How Do I Choose the Best Web Conference Software?

Web conference software is used primarily by businesses, collaborators and colleges, and choosing the right program for your conferencing needs will make the process much easier. Every web conference software program has a maximum number of attendees, and this maximum number must be enough to include everyone necessary; otherwise, you will have to set a limit on attendees during a conference. You should check the conferencing method, such as text or video, to ensure the conference can be presented the way you want it to be without having to pay for features you will not use. A hand-raising feature will make it easier for attendees to politely interject during such a conference. Files are often shared during a web conference, and a streamlined platform for file sharing will make this easier.

Just like a physical conference hall, web conference software will have a maximum number of attendees that can participate in a web conference at once. You should check this number before choosing a program and ensure the maximum is enough so everyone can participate. Most programs have a high limit, ranging from 100 to 1,000 attendees, which should be enough for most uses.

There are several ways to conduct a web conference, including text conversation, video conference or via an audio channel. While most conferences will benefit from mixing those methods, you should only choose methods that you are going to use. Getting web conference software with methods that will not be used usually just wastes money, because these features typically drive up the price of the conferencing software.

In a conference in which all participants are in one room, it is easy to know when someone wants to interject, because he or she can make a sound or raise his or her hand. To emulate this experience, some web conference software has a hand-raising feature that creates a small hand or similar graphic near the attendee’s profile name. This allows you to acknowledge a participant's request to speak or ask him or her to wait a moment so you can finish your thought. Otherwise, the participant may have to interrupt to get his or her point across.

During a web conference, files are typically shared so participants can read or see material that someone else is talking about. This is the same as passing out copies of a document in a regular conference. To facilitate this, there should be a streamlined file-sharing system in the web conference software so these files can be quickly shared between participants without much trouble and without delayed downloads.