Face to Face With Your Customer
 This post was written by our VP of Marketing and Web Sales, Rafael Alenda! While he revels in all things “SaaS and cloud”, his other interests include taxiing his 3 sons between sporting events, whipping up batches of paella and jetting off to Spain to visit his family! |
When we introduced video conferencing into Fuze Meeting earlier this year, it wasn’t only our product offering that changed. The way our sales team sold the product was also fundamentally altered. We here at Fuze Meeting are in an enviable situation where we use the product we’re selling to…well, sell the product…makes sense?
Most inside sales teams use online meeting services to show the software they’re selling or take a prospect through a sales pitch; slide by agonizing slide.
For the first year or so, our sales reps would invite interested prospects into a Fuze Meeting, give some background on our company, highlight some benefits of our service and then close the deal. It was slightly impersonal but it worked.
By adding the ability to have meeting hosts and attendees see each other during the demo, the client/prospect relationship became more personal, fun and effective. Another benefit was receiving immediate feedback from the audience we are trying to engage with and communicate to.
Our sales reflect the excitement that video conferencing has brought to our solution and we find our prospects are blown away as soon as they see the video panels pop up in the meeting. Demos are no longer routine and depend more on the interaction between the sales rep and the prospect. So good sales reps can be more productive and, better yet, more successful. Saying “No” is far easier over the phone than it is when you’re face-to-face but our experience has shown us that demos don’t even get to the answer part…prospects come out and tell us “I have to have this!”
Has your sales team recently started using video conferencing to sell? How has it changed your approach? What has been the impact to the company?
Fuze Telepresence Connect
Maybe you’ve seen the news today, but FuzeBox is out to revolutionize the telepresence industry with our newest launch, Fuze Telepresence Connect. Check out this video, and we’ll be updating the blog with more info shortly!
Fuze Meeting is the #1 Choice for Lawyers with iPads!
The mobile collaboration site, iPad 4 Lawyers put up a post reviewing meeting apps for the iPad. (You can read it here.) The author included all the big ones in his comparison: GoTo Meeting, WebEx, Adobe, and Fuze Meeting. And for the most part, the comments he used to describe our competitors are pretty much the same things we’ve noticed when testing out their apps.
In response to the review of our iPad app (he gave us “a solid B+”), we have to say…thanks! And we’re confident we’ll get into the “A” category very soon!
His one major area for improvement – a desire to annotate directly from the iPad – is a feature request we’re aware of and are working on.
That said, he missed 2 major features that would be sure to interest any tech-savvy attorney. (more…)
How well do you know Fuze Meeting?
For those Fuze enthusiasts who just love to quantify their knowledge (or for that guy in your office who loudly insists that he’s the resident Fuze Meeting expert), we have a wee quiz that will guarantee you bragging rights as you host your next meeting.
Think you’re an expert? Prove it!
Video: What is Fuze Box – the Outtakes
As promised in our post earlier this week where we showed the ‘serious’ answers to What is Fuze Box, we of course had quite a bit of footage that didn’t make it into the final reel, and we thought it was such a shame to let it go to waste.
So we present…the outtakes reel.
San Francisco Employees Answer – What Is Fuze Box?
We asked our San Francisco office what words came to mind when they thought of Fuze Box, and the answers were great. Stay tuned – I don’t want to give anything away, but there may be an AWESOME outtakes video on its way!
Update: As promised…you can find the update video HERE.
The Live Demos Are, Yes, Live
As (maybe?) you know, we recently moved offices to accommodate our growth so we shuffled the seating arrangements and most of us got new neighbors. So, your favorite Fuze Meeting Community Manager (me) is now happily sandwiched between Tatiana, the woman who keeps our office standing and Larry, one of our Live Demo guys (the other one is Caryl and she works remotely from Arizona).
Quite to my amusement, about three times a day, I hear Larry say “Yes, it’s actually live. Don’t worry, it sort of surprises a lot of people.”
So – seemed to me like the World Wide Web could use a little reassurance! When we say ‘Live Demo’ we actually mean that there’s someone there on the meeting waiting to answer your questions from 8 AM to 2 PM Pacific. The live demo is geared towards potential customers (though quite a few existing customers hop on with easy questions). On top of THAT we have a whole customer care center at the ready to answer anything a little stickier.
