How to host webinars without Zoom? [Best zoom alternative]

If you’re an online educator, actively coaching digitally in 2024, you know how important it is to connect with your audience in real time. And, one of the best ways to do that is through live interactions enabled by online webinars.

Zoom, is one of the most popular tools, which has predominantly acquired the online live interaction space. However, there are a lot of drawbacks to using Zoom as a webinar service.

In this blog post, we’ll uncover the most common challenges creators come across while using Zoom and discuss if there are any alternatives to Zoom, in the online live interaction space.

Let’s go!

What are webinars?

Webinars are virtual, interactive seminars or workshops conducted over the internet, where a creator presents content to an audience in real time.

Platforms like Zoom have become popular tools for hosting webinars, allowing them to connect with students and followers from anywhere in the world.

During these live sessions, creators can teach specific topics, share their screens to demonstrate concepts, engage with participants through chat features, and answer questions in real-time. This format combines the intimacy of a classroom setting with the convenience and reach of digital platforms. Creators often use webinars to deliver in-depth content, launch courses, showcase expertise, or provide valuable insights to their community.

Why is Zoom popularly used for hosting webinars?

Zoom’s widespread adoption is attributed to several factors, let’s discuss them one by one.

First, its user-friendly interface makes it accessible to both hosts and participants, regardless of their technical expertise. This ease of use ensures that presenters can focus on delivering their content without being bogged down by complicated software, while attendees can join sessions effortlessly from various devices.
Zoom’s reliability and robust infrastructure have earned it a reputation for stability, even when handling large audiences. This dependability is crucial for businesses and educators who need to deliver seamless presentations without worrying about technical glitches or connection issues.
The platform’s ability to scale from small team meetings to large-scale webinars with hundreds or even thousands of participants has made it versatile enough to meet the needs of organizations of all sizes, from small startups to multinational corporations.
Zoom’s integration capabilities with other popular tools and its continuous feature updates have helped it maintain its position as a leading solution in the virtual communication space, adapting to the evolving needs of its users in an increasingly digital world.

What are the disadvantages of using Zoom?

While Zoom is the first and most popular choice of an average internet user, it doesn’t come without any drawbacks. Let’s understand some of the common reasons a lot of people are frustrated with Zoom:

One of the primary concerns is security, as Zoom has faced scrutiny over “Zoombombing” incidents, where uninvited participants disrupt meetings.

What is Zoombombing?
Zoombombing is when uninvited people join a Zoom meeting or webinar and cause disruption. This can happen when meeting links are shared publicly or when security settings are weak.

It interrupts the flow of calls and can derail the meeting, causing confusion and wasting time. People who zoombomb often share offensive images, sounds, or messages, which can be distressing for participants. It may also reveal any sensitive information discussed in the meeting. For businesses, Zoombombing incidents can harm their professional image.
Cost can be another significant disadvantage, especially for small businesses or individual content creators, as Zoom’s more advanced features and larger participant allowances come with premium price tags which often are unaffordable for small-scaled creators.
Zoom’s limited customization options for branding and user experience can be restrictive for businesses looking to create a more personalized environment for their webinars. The platform’s recording and storage limitations in its basic plans may force users to upgrade or seek external solutions for content management.
While Zoom offers various integrations, some users find it doesn’t seamlessly connect with all the tools in their existing workflow, potentially complicating their webinar preparation and follow-up processes.

Is there any other alternative to Zoom?

There are a lot of notable alternatives to Zoom which are widely used by people across the globe. Let’s discuss each of these alternatives one by one:

Google Meet:
The first to make it to this list is Google Meet. Google Meet has gained traction for its seamless integration with Google Workspace. People appreciate its simplicity and the fact that it’s often included in their existing Google subscriptions. Many report that it’s less taxing on system resources compared to Zoom.

This easy, smooth, and seamless experience provided by Google Meet, makes it a popular choice.
Microsoft Teams:
Microsoft Teams is favored in corporate environments, especially those already using Office 365. Its robust collaboration features and tight integration with other Microsoft products make it a go-to choice for many businesses. Users often praise its all-in-one approach to communication and project management.

