How to Integrate Video Calling into a Website

Video conferencing technology is now widely used in practically every field. Thanks to the abundance of video calling software and dedicated platforms, it has become very simple to create video conferences.

Businesses of any scale and educational institutions require video call solutions right now more than ever. However, not every user can put time and effort into downloading and installing certain programs, online classroom software, or registering on video call websites.

If you are a client of a certain company or a parent that wants to talk with a teacher without tinkering with specialized software, you might want to make these solutions even easier. In this case, it is recommended to integrate special video conferencing software on your website.

Why Is It Necessary to Integrate Video Conferencing Solutions?

While programs like Zoom, Skype, and others are very popular and easy to use, it is often much better to embed certain software on your website. Using cloud video calling solutions on your platform is preferable in many cases. Here are some of them:

• Telemedicine –being able to arrange a video call with your doctor is very important. A hospital website must have a convenient feature that allows creating a video conference in a few clicks.
• Studying online – for schools that use video conferencing solutions regularly, it is recommended to have video call features on their websites so students could join classes without installing additional programs and such. It is also more convenient for parents to communicate with professors this way.
• Business websites – if you are a company that wants to create a strong brand name and find reliable customers, it is essential that you host product launches, webinars, conferences, and other events on your website. Your clients need to come to your site rather than to a third-party platform to communicate with you.
• Client support – for sites and applications that offer customer support, it is a great option to offer video chat in addition to other ways of communication like e-mail, chat, phone line, etc. This way, you can connect with clients and solve their issues quicker and more efficiently.
• Event hosts – if your business arranges different online events or offline gatherings that need to be broadcasted on the web, you must provide access to the streams on your web page.

These are a few of the most popular cases when including video calling software on your site is a must. This enhances the customer experience greatly and improves your reputation.

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Ways of Integrating Video Conferencing Features on Your Site

If we are talking about the video call software developed by some other professional team, there are two ways of adding it to your website. You can either take this software and install it on your servers or simply use cloud-based solutions. Here are the two options:

• Using your servers – installing third-party software on your servers might seem more reliable and convenient. However, this decision requires constant technical support from your side. This means that you will need to have not one technician but a dedicated team of developers to tend to your servers. As your business expands, more employees, time, and money will be needed to maintain your software and hardware. This solution is recommended if you want to have full control over the video calling software.
• Using cloud-based software – it is by far the most convenient and, therefore, the most popular solution for integrating video conferencing software. All you need to do is simply embed the software on your site, while the servers are located somewhere else and fully monitored by the company that developed the software. All the technical support, updates, troubleshooting, integration of new solutions, etc. will be done by professionals from the developing company.

The second option will be preferable in case you want to focus on your own business without worrying about the technical side of video conferencing. You still might have your technical issues to tend to with other types of software and equipment, which makes it perfect to delegate a part of responsibilities to another company. Of course, you will need to pay for the video conferencing software and its maintenance, but you will receive more spare time and quality in return. In addition, this is still more cost-effective than dealing with such software on your own.

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Adding Video Conferencing Software to the Website

As soon as you select certain software from a reliable provider, it is relatively simple to integrate it into your website. You will need to use the API of your website to embed the necessary software.

This is not as difficult as developing an application from scratch per se, but you might want one of your technicians to look into it.

If the video conferencing provider offers REST API solutions, you can use them to add diverse video call features to your website.

This is a highly customizable process, which means that you will be able to add only the required features to your platform.

Before starting with the software, decide on the features you want to have. Think of the number of people you will need to host with each call and how you want to communicate with them apart from using the video call itself.

Will there be a screen sharing feature, the possibility to send files, a chat box, etc.? Security measures are also extremely important.

You will need to choose software with reliable security so your clients can feel safe using the video conferencing features on your website.

Overall, working with a video conferencing software company is a smart move. You will receive constant technical assistance and client support. The servers used for hosting your calls will be monitored by this company, which means that you will not have to worry about your site lagging or malfunctioning. There will be a lot of storage space to upload the recording of your streams as well.