Unibuddy vs Webinar software

As we’ve transitioned online, all of us are getting used to online meeting and webinar software like Google Meet, Zoom and Skype. These tools are great for hosting meetings, catching up with friends and even running certain types of webinar. 

But our virtual events platform, Unibuddy Live, is different. It’s been tailor-made for the Higher Education sector to help you attract, convert and stay connected with your students throughout their journey. 

Here are some of the key differences between our product, and other meeting and webinar tools. 

Built for Higher Education

Unibuddy Live was tailor-made for colleges and universities. If you’re hosting virtual Open House, Admitted Student Days, Orientation Week or even just a drop-in session – you don’t need to find a way to make it work for your school, it just works. 

Everything is expressly designed for students and schools. From the customisable sign-up form, to the administration dashboards where you can create events, to the post-event reports. 

Secure

We’ve all seen the headlines about unauthorised access to webinar software. Unibuddy Live gives you full control over who can chat and who can broadcast. You decide who can livestream and you set the times that they can. There’s no secret pins or private URLs that can get out by mistake – only an approved account is able to stream video. 

And for your attendees – you, your staff, or your student ambassadors have the ability to instantly block or remove any attendee. They won’t be able to rejoin your event, and you can instantly remove their messages. It gives you peace of mind and full control over the event you’re running. 

Chat and video-based

Webinar and meeting software are both optimised for video, rather than chat. But we know that for Gen Z, chat is a natural communication tool. It means if you’re hosting a webinar for a group of students, it can sometimes be hard to keep up with all the messages they are sending. 

Unibuddy Live is optimised for chat and video, which can be used in tandem. Your students can chat with each other, with moderators and with you all while you broadcast. If you’re not broadcasting, or before and after your webinar, those text-based chats stay open so the conversation doesn’t have to end. This means that Unibuddy Live events are much more than a webinar – they are an engaging chat experience. 

Current students, staff, prospective students and you!

Webinars are a one-to-many broadcast tool, and often everyone has quite a defined role: you’re a viewer, or you’re a presenter. And meetings, everyone has the same role and the same ability to unmute their microphone and start talking, which can cause chaos. 

Being built for Higher Education means that Unibuddy Live recognises the very different roles everybody plays during a virtual event. That’s why your attendees can be prospective students, current students, staff, or university moderators. Each role is clearly marked during the event, so everyone knows who they are talking to – and you can control who has access to which channels and direct messaging. 

Insights

Understanding your students is vital for communicating with them effectively – which is why we built a powerful Machine Learning algorithm directly into the product and included as standard as part of Unibuddy Live. It automatically generates insights into what students are talking about, so you can see exactly what their concerns are and when. It’s built into the dashboard and provides insights for you based on all of the conversations that have happened across the Unibuddy platform – whether that’s 10 chats or 10,000. 

After every Unibuddy Live event, you can easily access data about participation, and of course all the leads you generated including their course of interest and country of origin. Most webinar software will give you a post-event report, but Unibuddy’s is built for HE providers. 

Engagement beyond the event 

Right now, more than ever, it’s important to stay connected with students throughout their student journey – and defined touchpoints aren’t enough. Unibuddy Live includes the main Unibuddy platform, which lets your prospective students chat with current students and staff at a time that suits them. The interaction doesn’t have to end when the webinar does – using the same profiles and sign-up details, attendees can send messages to all participants and keep the conversation going.