Zoom Webinar Training from Classicist on Vimeo.
In today's training session, I'm joined by Edith Platten, Director of Education; Julie Benton, Education Associate; Molly Wohlforth, Peter Pennoyer Education Assistant and Cast Hall Fellow; and Hannah Simon, Chapter and Board Liaison.
So let's get started by showing you how to create a webinar on Zoom.
To start a webinar, we actually have to start it on the website. You can't actually register a webinar in the app. So I have to go to my account, go down here on the left to "Webinars," and then click "Schedule a Webinar."
This is very similar to the Zoom Meeting option, where I select a date and a time.
A "recurring webinar" is something that will repeat on a continual basis for as many times as you set it for.
"Registration" - something that we've been doing with public programs is we've been registering through our regular website, and not using the Zoom registration, because we felt that it was helpful to keep everybody on the mailing list, and not require them to have to go through the Zoom interface to actually register. So this box is only if you want people to actually register through the Zoom interface, and have all their contact information and attendance lists and everything actually stored in the Zoom interface. So what we've been doing at National is actually doing registration through our site. And so we leave this box unchecked, but there is the option to actually have attendees register through the Zoom interface.
The "webinar password" - Zoom has been encouraging us to use passwords on every single meeting. And the reason for this is to prevent "Zoom-bombing," which I'm sure you've heard of, which is when somebody who was not invited to a Zoom meeting or someone who is otherwise trying to cause chaos, jumps in and tries to distract people or show something inappropriate on their screen. So Zoom has been trying to counteract this by requiring passwords on all of their meetings and webinars.
However, what we've been doing it National, like I said before with the registration, is that if we are only passing out that link to people who are members, people who have pre-registered on our website - we felt that for a lot of people, requiring a password would just be asking for an additional level of complication for them to access it.
The password is usually embedded into the sharing link that you get when you create a Zoom Meeting or a Webinar. So usually when you're clicking on that link to join a meeting or a webinar, you don't have to input a password.
However, it can cause issues when you have this password box checked, and somebody clicks on a link to join your meeting, and they're accessing it from an account that wasn't previously authorized to access the meeting, and then they'll get a box up on the screen that will be asking them for a password. In addition, if somebody is calling in from their phone, which will get to in a minute, and we have this box checked, the phone menu will be asking them for a password.
Usually, this is included into an email when you're sending a Zoom invite email, but it can sometimes get lost in just the wall of text that you get in that email. And sometimes people get confused, or they're not really sure where the password is.
So what I like to do is just leave it un-checked, because again, we're only sending these webinar links to people who have already registered through our website, who are already members. And I just felt that it was just an extra level of complication that wasn't really providing us with all that much more security. Because again, if you're enabling a password and you're asking for people to input a password, that password is being sent to people along with the link that you're sending.
So in my view, that was just - basically, you're sending two pieces of security to the same person, and I didn't really feel like it added all that much security for us.
If it were a public program, like if we were advertising this online, and we were opening this up to anybody on the internet, I would certainly encourage registration and password.
But again, because we're doing this internally, usually with just members or people who are affiliated with members, I leave that unchecked.
Edith Platten: (00:09:14) So for example, the courses for the summer programs we've got coming up, you would keep both of those unchecked.
Justin Kegley: (00:09:20) Right.
Edith Platten: (00:09:20) Because it's advertised separately, and registration is through our own website.
Justin Kegley: (00:09:24) Right, right. Because we're taking in people's names and emails through our website, and vetting them there.
This next box here, "video" - it doesn't really explain it here, which I hope is helpful that I'm explaining it here - is only to start someone's camera automatically when they join.
You're probably familiar with that situation where you're starting a meeting, and somebody joins, and they don't know how to turn on their camera or their audio. So I usually leave this on, just because it minimizes that level of complication. But again, it's kind of up to whether the person that you are inviting to this knows that or not.
For a webinar, I usually leave these on because we are only going to be having ICAA staff and then the instructor, or whoever else is going to be holding the event, and we're not going to be having video or audio from any of the other attendees, who are only watching as passive observers. So I like to leave them on.
