It is so easy to make a conference call that many companies are now using this method to bring clients and team members together. In addition to simply using the telephone to talk to four or five people at once, you can also use web conferencing online to deliver presentations to large groups of people without having to pay for expensive travel. To make a conference call, you can, of course use the telephone and a toll free number to be able to speak and listen to several participants. What many people do not know is that you can also use the services of your Internet provider to achieve the same goal.

You do need the names and email addresses of the participants you need for the conference call and you do have to notify them of the time and date of the call. Choose Tools from your message browser and then the names of those whom you want to conference with. Then you click create conference from the drop down menu and type in the subject of this call. Then you simply click start to make the conference call. When you want to end the conference, you click on the telephone icon. You will be asked whether or not you really do want to end the conference, just to make sure that you didnt accidentally click the wrong button.

Making a conference call involves just as much planning as calling a regular meeting. You still have to set an agenda for the meeting, which you can email to all participants beforehand. You should also create a time frame for the length of the meeting because as with all meetings discussions among the participants can take up a longer period of time than you intended. When participants know the time frame and the topic of the conference call, they come prepared and will know which pertinent questions they want to ask. It will also allow for feedback, just in case there is something you may have forgotten.

You can place conference calls within your local area or all over the globe. When you have an international conference, it is very important that you remind the participants of the country codes. For your first conferencing session or for all of them, you might want to have an operator to help you out. This person will preside over the conference and remind participants to abide by time constraints. The operator can also handle such services as recording and polling, if you need them. The first time you make a conference call may be a little tricky, but this will only show you how easy it is and you will come to rely on this feature as part of your business practices.