In today’s Zoom review, we’re going beyond the basics to explore the functionality of the entire Zoom platform. After all, though Zoom may still be commonly associated with video meetings and webinars, the company offers so much more than many businesses realise.
The Zoom ecosystem even earned a space as a leader in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for UCaaS at the beginning of 2023, alongside major vendors like Cisco, Microsoft, RingCentral, and 8x8. For years, Zoom has positioned itself as an innovator and market leader in the communications space, committed to unifying teams with simple, yet transformational tools.
However, it wasn’t until the pandemic hit in 2020 that Zoom’s growth really skyrocketed. Within a year, active meeting participants grew by 2,900%, and by 2023, Zoom boasted a massive 12% increase in enterprise customers, demonstrating its growing presence in a range of markets.
So, what exactly does the Zoom platform offer? This comprehensive review will tell business buyers everything they need to know.
Zoom Review: The Zoom One Platform
In 2022, Zoom cemented its position in the UCaaS market with a new packaged platform offering: Zoom One. Promising an intuitive experience capable of unifying teams across multiple platforms, Zoom One is an all-in-one collaboration and communication toolkit.
Pricing for Zoom One is based the number of users in a company, and the features required. Options range all the way from a free plan which supports up to 100 attendees in basic meetings, to various premium options such as:
- Pro: $149.90 per user per year: Includes all the features of Free plus 5GB of cloud storage, and access to essential premium apps for free for 1 year.
- Business: $199.90 per user per year: All the features of Pro plus 300 attendees per meeting, unlimited whiteboards, SSO, managed domains, and more.
- Business Plus: $250 per user per year: All the features of Business plus 10GB of cloud storage, phone access, translated captions and workspace reservations.
- Enterprise: Custom pricing for all the features of Business Plus, as well as up to 1000 attendees per meeting, full-featured PBX phone, and more.
Depending on the plan, the Zoom One solution combines the following features into a comprehensive tech stack for teams:
Zoom Meetings
Zoom Meetings is the iconic HD audio and video meeting platform, designed for internal collaboration. The solution was built for modern teams, allowing staff to join a meeting from any device, using either a link, or an integrated calendar system invoice. There are even dedicated “Zoom for Home” devices available for remote workers.
Zoom Meetings goes above and beyond the basics of video conferencing, with powerful virtual meeting security sessions, such as role-based security, passcode protection and waiting rooms. It also features a number of innovative collaboration tools, such as screen-sharing, co-annotation sessions, virtual whiteboarding, filters, reactions, and polls.
Users can meet and chat at the same time with included messaging, share files, music, and video, and even record meetings which can automatically be converted into searchable transcripts. Some of the other core features of Zoom Meetings include:
- Advanced lighting and appearance touch-up options
- Reactions and emojis
- Advanced background noise suppression
- Virtual backgrounds (with slide sharing options)
- Immersive view for engaging meetings
- Auto-generated reports and notes
Zoom Chat
Integrated with the rest of the Zoom One ecosystem, Zoom chat is the simple messaging solution provided by Zoom. It includes powerful search filters, to help teams find information quickly, message pinning and @mention options, and easy-to-use private and public chat threads.
Zoom Chat supports file and screen sharing, with advanced encryption options, SSO, and multi-factor authentication for security. Admins can also take advantage of granular admin controls to determine how files are stored, and which users can add new contacts. The solution comes with cloud storage support built-in, as well as integrations with options like Google Docs and Dropbox.
Plus, teams can enhance chat sessions with apps and bots, available throughout the Zoom platform. Accessibility features and analytics are also available within the same Zoom interface.
Zoom Phone
An essential part of the Zoom UCaaS toolkit, Zoom Phone (now with 4 million users), is a feature-rich cloud phone system intended for businesses of all sizes. The intuitive VoIP phone system allows teams to make outbound calls, and receive inbound calls in the same unified interface.
Zoom boasts global coverage for its phone technology, and promises exceptional security, with standards based SIP over TLS 1.2, and AES 256-bit calling encryption. Zoom Phone also aligns with various major standards and certifications relevant in a host of industries. Zoom Phone includes all the features you might expect from a leading VoIP solution, such as:
- Mobile and desktop apps
- Call transfer, forwarding, and routing
- Voicemail
- Call blocking
- Call recording
- Call delegation and hold
- Listen, whisper, and barge-in options for supervisors
- Call park
- Presence
- Shared line groups
Companies can choose to either purchase phone packages directly from Zoom, which start at around $120 per year, per user, with included internal and outbound calling, or implement their own carrier into the Zoom system. The BYOC solution is available to access either in the cloud or on-premises, so teams can build their ideal communication strategy from scratch.
Zoom Whiteboard
Part of the overall meeting experience offered by Zoom, Zoom Whiteboard is a digital, scalable whiteboard which allows staff to collaborate however, and whenever they want. Companies can take advantage of interactive, real-time whiteboard collaboration, virtual sticky notes, and convenient sharing tools. Whiteboards can also be saved automatically and shared outside of a meeting.
Advanced whiteboarding tools include custom templates, organizational templates teams can share through the organization, and third-party integrations. Plus, Zoom has a host of recommended partners available to deliver hardware to collaborating companies. Options range from the DTEN D7, to the Neat Board, and Logitech Rally Bar with Touch Display.
Conversation Intelligence
Otherwise known as “IQ for Sales”, the Conversational Intelligence solution offered by Zoom provides direct access to productivity metrics and actionable insights in Zoom Meetings and Phone interactions. The platform transforms raw data from across conversations into visual graphs and dashboards, with AI-enhancements to help guide business decisions.