So…looking for answers for Fuze Meeting?
Drop in on a Live Demo
Or contact customer care via live chat or email or call them at (800) 844-4118 and you’ll be well on your way to becoming a Fuze Meeting expert!
What in the World Is Coworking?
Just the other day, I was doing my due diligence on the webbernets trying to find out some juicy tidbits about alternate working situations. And since you happen to be on a web conferencing blog, chances are you’re on the lookout for more tips and tidbits that could make your situation more efficient. Well, I ‘discovered’ (similarly to how Columbus ‘discovered’ America) this brilliant alternative to from home not from home!
It’s called coworking! And from what I gather…
Coworking is a way of working where you independently work alongside other workers, though the work you’re doing is totally separate. Think of it as a well-lit and nicely temperature-ed café where you can go to work comfortably all day without enduring the angry glares of the barista trying to Jedi Mind Trick you into buying more coffee or get off his ‘free’ WiFi. There’s only so much caffeine one person can take, doncha know.
No, it’s not free, but it seems reasonably priced. These coworking spaces are all over the place and a quick Google revealed five locations within walking distance of my current office and a whole bunch more in the area.
What’s more – these places seem really COOL. Quite a few of them offer free drop-in options to check them out. You can use meeting rooms, supplies and whatnot as part of the service. I had a big old #FAIL that one day I had to work from home, and if I had to work from home on a regular basis, I would totally consider signing up for something like this.
So… whether it’s coworking, meeting online, figuring out a way to pre-occupy the kids or putting an accountability system in place (Thanks Heather and Yasou for the tips !!!) – we realize that knowing your options is the first step.
Have you ever tried coworking? How did it work?
6/17/10 Update: Seth Godin recently did a post on coworking. Check it out > Goodbye To The Office
Community Guidelines
and the No-Tolerance Ninjette
We realize if you’ve made it to the Fuze Meeting site and its associated blog, then you’re already probably a certified genius who knows how to conduct him/herself in an online community. But lest we are accused of under communicating, we thought we’d make it official.
- Do
- Be chatty. We love opinions and inter-commenter conversations. We love dissent just as much as accolades (especially when witty).
- Be courteous. Free speech has been all the rage for the past 200+ years, but please keep your comments in good taste.
- Think first, submit second. This site is a public forum and once it’s up, it’s up. The web has an impressively long memory.
- Don’t.
- Hate. Or use hate language/symbols, vulgarity or piss poor manners. We’ve got no tolerance for that business.
- Spam. Setting the obvious Karma implications aside, this is still no fun and ruins the spirit of commenting. Spam includes identical repeat posting or posting anything unrelated to the topic and/or specifically intended to drive traffic to another site.
- Break the law. Actually a good life-rule. Unless you want to go to jail. If you don’t know the law, learn the law.
We’re so excited to have an engaged and energetic community. Unfortunately, there are some e-baddies out there who can mess things up for the rest of us so we hired a no tolerance ninjette (female ninja) to do the dirty work. Our ninjette has the right delete any comment or ban any user, with notice or with ninja-like stealth, at any time and for any reason. *swish swish* (ninja swords)
Ms. New Community Manager
To steal a passage from my Programming 10 Class, nerdy T-shirts of the 1990’s, and Bill Gates’ first Tweet:
Hello, World!
Fuze Meeting has just signed on a Social Media/PR/BloggyBlog/Community Management enthusiast (me) to take the reins on keeping our users and prospects (you) up-to-date and in-the-know about all things web conference-ish and other (loosely) related topics.
That’s right! We now have a whole entire human exclusively dedicated to listening to your deepest desires and needs…er…particularly those associated with web conferencing (and more particularly Fuze Meeting)!!! Can you believe your LUCK? And you thought Chinese New Year was over.
So, don’t be shy! Make my day! Let me know what you think about our product – what do you love? What could be better? What do you want to see next? Are you really excited about the iPad or do you just think it’s going to fizzle away? What would you do for a Klondike Bar?
“Yes, Kristen, YES!”, you scream with gusto. “How ever may I communicate this valuable information?!?!!?”
Good question! We’re multi-talented and well-versed, so hit us up on Twitter, Facebook or slap a comment at the bottom of this post.
Nice to meet you folks. I’m sure I’ll see you around the circuit soon.
-k.
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