You get an email about an event or visit a carrier’s training page with a list of webinars, or you spot an ad to attend an online meeting, sounds easy enough. There is always good information to be gleaned from other people in the insurance business. But then it comes time to actually attend the event and suddenly you can’t find the link or have trouble logging in. You get confused and nothing seems to work. You get frustrated.
Emails sometimes have multiple links in them, and it may require trying each one until you discover the right link. Or you need one link to register and another email with a link to join the meeting. And many of the online event hosts have been throwing off into the deep end of the Internet pool and are still just treading water.
This online stuff is not down to a fine art, yet. We are all still learning, so remember you are not alone in this fog, and we all have to be patient.
Online webinars and meetings are great! But sometimes joining an online event can be a struggle. Both hosts and listeners are still learning to navigate these online meeting platforms. People are actually doing pretty well, but with several different meeting and webinar platforms, it can still be confusing.
For listeners, some questions can be like, where’s is the mute, where is the chat, where can you see who is participating. For hosts, where are the controls to mute listeners, and for on platforms like Zoom, how can you insert a background? We are all still learning.
One of the first obstacles a listener might encounter is finding the link to join on the day of the event. Often there is no reminder sent on the day of the meeting and it may become necessary to shift through old emails to try and find the initial meeting link or log into a carrier account to re-find the event on the training page.
If you get tons of emails, scrolling through them can be daunting. So is a good idea to come up with a system to find those event emails that contain the link. If you are using a calendar say on your computer or cell phone, one idea is in the calendar address line add the name on the sender’s email and the date the email was received. With this information you can go to the date you noted and look for the name of the sender to find the meeting link.
Another issue can be the browser used to attend these online events. For most webinars, any browser will probably work okay. For online meetings and events, especially those that require participation, the better choice might be Chrome or Firefox.
If you are attending or hosting Zoom meetings that are many features beyond just chat and mute. There are setting that need to be made as a host, and features that are good and even fun for attendees. Adding a background is nice, and some computers allow people to add their own image, use a green backdrop, or add Zoom-provided fun images. But not all computer operating systems will work for some of these features. – For Zoom, it is a good idea to read an article or watch a video about using Zoom’s features and settings.
Many of the carriers and sponsors of events will have contests and prizes, during their online events. These contests can be fun and offer really nice prizes, but insurance people can be very competitive, for these people, the prize may not matter, just the winning. So here are some tips.
Be aware that the host or sponsor may give the contest rules at the beginning of the event, and forget to repeat the contest requirements again during the event, for people who missed the instructions at the start due to a dog distraction, or kids interrupting, or arriving late due to a login problem, ask if the host could possibly give the instructions again, most will.
A common problem with webinar contests is the Chat feature, by default, it may be set to “Host-Only”, so you answer the host’s question first, but the host is not actually monitoring the answers, someone else is, so they can not see your fast, correct response. Webinars often require Chat be set to “All Participants” for the answer to be valid, so the person monitoring the answers can see your response. Again, the host may forget to remind everyone to set Chat to All, so you need to remember to do it. And hosts are not perfect, and in their zeal to encourage participation, if only one person does what is asked, the host might continue to ask people to respond properly until there are more entries.
Some contests are involved, with several chores to be complete, and these can be fun learning trials, and winners are often rewarded with very nice prizes.
At large events with sponsors there may be several contests, requiring visiting sponsor booths, perhaps chatting with sponsors, or entering drawings at sponsor booths. These can be fun and rewarding.
Then there are the simple random drawings of all of the attendees of an event or at a sponsor’s booth. These are pretty straightforward.
One of the best things about these online events is that you can attend them in your PJs while smacking through a bowl of Cheerios, with your dog or cat cuddled up next to you. Not a bad way to garner knowledge.
Try keeping your webinar and in-person training notes in a spiral notebook, using only the front of a page for each event, only using to the back of a page if an event requires it. And put a mark next to important notes. This way you can easily flip through your spiral notebook to refer back to your notes. At the top put a reference note, like carrier/FMO name, subject, presenter/hostname, and include the date. This also helps to reference back to your notes later
Ask your questions early, because these webinar platforms have time limits and the hosts are often quick to end the event abruptly, leaving you with unanswered questions. The same is often true of in-person events, the presenter will often rush off after a brief Q&A, sitting they have other obligations. If you are asked to wait until the end to ask questions, or prior to a meeting you already know you have questions, have your questions written down, so you can get your question asked quickly and so you don’t stumble and get confused.
So enjoy all these learning opportunities, and figure out your own system of reminders for attending these webinars and meeting and getting your questions answered. Learn how to use the hosting platforms, which you will learn just by attending more events. And have fun with the contests and drawings, and hopefully, you will win one someday.
