Zoom Workplace

What differentiates Zoom Workplace from other similar products?

I don't have anything to add here. There is convenience to using the same service for VOIP and Video Conferencing though.

What is your favorite aspect of this product?

The ability to easily offer Voice or Video Conferencing

What do you dislike most about this product?

The contracts and confusing nature of the billable services such as phone number registrations.

What recommendations would you give to someone considering this product?

Ask a lot of questions when negotiating contract terms, and look out for term changes at renewal. After years we negotiated a month to month so that we could be more flexible as a small business and we were locked into a new annual term with autom renewal at the next renewal year despite the month to month relationship that had been previously negotiated.

What differentiates Zoom Workplace from other similar products?

i used to pay for otter. ai to record my meetings and there's a 3rd party app you can use, the zoom ai companion does it now as part of my paid plan at no additional charge. that is a massive differentiator. google meet has some captioning, sure, but the way that zoom’s recap email summarizes the meeting and straight-up emails a coherent recap with action items is on another level. it separates it out from teams because i don't need a full on enterprise heavy license to get at all the good ai features; you can do this even with some of their smaller business plans.

What is your favorite aspect of this product?

the reports of the meetings are also eerily on point. i like that i can be late to the meeting and ask the ai “what did i miss?” and it brings me up to speed privately. I can now concentrate on the conversation and not madly take notes. another thing i like is the light adjustment. i work in a custom dimly lit room, and zoom is able to brighten my video up such that i look professional without spending more money on ring lights. the elimination of background noise is magic too; my dog barks and no one hears it.

What do you dislike most about this product?

support can be extremely difficult to get through if you have a billing problem. you’re mostly left with a chatbot that bounces you around before connecting you to a human. i also hate how quickly the cloud recording storage gets full on the lower plans.

What recommendations would you give to someone considering this product?

if you don’t like taking meeting notes, you should switch over to this. the ai features are a massive productivity boost and save hours of admin work per week. it’s perfect for the project manager or team lead that needs to log everything.

What differentiates Zoom Workplace from other similar products?

i have experimented with microsoft teams and google meet for client calls, but i always return to zoom. the biggest is for me is that of stability. with other services i constantly struggle with lagging audio or a pixelated video when my internet is working well. zoom appears to efficiently transmit much less data. also, the noise cancelation on zoom is better than those others, which is huge when i am trying to work from a noisy cafe. it just feels more professional and dependable for outside meetings where impressions count in the first ten seconds.

What is your favorite aspect of this product?

the quality of the sound and video is always good, which I value most of all. I very much so enjoy the new ai companion mechanics that have recently been put into place. having the summary of a meeting emailed to me so that I don’t have to take any notes saves me what seems like hours. i am a heavy user also of the whiteboard function during creative brainstorming with my team. it's so simple to use and everyone can get involved in the moment. the interface is clean and not overwhelming, with easy accesses to settings like background blur (or audio input) without diving through menus.

What do you dislike most about this product?

the updates can be heavy handed sometimes. every time i go to open my app now so that i can join a rush meeting it wants me to install some new update the only thing is after a while that can get annoying. also free plan cut off at 40 minutes is a super annoying when there's a good conversation going.

What recommendations would you give to someone considering this product?

well if you are looking for a tool mainly for client visits and that too outside, then no doubt this is the best. guests can join without signing up it is more difficult for guests to join than users. reliability alone it’s worth the subscription fee if you’re making high-stakes calls.