Forum Discussion

pjpatton's avatar
pjpatton
New Contributor
5 years ago

Seamless presenter switching?

My background for a few years was with ReadyTalk, where one overall slide deck was uploaded and the host/organizer just gave each presenter control when it was their turn.

 

Corporate has changed over to GoToWebinar and I've learned that even when I pause my slideshow frame, the attendee viewing experience is interrupted when I switch to another Presenter because the attendees briefly see the default GoToWebinar black text on white screen while "loading" the other Presenter's screen. [We're doing this with the exact same multi-presenter Powerpoint presentation on each of our hard drives.]

 

Is there any way to do a truly seamless Presenter switch? Or must I be the one to advance all the slides (while trying to field and forward questions, etc.) for each presenter and just mute/unmute them at the appropriate times?

 

I don't want to give a presenter control of my mouse and keyboard because I have to do the question stuff and probably help with tech support via Chat. No, I don't have a co-organizer that can handle those duties - we're on a lean budget. But if it's possible for them to just do the slide advance of the presentation on my screen that would be great.

  • Chris Droessler's avatar
    Chris Droessler
    5 years ago

    In those situations, I "organize" the webinar on a separate computer.  That way I can give mouse and keyboard control to the presenters, but still handle the chat, questions, muting, etc. on the other computer.

     

    The second computer can help you to see what the audience sees.

  • Chris Droessler's avatar
    Chris Droessler
    Respected Contributor
    5 years ago

    In those situations, I "organize" the webinar on a separate computer.  That way I can give mouse and keyboard control to the presenters, but still handle the chat, questions, muting, etc. on the other computer.

     

    The second computer can help you to see what the audience sees.

    • pjpatton's avatar
      pjpatton
      New Contributor
      5 years ago

      Hmmm, sounds interesting. So computer (A) would be the organizer who actually starts the webinar (me) and  computer (B) would essentially be a co-organizer who enters the webinar through the link that was emailed to him (also me).

      - Computer B computer shares the presentation slideshow.

      - Computer A starts the broadcast.

      - As the host, I talk during the first few slides as I forward the slides on the B computer and introduce the presenters.

      - Then, on  the B computer I turn keyboard/mouse control over to the first presenter, but don't need to promote him to Presenter? Just unmute him?

      - Meanwhile, back on computer A I handle questions, tech support, yadayada, while the first presenter does his stuff.

      - At the slide introducing the second presenter, I thank the first presenter and on the B computer turn over kbd/mouse control to the second presenter.

      - I continue to do my question stuff on computer A.

      - When we get to the Q&A slide, I take back kbd/mouse control over computer B and unmute both presenters so they can answer questions.

      - At the end of the webinar, I stop the broadcast from the A computer.

       

      That sounds pretty seamless! 

       

      We have two computers near each other in our home office and I currently have my wife enter the webinar as an attendee. That lets her officially ask seed questions given to me by the presenters and have them pop up in the Questions tab. Would I still be able to do this with your two-computer method? Or is there another way to get the questions into the pipeline via computer A?

       

      • Chris Droessler's avatar
        Chris Droessler
        Respected Contributor
        5 years ago

        Best to set up a test session and try it out.

         

        You do have to be on the Presentation computer to assign keyboard/mouse rights to another person.  Only the active presenter can assign that.

         

        I started doing this when I was running GoTo from a conference room that had a built in computer and projector.  No second display on that computer.

        In that case, the room computer controlled the visual and audio for the webinar.  The PowerPoint was on that computer. 

        My laptop computer handled the questions and everything else.

         

        Be careful NOT to use the "mute all" command on your non-presentation computer, as that will mute your presentation computer as well.

         

        GTW Product Idea -- I wish there was a Mute All Attendees button that would just mute the Attendees, not the Panelists or Organizers.