Deliver a Zoom Webinar

Important!

UTS has a limited number of webinar licenses. These licences may incur a cost for your faculty so please read through the information on this page to make sure a webinar is the format you want before requesting a license.

Things to consider

Zoom Webinars are very different to Zoom meetings in the way they are set up, scheduled, and customised. They also offer a completely different experience for the participants and the hosts. Before you decide to run a Zoom Webinar, you need to consider the points below.

The number of attendees

Zoom Webinars are designed for events with a large number of expected attendees. Because of this, they are significantly more complex for hosts to run and therefore require multiple co-hosts to assist in the set-up and operation of the webinar.

The cost – free or billed monthly?

Every staff member and student at UTS is given an ‘On Prem’ license. This allows them to run meetings with up to 300 attendees, and for an unlimited duration. There is also a limited number of additional large meeting licenses, which can increase the number of allowed participants in a standard Zoom Meeting up to 500. A limited number of Webinar licenses which enable up to 100 or up to 500 participants are available to UTS staff.

Zoom provides webinar licences which allow for up to 1000 or up to 3000 participants. Upon approval, faculties will be billed monthly for each of these licences that are granted to them.

Find out more…

For complete costings, refer to the AVS webinar policies.

Participation or attendance?

Zoom Webinar is largely a one-way experience. The most your attendees can do is ask a question via chat message. So as a host, you will need an assistant to answer those questions for you.

If your event does not require participation – it is, for example, a demonstration, then you may request a Zoom Webinar, keeping in mind this will likely be the same as watching a recording.

If you require any interaction with or between attendees, then Webinars are not appropriate. If you are expecting attendance to be more than 300 and would like to interact with your participants during your session, consider splitting the attendance over 2 or more Zoom meetings instead.

You don’t get a break

A Webinar is you talking the whole time. This is tiring for you and your audience. Unless you have another speaker to take turns with you, or you are channelling Tony Robbins, you may not want to be the centre of attention.

Integrate online active learning principles

A ‘Personal learning experience’ and ‘Digital partners for learning’ are two cornerstones of the UTS 2027 strategic initiatives. The Webinar format may not align well with these initiatives. Students with a strong sense of autonomous learning will survive your Webinar, but they would miss out on the opportunity to interact by participating in your online session through active dialogue.

An application is required

You will need to complete an application process to host a Zoom Webinar. After the online application, your request will be reviewed and you may be required to have a consultation with a Learning Design and Technology Specialist from the LX.lab.

Enable automatic captioning

The Live Transcription feature in Zoom is available for Zoom Webinars. Refer to the Zoom Live Transcription (automated captioning) resource for more information on how to enable this feature.

Need help?

If you require more help with setting up your Zoom Webinar, you can get in touch with AVS the following ways:

• Log a ticket via ServiceConnect
• Phone 9514 2538 for AV Support

Zoom webinars vs meetings

Applying for a webinar license

If you have reviewed the above information and have decided that Zoom webinars are suitable for your needs, follow the below steps to apply for a license to host a Zoom webinar.

Go to ServiceConnect and select ‘Requests’.

Select ‘AVS Service request’.

Select ‘Zoom Webinar’.

Complete the form on this page which states:

All UTS Staff and Students have free access to the Zoom Meetings software, which has a capacity of 200 attendees. For access to the Zoom Webinar Software, which has a capacity of up to 500 attendees, please complete this form

Complete these steps:

• ‘Have you used Zoom before?’ – answer ‘yes’ or ‘no’ (if you answer ‘no’ to this question, you may not be ready for a Webinar license)
• ‘Who will be hosting the Webinar?’ – write the name of the UTS staff member who will be responsible for hosting the Webinar.

If you’re absolutely certain that nothing but Zoom Webinar will do for you, click to ‘Submit Catalogue Request’.

Once you have been given access to a Zoom webinar license, you can schedule and manage your webinar in the ‘Webinars’ section of your UTS Zoom account menu. Find more information and follow the instructions on the Zoom webinar help pages. 

Find out more…

The following pages are particularly useful for setting up and managing your webinar:

• Scheduling a webinar without registration allows attendees to join your webinar without signing up in advance. Attendees will still need to enter their name and email address when they enter the webinar.
• Scheduling a webinar with registration allows you to collect attendees’ names and email addresses in advance. All attendees will need to submit a form before the webinar is due to start. You can also choose to manually approve attendees.
• Getting started with webinar including inviting attendees, and starting your webinar.
• Managing participants in a webinar including designating a co-host or panellist, chat controls, and removing participants.
• Webinar chat allows your webinar attendees to communicate with you and eachother.
• Polling and Q&A features for attendees to ask and answer questions during your webinar.
• Webinar reporting allows you to generate reports on attendance, attendees, polling, and Q&A after your webinar has ended.