Millions of teachers and students stormed the internet to start school on August 24 when the video conferencing website Zoom failed in the eastern U.S. and in England.
The outage left many businesses wondering what to do aside from reschedule their meeting. Missing out on a meeting could mean missing out on business.
If you’ve relied on the internet, social media or websites for a living then you already know this: you can’t rely on any of them. Add electricity, television and the telephone to that list. It’s always a good time to prepare for possible outages and disasters so you can keep business running.
If you need the ability to make changes on a website in a hurry, you’ll want to start with electricity so be sure to have a generator and fuel. The internet could go down locally but it may work through your mobile phone service – so learn how to use your smart phone as an internet hot spot and you can get your computer or tablet online.
The Zoom outage wasn’t the first time an app or website failed, and it won’t be the last, so it’s a good idea to get backups available to keep business operating. Select one or two of these applications and create accounts if necessary.
When you plan a business meeting, weave these backups into your meeting invitation’s explanation.
Here are some alternate video conferencing tools to consider using:
Google Duo
The Google Duo video calling app is free and it works with smart phones, computers and tablets.
It’s available for iPhone and Android.
If you want to have a conference, you can create a group with the individuals you plan to invite – up to 32 different people can join in, at the time of this writing.
Visit Google Duo and try it out.
Skype
Skype is a video conferencing site that offers free conference calls.
Bought by Microsoft in 2011, Skype allows you to hold a meeting with up to 50 people and the call can last up to 24 hours.
Facebook Messenger
If you have access to Facebook, then you can use Messenger to video chat. You can chat with one person or with a group of people.
Messenger’s feature called “Rooms” allows you to create a virtual meeting place and share a link to those with whom you plan to meet.
One or all of these could serve as a suitable backup. Once you choose a primary and backup video conference program, establish a plan in writing and share it with participants you plan to meet with.
