Modern businesses have offices and branches not only all over the country but even all over the globe. In such a scenario, travelling expenses can form a major chunk of total business expenses. Where cost cutting is the order of the day, many multinational businesses have adopted teleconferencing as the most effective tool for communication between different employees, stakeholders and customers.
A conference call is no different from a regular phone call, except that there are three or more persons connected with this kind of call. The persons may be physically thousands of miles apart, but telephone conferencing helps them to effectively communicate and co-ordinate between themselves. Teleconferencing lines are available 24/7 and so there is no need to wait in matters that require urgent communication. It only requires good network support and a simple phone.
Depending on the conference call service providers, the number of persons that can be connected simultaneously may differ. It may allow the host to call a number of people or all persons may be able to connect independently with an access code. This is done with the help of conference bridge, which is a server that can link a number of phone lines at once. The bridge is hosted by the conferencing services provider.
You need to contact a good teleconferencing service provider who will guide you through the basic set up of phone conferencing and you can get your own personal identification number which you need to dial to get connected to the teleconference.
Irrespective of the size of the business, conferencing solutions are proving to be a boon. There is no need to travel, no need to spend on conference halls and accompanying lunches. You need not buy expensive equipment to set up call conferencing. But a company can buy their own conference bridge if they so desire and can afford it.
A voice conference can be carried out with the help of a moderator who dials all participants and connects them to the call. He also has the option to allow the called persons to speak or only listen.
Conference calls can prove to be of much help in conducting sales presentations, training sessions and promote regular communications between employees who might be working in different offices of the same company. It reduces out of office time that the employees spend travelling and enhances productivity. When used along with web conferencing, a conference call even allows for sharing of files.