Today kicks off Zoomtopia, Zoom’s annual conference geared toward communication, collaboration, the future of work, and those hoping to learn more about the platform. There are roughly 90 sessions planned across the two-day event, with a few forums attendees should be on the lookout for. Starting with this year’s keynote address, Zoom Founder and CEO, Eric S. Yuan, will deliver the company’s vision for the future and discuss the whirlwind year that catapulted Zoom into a powerhouse, along with changed the way most people in the world operate when it comes to the workplace and personal communication.
The whole experience – you guessed it, powered by the Zoom platform. Another session I’d like to highlight, “How IT Leaders Can Stay Flexible and Agile During Impending Change. “Last night during a press briefing for the collaboration giant’s first-ever virtual Zoomtopia – I learned that there are over 50,000 people set to attend the virtual event. And they can expect some significant announcements from Zoom set to further transform the tool into a household name.
Aleks Swerdlow, Product Management, Zoom Video Communications, said the company plans to launch a new kind of marketplace of what she calls ‘immersive experiences set to simplify how you deliver virtual events.” According to her, Zoom’s latest should also change how customers reach new audiences and engage with customers.
Introducing OnZoom – set for international arrival in 2021, a spokesperson for Zoom said it already has several partners signed on for the platform which makes its debut in North America today. According to Swerdlow, OnZoom is an extension of Zoom’s unified communications platform. In a statement, she added:
“OnZoom is a comprehensive solution for paid Zoom users who want to create, host, and monetize events using the Zoom Meetings platform”
Zoom says it will not take a cut of revenue earned by hosts, at least for now. That will be the case through the end of the year, but in 2021, Zoom plans to decide on if it will charge a platform fee and what that percentage should be. The company plans to integrate with various payment processing platforms, including Shopify and Square.
Event hosts can create events for up to 1,000 attendees depending on their Zoom Meeting license. They can also list and sell tickets along with share and promote public events. If Zoom customers want to host larger events, they can turn the session into a live stream. Zoom clarified this last night during a pre-briefing for the press, noting there’s even a public directory of events. Payment is secure via the platform, with a Zoom spokesperson telling UC Today in a statement:
“Attendees can pay for events via PayPal and major credit cards, along with buy and gift OnZoom tickets”
Zoom is also set to introduce Zapps. These are apps on Zoom, and a new offering that will enable third-party developers to create as well as distribute apps that enhance the Zoom meeting experience/workflow with the express goal of increasing productivity before, during, and after meetings. First set to make their way to the Zoom platform by the end of 2020, Zapps will become open to developers shortly thereafter. So far, Zapps has over 35 launch partners, including Asana, Atlassian, Box, Dropbox, Hubspot, Kahoot, Kaltura, Salesforce, ServiceNow, Slack, SurveyMonkey, Unsplash, and Zendesk.
See our full report on all that was announced at Zoomtopia 2020
