Technology for Book Launches

How to: Video Conferencing Apps

Online video calls and conferencing is not new technology, however, since the recent pandemic it has made its way into many lives – for both business and personal. If you’re working from home, you’ll likely know a few different apps such as Zoom, Skype and Microsoft Team, however, not everyone has experience with these video conferencing apps. 

The idea of a virtual book launch, began at the start of March when bookshops closed – despite the opening of shops now, many are still choosing to opt with virtual due to practicality and increased safety.

If you’re looking to have a virtual book launch or workshop, first read our advice on the technology itself, below.

Zoom

Firstly, we recommend watching this handy video, as it explains the entire process very simply: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LE2w9tRpF4I

1. Firstly, you’ll need to sign up to Zoom – don’t worry it’s free.  https://zoom.us/signin
2. Go to ‘schedule a new meeting’ and add in all the information you need e.g. title, time and date.
3. Keep in mind: for calls of 3 or more people, you are limited to 40 minutes. If you need more time, you will need to upgrade to Zoom pro, or use a different app.
4. Click ‘generate automatically’ for your meeting ID
5. At the end where it states ‘meeting password’ please enter a password, which you can then give to those invited – you can also choose to not have a password.
6. We recommend keeping ‘host’ and ‘participant’ on.
7. For ‘audio’ set at ‘both’
8. Finally, meeting options. We recommend setting it as ‘mute participants upon entry’. Because you’ll likely have more than a few people, this will create less background noise at the start.
9. Once you have saved the scheduled meeting, click ‘copy the invitation’ then all details needed to join, including the link for where to join will be copied so you can then paste it into an email or word document to be later send as invitations to the participants
10. When the time for the event comes, simply press start!

Skype

We recommend taking a look at this helpful article by Business Insider first: https://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-set-up-a-skype-conference-call?r=US&IR=T

A very easy to use system.

1. Firstly, you will need everyone to add you as a contact on Skype (it may be better to do your invites before this so you can see who is interested and have them join skype first.)
2. Launch Skype and click the ‘group’ icon.
3. Click and drag the contacts you wish to attend.
4. When you’ve filled the room with everyone you wish to attend, click ‘call group’
5. Skype has a call duration limit of 110 minutes.

Microsoft Team

Microsoft team can support up to 250 people, attendees can join without downloading and is supported across almost all browsers such as Chrome, Safari and IOS. It’s also free.

The idea is very similar to the above two options. Please look here for a great guide on scheduling meetings in Teams: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/schedule-a-meeting-in-teams-943507a9-8583-4c58-b5d2-8ec8265e04e5

Facebook Rooms 

Firstly, have a look at this article, as it is full of helpful information: https://www.pocket-lint.com/apps/news/facebook/151964-what-are-messenger-rooms-and-how-do-they-work-in-facebook-and-whatsapp

Announced in April 2020, the concept for Facebook Rooms is to allow you and up to 49 others, to attend a video call. This can be started from Facebook, Instagram Direct, Messenger as well as a few other platforms.

The process of creating a room is very simple. Open the messenger tab, click on the ‘people’ tab, create a room and select those you wish to attend.

You can then share the room on your Facebook newsfeed and go live whenever you’re ready. 

Social medias

You can have a more relaxed book launch on Facebook or Instagram. This requires no invitation or downloading software. You can let those you invite know what time and date you’ll be going live on your page and those who wish to join can simply click on the video and comment throughout the live stream. The downside is the only person on video will be yourself, the attendees will be there in comments only.

IG and Facebook live are perfect for those who wish to have a simple and easy book launch. For further info please see here: https://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2017/07/31/facebook-live-guide and https://later.com/blog/instagram-live/