.

To keep your audience listening, you need to continually “Perfect” your podcasts. The best way is to talk to your audience and get their feedback. First, you’ll need to find out who’s listening. Track downloads of your podcasts for statistics on traffic and subscriptions. Use the same communication channels for promoting your podcasts to solicit feedback on who’s listening. Once you know who’s listening, ask them what they like and don’t like about your podcasts and get their ideas for making them better. Encourage a conversation among your audience by setting up a blog or online forum to facilitate a dialog around your podcasts. You may get more out of it than just ideas for making your podcasts better.

In this series of blogs, I’ve covered 8 “Ps” in podcasting: the Popularity, Pros, and Possibilities of podcasting and ideas for Planning, Producing, Publishing, Promoting, and Perfecting your podcasts. The final “Point” (sorry, I couldn’t resist one last “P”) is that ReadyTalk provides a turnkey podcasting solution with everything you need to create and publish your podcasts. It’s easy to use and comes standard with every ReadyTalk account – the perfect solution for beginners.

So give podcasting a try. It’ll be good for you.

Technorati Tags: B2B, Customer Service, Human Resource, Marketing, Podcasting, Public Relations, Sales, Social Media

The last “P” I talked about was “Planning.” Once you’ve done that, you’re ready for the next “P”: “Producing.” This is where the “Ps” really start to get good.

Producing podcasts consists of creating the content and recording it. Here are some best practices to keep in mind as you produce your podcasts:

• Content is king. Make sure the content is something your listeners will value. Also, get to the point and be succinct. The worst thing you can do is waste your audience’s time.
• Stick to the basics. The structure of your podcast should be the same as any other presentation, whitepaper, or effective communication: introduction, body, and a reinforcing conclusion.
• Don’t advertise or sell. Your audience can smell a sales pitch a mile away. What they want is information that enlightens or entertains them. Otherwise, they won’t listen.
• Be authentic. Polished, professional-sounding podcasts are difficult and expensive to produce. Luckily, it’s not necessary, if you’re producing something useful. It’s more important to be authentic.
• Have a clean delivery. Although you don’t have to sound like a professional, the quality of the performance is still important. Use performers with clear, articulate voices. Follow a script to keep the performance focused. Practice before recording, at least while you’re getting started.
• Make it easy to edit. You will make mistakes, probably a lot of them at first. So record your podcasts with editing in mind. Slow down and pause frequently as you record to create adequate cut points if you need them. Don’t try to edit individual words. If you make a mistake, re-record the entire sentence or more.
• Build a backlog. Try to produce several podcasts in your series before publishing your first one, and always have more than one ready to go. This will ensure regular releases, which helps build and retain your audience.

Producing your first podcasts may be a bit intimidating and take some time. But don’t worry, you’ll get good at it. And before long you’ll probably really like doing them. Just like you learned to like peas. Okay, well…better than that.

Technorati Tags: B2B, Customer Service, Human Resource, Marketing, Podcasting, Public Relations, Sales, Social Media