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In this newsletter:
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CU Village recently redesigned and developed the Michigan Credit Union League’s site using our Content Management System. Take a look by clicking on the image above!
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How to Conduct a Successful Web Conference
Conducting a Web conference is an efficient and cost-saving way to meet with your peers to discuss a new initiative, conduct a training session for your member credit unions, or meet with your colleagues to collaborate on a document.
But is a Web conference always effective? Just as you would in an in-person meeting, engaging your audience and making your session interactive can help a great deal.
A simple way to make your Web conference interactive is to conduct electronic polls throughout the course of the session. These polls can help ensure your audience is participating and paying attention. For instance, you might use polls for the following:
- Voting or making a decision before moving forward
- Learning how many participants are familiar with a particular regulation
- Determining if participants grasp a concept before building on that idea (especially useful during an education session)
Another method of adding interactivity is to use the application sharing feature and pass the control of the application to someone else in the meeting. By doing this, one or more participants will be able to manipulate your screen. For example, if you’re collaborating with a group on a document, passing the controls enables your colleagues to input their changes directly—and keeps them actively engaged.
A third way to add interactivity and increase participation is to use the whiteboard feature. The whiteboard with annotation allows you and your attendees to highlight or mark items on the slide presentation. If you choose, you can simply make notes on a blank whiteboard.
Other good tips to conducting a successful Web conference are:
- Send an e-mail reminder a day or so prior to the meeting with instructions about how to participate, including any phone numbers, PINs, or URLs they will need in order to easily access the meeting when the appropriate day and time has arrived. You’ll also want to encourage participants to test their browsers prior to the meeting to make sure they can get in when the time comes. This is also a good time to send a PDF of your PowerPoint presentation if you plan to use one.
- Practice your presentation beforehand—especially if you’re using new or updated technology. Practicing will also help you pace yourself and tighten your presentation so it meets your scheduled time.
- As the host, log in at least 10-15 minutes early to allow time to resolve any issues that may come up prior to everyone else joining in.
- Create an itinerary and stick to it. Of course, you want to allow time to answer participants’ questions. To ensure that you cover your entire presentation, you might decide to save your Q&A session until the end. Another option is to use the chat feature that allows you to send and receive instant messages from participants. This ensures that questions are answered in a timely manner.
- When asking for input, be specific. A general “do you have any questions?” might garner some response—or none at all. Instead, ask for specific feedback, such as, “Do you have any questions about Topic X and how it will affect operations at your credit union?” This will help keep your audience engaged as active listeners and participants.
Our Web and phone conferencing services (i.e. Raindance, WebEx, and MeetingPlace) include all the tools and functionality you need to conduct a successful conference, and are priced significantly less than most other providers. Call us today to find out how you can use them for your next Web or phone meeting.
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Organize and Archive Articles Using the Article Module in CMS
Whether you’re in charge of publications, public relations, or any other department that’s responsible for communicating with your members, documents are a key component of your productivity. In a paperless environment (that is, your Web site), you still need to store those documents for future reference. If you’re using our Content Management System, you can use the Article Module to help organize and archive your articles so members can have access to them when they need them. With the Article Module you can:
- Designate groups for your articles (such as press releases, regulatory alerts, and comment calls)
- Assign articles to the appropriate group or groups
- Select the date you want the article to display – Choose a date range to assign the dates during which each article will be displayed; or choose “always display” and the article will remain accessible to your members indefinitely.
- Preview the article before you add it to the system—so you’ll know exactly how it will appear on your site.
- Link from the article to other areas of your Web site—and even other sites.
The Article Module can help reduce the amount of time that you spend managing the articles on your site. Once you organize your groups, enter your articles, and set the date, you don’t need to worry about them. However, if you want to delete an article or change its category, you can easily do so with a couple of mouse clicks.
But the main benefit is to your members. In addition to having access to the most current information, they’ll also be able to locate older materials that are still relevant. The Article Module allows you to established organized archives of information to assist your member credit unions with their daily operations.
New Functionality Added to Content Management System
Users of our Web Site Content Management System (CMS) appreciate the control it gives them over updating their sites. Now you can do even more! We recently:
- Added ability for any field to be edited using the WYSIWYG editor. Some fields have been added with this ability, including:
- Rates marquee (good for your member credit unions) and text fields
- Calendar description
- Article description
- Variable content (This has also been converted to a TEXT field, removing the 255-character limit for these fields.)
- Modified the backend-user area to behave more like the other “admin” areas, including the removal of “quick add user” function.
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August 2007