Streaming video provides a powerful collaboration tool, enabling participants to see and hear information that is presented in such a way that grabs their attention and focus. Streaming video is ideal for example for training contact center agents, informing sales reps of new products and to deliver tech support to users. All of these functions can minimize or avoid costly, productivity-damaging and air-killing travel.

InterCall is now offering streaming video via InterCall (News - Alert) Streaming that features technology and tools that permit streaming events to be more interactive, flexible and mobile, thereby engaging and fully involving the audience. InterCall Streaming also takes advantage of new mobile technologies, integrating SMS polling and social media functionality.  

Some of the new features include:

*          Screen broadcast. Presenters are able to broadcast their desktop, all Flash-based, without any installation required for those viewing

*          Integrated video encoding. Presenters can achieve top quality VP6 or H.264 video encoding all within the application without additional steps.  Advanced users also maintain fine grained control over encoding, such as bitrate, cropping and processor usage

*          New registration engine. The current registration system has been upgraded, now enabling multiple event registration, an advanced landing page, more customizable areas, and greater control over look and feel

*          SMS poll voting. This allows users to vote on polls using a standard text message.  This feature is aimed at hybrid meetings or other meetings where the webcast is displayed on a projector or LCD, thus giving participants a way to vote interactively without being in front of their own computers

*          Automatic video in PowerPoint support. Videos in PowerPoint presentations will be automatically encoded and streamed during webcasts

*          Slide and Screen broadcast zooming and panning. This allows users to zoom in on slide and screen broadcast content - great for slides with complex graphs and charts

*          Integrated Twitter feed.Participants are able to log in to their Twitter accounts right from the application's module navigator and Tweet about the event or just follow the conversation as it is happening.  The Twitter hashtag is automatically inserted in the participants’ Tweets

These new tools enable the presenter and audience to truly interact live, ensuring that the audience remains engaged with the content.  During a training session, for example, the presenter can send out quick polls every few minutes to test participants’ understanding of the material.  If all poll questions are not answered, a training participant may not receive credit for completing the training.  The new tools are also a great way for participants to contribute to the presentation.  Users can ask questions and respond back to polls about the content which the presenter can react and respond to in real time.  They can also participate in group chats during the session.  

“We’ve worked with our customers for years to pinpoint and develop the ideal features to deliver what they need in a streaming solution,” said Ben Chodor (News - Alert), senior vice president of InterCall Streaming.  “The new InterCall Streaming platform represents this feedback.  We're giving customers an intuitive, interactive and customizable streaming experience with superb video quality.  This is truly the next step in streaming.”