The world is a big place. That sounds like a cliché, but unfortunately it’s true. Although our lives seem to be running faster, and we’re more widely connected than ever before, geographical distances still haven’t changed (and seem unlikely to change without some sort of event occurring that we’d all rather not be around to witness).
Why do we, as a product manufacturer, bring this up “obvious fact”? Because it has a direct impact on the way that our business communicates with all the other businesses we are connected with.
Insol Ltd, as a nation-wide company, services clients and projects all over New Zealand. While we have three main branches in central locations, we aren’t physically able to visit everyone that requires our help at short notice. For example, we regularly have queries and requests for technical assistance from long term clients in places such as Dunedin, Kerikeri, Whanganui, Nelson and Taupo. For sure, we call on these clients regularly and ensure they are up to date with our latest products, but we can’t visit them every time they have a technical question.
This set of circumstances has formed the way we communicate with our clients in the past. Traditionally, if an architect wants to use our product on a project, the communication sequence looks something like this:
- They will phone our offices and ask to speak to a technical representative.
- Once put through to the appropriate person, they will verbally describe their project and explain how they would like to incorporate our product.
- This will usually be followed up by an email, with a set of preliminary drawings for us check and base our recommendations upon.
- We often mark-up these drawings, showing our suggested details and send them back along with appropriate product information.
- The architect will review our suggestions, and email or phone us back to discuss them in more detail.
- Often this process can be repeated several times, until a satisfactory solution is arrived at.
Does this sound familiar? How often have you had similar situations where it would have been so much easier to have someone just call in and discuss your questions and provide you with an answer there and then?
Enter ZOOM.US
While we are all familiar with Skype, Lync, Go-to-Meeting and the hundred and one other video conferencing platforms available, ZOOM offers some fantastic benefits for our industry. We at Insol have used it internally for the last couple of years, and are now comfortable that it is the ultimate communication tool for both us and our clients. ZOOM comes with the following benefits:
- A lot of other platforms we have tried seem to be temperamental, and will occasionally get hung up on firewall or other computer issues. ZOOM, while it’s not 100% perfect, is the most reliable system we have found.
- Excellent screen sharing. During a call, I can share my computer screen with the other person and show them photos, drawings, data sheets, videos… anything on my computer.
- ZOOM comes with a white-board style tool that allows callers to draw, sketch and highlight the screen that is being shared. This is an awesome way to explain how a technical product works, and allows temporary mark-ups to be made to plans and other drawings.
- The program offers the ability to either take screen grabs of important points or record the whole conversation as a video. Very cool if you need to go back and check something later.
- Ability to call in by phone. One of the main problems we face is that there are still computers out there without quality webcams or microphones. If you have a computer like this but would still like to use the screen sharing and annotation features of ZOOM – it’s no problem. The platform has a local phone number to call, you enter the meeting ID code, and presto… the audio side of the conversation is carried out over your landline or cellphone.
- Multiple callers. In our industry, there can be multiple parties involved in a project. For example: we might have an architect from Wellington, working with a builder in Palmerston North, on a project that is being managed by an Insol project manager in Masterton, that needs technical input from an engineer in Auckland… sound confusing? With ZOOM, all of those people can easily get together to discuss the project in detail – without leaving their offices!
- And lastly – IT’S FREE. Whilst we have a paid subscription (which comes with a few extra bells and whistles), our clients can create their own free accounts to use however they want.
So if you are an architect, consultant, builder, end-user (or not even related to our industry), I’d encourage you to try using ZOOM for your business communication. It beats flying, it certainly beats driving, it’s quick, it’s easy and it’s free.
Click this link to contact us on if you’d like to connect to us in this way. Or if you’d rather, just hop onto www.zoom.us, spend about a minute setting up your account, and you’re good to go.
Here’s to the business communication tool of the year – thanks ZOOM.