How can you host Zoom-like webinars without using Zoom?

Zoom is undoubtedly an expensive service, and we have established by now all its advantages and disadvantages. There are many alternatives you can use to host live sessions online, but what is the cheapest, most economical, yet the most efficient way?

In this section, we’ll discuss the most economical and efficient way to host live sessions and webinars – on Fermion.

Live streaming on Fermion is very simple once you understand how it works. Let’s take a deep look into how you can easily host webinars within your Fermion instructor account.

(P.S. Get started for free on Fermion by scheduling a free demo with me here: https://sales.fermion.app/demo-call)

Step 1 – Create a live session

Inside your course, you should be able to click on “Live sessions” on the left and “Add a new session”

Step 2 – Fill out metadata for your stream

You can set the title and description for your stream. It will be visible to your users when they’re watching your stream. Include any helpful information or links here.

You can also schedule when you plan to go live and how long the session will be for.

Note:

This is just a hint to your end users, you can go live any time before or after your set time.
Fermion automatically sends email reminders to your students 30 minutes, 6 hours, and 24 hours before your stream starts. Therefore, please try to start the stream roughly around the same time you specified in the live stream setup, otherwise your students may get confused

Step 3 – Publish the stream

Note that in order for the class to be visible to your users, you have to publish the live stream class. This will not start the live stream yet. It just makes it visible to your end users.

Once you press the Publish button, here’s how it will start looking on the user side:

Step 4 – Enter the live studio

When the time is right, you can enter the live studio to start streaming.

Please note that when you enter the live studio, you will have 30 minutes to start the streaming process. Please start your streaming within 30 minutes otherwise your stream will be marked as completed.

Once started, you can keep streaming for any number of hours. When you enter the live studio, you will be shown this confirmation warning:

Click on Proceed only if you want to go live within the next 30 minutes.

Step 5 – Setup OBS

Download OBS software if you haven’t downloaded it already. You can download OBS from here: https://obsproject.com/download.

Once you’re inside the studio, wait for Download OBS Profile button to be enabled. Initially, the state would be like this:

Wait for the state to become like this:

When you click on Download OBS Profile button, a ZIP file will be downloaded. Extract it into a folder. This folder must have 3 configuration files.

Now you have to import this folder into OBS. In this case fermion-14-Jul-2024-11-46-AM folder.

Select the folder you just extracted from the ZIP file that contains those 3 config files.

Now click on the Profile again, and make sure to change the profile to the folder you just imported. This is important as OBS does not auto-select the profile you just imported. Without this, your setup won’t work. Here’s how to do it:

Once you’re done selecting the profile. Click on Start Streaming inside OBS to go live on Fermion. Make sure not to change any OBS streaming system settings from this point onwards (i.e. bitrate, video quality, keyframe, etc. – do not modify them).

You can use every other effect inside OBS normally.

It should start streaming on Fermion. It should change the status as follows:

Whenever you’re done, click on the “End Live Stream” button to close your live stream.

What can you do with webinars inside Fermion?

Stream to thousands of students at once
Fermion lets you broadcast to thousands of students at once, without any lag, buffering, or streaming issues. It provides a buttery-smooth experience exactly like Youtube Live Streaming.

Add polls inside your stream
Click on Start a Poll button while you’re inside your live stream to start a new poll.

This is how the poll interface would look like once you click the Start a Poll button.

Monitor your stream analytics easily
Once your stream is ended, you should be able to see a View Stats button in front of your live stream. It should look something like this:

Once you click on the View Stats button, you will be able to see all the statistics inside of your live stream.

Here’s an example of how stream analytics will look like:

Additionally, you will also be able to see granular student-level details. For example:

My two cents

Zoom is a great platform to host webinars if you can afford the platform. However, the increasing cost of Zoom subscriptions has made it difficult for budding creators to purchase the platform right away.

If you’re an online creator, you should not only find a platform that suits your budget but also consider your custom requests and personalized experiences that you’d like to implement for your audience. Luckily, Fermion does that job for you.

Schedule a free demo with me here