Webinar Wire

Bulletproofing Event Audio

Posted by Ken Molay May 8 2008 12:49 AM EST

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I received an email ages ago (Sorry, Michael!) asking if I would write about audio problems in webcasts. Michael said that after several years and hundreds of webcasts, he hasn't found a bulletproof way to ensure audio quality and continuity during an event. More infuriating, he said, was the lack of responsibility and responsiveness he has seen from audio vendors when something does go wrong.

Audio is the lifeblood of a web seminar, and losing a speaker line or disconnecting your audience is one of the worst things that can happen to you during an event. Having a vendor say "the fault wasn't on our network" doesn't help when you have hundreds or thousands of angry audience members who suddenly find themselves without sound.

I don't think it is theoretically possible to guarantee audio continuity. There are too many weird things that can go wrong. Presenters can lose their connection in a power outage, a local line break, or tripping over a phone cord. I have taken to dialing in to the presenter line on two separate phones. My personal office setup allows me to have one traditional "phone company" line and another phone carried over the cable company's system. They are separate and distinct carrier circuits and a failure in one would still let me speak on the other. That's an unusual configuration, but you might try the same thing by dialing in on a cell phone as an emergency backup (although you would need a full battery charge ahead of time!). At the least, you could program the dial-in number on your cell phone so you just have to hit "Send" in the event of an interruption on your normal line.

But that only solves one piece of the puzzle. I reached out to Christopher Dean at KRM Information Services to get his thoughts on the subject, as KRM manages many paid-admission events and I know they run their own telephone bridge and operator assistance for each event.

Chris said that KRM started out the same way most companies do... buying audio conferencing from a major provider. They found a variety of human errors could easily creep in when the audio provider managed the conference. Audio calls were sometimes mis-scheduled, wrong access numbers went out to the audience, events were disconnected early, and so on.

They went through five teleconferencing companies (including one major event disconnect that cost them $50,000 in refunds and client recovery efforts) before giving up and deciding to run things themselves.

Chris pointed out several technical things you can ask about when interviewing a teleconferencing provider. These can help to minimize the probability of a technical failure cancelling your event:

1) Are all systems certified as carrier-class, with redundant power supplies, controllers, etc?

2) Do signal conduits in and out of the provider's facility have redundant circuits, preferrably optical fiber? Redundant paths should carry the traffic in parallel with the main circuit, rather than needing a physical switchover in a failure situation.

3) Is the data center and switching facility fully power protected, with generators, batteries, and capacitors to allow no-break continuity in a power failure?

But even with these assurances, things can still go wrong that truly are out of the carrier's physical control. That's when service becomes the key differentiator. It costs more, but if you want to minimize the impact of unexpected problems, you need live dedicated event managers listening to the event and taking personal responsibility for its success.

You can't get this with an automated "reservationless" conference call. You need someone paying attention and ready to step in with instructions to the audience if the speaker drops off. Someone who has the authority and the technical ability to switch circuits or fix audio problems as they occur. And most importantly, someone who treats your call as a personal priority.

No technology has a zero failure guarantee. Ships sink, planes crash, and nuclear reactors melt down. But you can reduce the chances for - and the impacts of - audio problems by ensuring redundancy everywhere you can think of, by cross-checking and verifying all event information, and by managing your call with a live operator taking responsibility for its success.