This next item here, "audio," is for how people can join. For a webinar, I usually leave them on both, because it allows people to join from their computer and from the phone.
If I am scheduling a practice session with someone and I want to force them to use their computer, as opposed to their phone, I'll check "computer." But usually when I'm setting up a public program, I'll select both. Because we do usually have maybe one or two people who are, for whatever reason, are unable to join from their computer and they have to call in.
Occasionally we've also had the situation where somebody can get video on their computer, but they can't get audio. And so they will access the video on their computer, and then they call in on their phone to be able to get the audio stream.
These "webinar options" - usually I leave "Q&A" checked, just because that's usually an option that we want. And I'll go over that in greater detail here in a minute.
If I'm meeting someone for a sound check or a tech rehearsal or a practice session beforehand, I need to have this checked ("Enable Practice Session") . And what this will enable us to do is, we can meet on this same link at any time. As long as the two or more people are actually accessing the link at the same time, that link will always allow myself as the host, and anybody else as a panelist, to actually join in. And with a practice session, you're able to meet amongst yourselves before you actually start the broadcast for the attendees. And that's important, for example, if I have an event starting at 6:00 PM, I'll ask the panelists to join at 5:45, just to make sure that we're all comfortable, that we have sound and internet connections and everything straightened out beforehand. And so we're able to interact in this space, the same way that we are doing right now, without actually broadcasting to any of the guests who may be joining.
While we are having our practice session, before we've actually enabled the broadcast, those guests or attendees will only see a screen that says "This webinar is scheduled to start at this date, at this time."
And until I actually select "Broadcast," they actually won't see anything that we're talking about.
So usually I'll just leave that on, just so that we can do a sound check or anything else.
"Only authenticated users can join" is somewhat related to the "Registration" item that we talked about earlier. What this means is that only someone with a Zoom account that has been authorized and enabled through their email can actually join.
I usually leave this unchecked, because we often have members, or other people who are joining, who maybe didn't sign up beforehand. And if they're tuning in right as the event is supposed to start - if I have this checked - they're going to be met with a screen that says "You have to register a Zoom account."
And similar to this password security feature, I felt that it was kind of unnecessary because again, we're vetting internally, we're looking at the list to make sure beforehand that people are registering on our site. And I just felt that this was another level that was just causing complications for people.
Edith Platten: (00:13:36) So an extra added complication for you, the host, trying to do everything else before the program begins. And then someone says, "Oh, I can't get in."
Justin Kegley: (00:13:43) Right. "How do I make a Zoom account?" Right.
So if I leave this unchecked, and I send this link to someone who registered through our site, they'll be able to click on it and tune in without needing to make an account. There are benefits of having an account, but I don't think that it's necessary for guests to need to be able to actually tune into the webinar.
"Record the webinar automatically" - when you select that, whenever you start the event, it'll automatically start recording. So if you know that you're going to be recording an event, and you just want to tick that box to make sure that you don't forget, that's a really handy feature.
I've typically been using in the cloud, just because if your computer crashes, and you're recording on the local computer, it can interrupt the recording. The only thing that you have to watch for in the cloud is that it'll take up your cloud storage space. So here at National, because we've been running so many of these events, I usually have to record it to the cloud, and then once that recording is made available, I have to download it and archive it here - or put it on Dropbox or Google Drive if I want to share with someone - and then actually delete it from my account, because you have to pay extra to actually enable more storage quota.
So I'll usually leave that "automatically" checked, and "record to the cloud."
"Alternative hosts" only works if you have someone who also has a Pro account. So, if I wanted to host an event, and say that there was a chapter who had a Pro account, and they wanted to co-host with me, I could input their email address here. And what that means is that they have equal privileges as I do, as the host. They can open the meeting, they can close the meeting. They'll have privileges for kicking somebody out of the meeting, and anything like that.
But, again, that only works if that alternative person also has a Pro account. You can't just assign someone from your organization, unless they have also paid for the professional account.