When using EventPilot's Zoom integration, emails with personalized links for your speakers can be sent via email. Speakers must access these links using a computer and, ideally, they should have the Zoom app installed.
You can disable virtual session related emails from ATIV Software from Add Ons > Virtual Sessions > Setup. Toggle OFF "Send Emails to Speakers (does not affect Zoom email settings)." If you have toggled this OFF, the emails from ATIV as described in this article will not apply. Important: As the name implies, Zoom may still send emails to your speakers, depending on your Zoom account's settings.
Please review this video that explains Zoom integration with EventPilot before reading further.
Please inform your speakers in advance to expect an email from alerts@ativsoftware.com a few days before their session with details about their virtual session. Your speakers must add this email address to their address book to avoid issues receiving the email.
You can use the following template. Important: Ensure to review any links in this template. As some links go to 3rd party sites such as Zoom support, they may have changed without our notice.
We will be using Zoom as our video conferencing tool for live sessions. As a speaker at our event, you will receive an email with your personalized link to join the virtual session. This email will be sent about 2-3 days before your session. Ensure to add the email address alerts@ativsoftware.com to your contacts / address book in your email program in order to avoid having it blocked or possibly routed to your spam folder. If the organizer has set up your particular session as a Zoom Webinar, you will receive a second email directly from Zoom with your personalized join link. You can use either one of the two emails to join. All emails contain the session title, so if you are presenting in multiple sessions, you know exactly which link to use.
The following information will help you prepare for your session:
- Check your computer by joining this test meeting from Zoom http://zoom.us/test. You can test your audio and video. Try out the buttons you see - not all features may be enabled in this test.
- Learn how to share your screen.
- Your organizer may set up your particular session either as a Zoom Meeting or as a Zoom Webinar. Understand the differences between the two by clicking here. Features you can generally expect are video, audio, screen sharing, and chat. For Webinars, most organizers also offer Zoom's Q&A feature.
- If you are a moderator of a Zoom Meeting, you may receive a host key so you can claim the host role and control the meeting including recording or muting participants. Learn how to claim host.
- You want to look professional? Review these tips and tricks for presenting online.
For additional details and FAQ, review the Knowledge Base in advance of the conference.
Quick Summary
NOTE: This article is written assuming that the parent session is tagged with the virtual keyword. In this case, the parent session becomes the Zoom event (either Webinar or Meeting, based on the keyword). If you are tagging sub-sessions themselves, then consider those to act like parent sessions as described in this article.
Zoom Webinars
All associated speakers receive an email from Zoom and an email from ATIV with their panelist link
Zoom Meetings
Speakers associated to the parent level receive an email from ATIV with early entry and the Host key.
Speakers associated to the sub-session (presentation) level: Email from ATIV with early entry. No host key.
Zoom Meetings
When the EventPilot Content Management System (CMS) creates the Zoom Meeting, the CMS sends an email to all speakers that are associated to the tagged session and its non-tagged sub-sessions. As a reminder, the system generates events in Zoom at most 3 days prior to the session. For example, if today is Monday and you toggle generation ON, sessions through midnight of Thursday (that are properly tagged with a keyword in Filter 4) will be turned into a Zoom event.
After this generation completes, EventPilot automatically turns the toggle back OFF. This allows you to make edits to sessions 4+ days out without impacting the Zoom events. Each day, toggle the generation ON from the CMS > Add Ons > Virtual Sessions to generate new Zoom events.
When the virtual event is generated (i.e. when the session is in set up in Zoom), the CMS sends one email to all speakers associated to the tagged session and its non-tagged sub-sessions (presentation level). This email contains the details for joining the Zoom Meeting.
Speakers associated to the session that is tagged (typically the parent level) also receive the host key and a link to instructions on how to claim the host role. This first person who claims host can then promote the other speakers in the session as co-hosts if they need to share their screen. We recommend the session chair or organization staff to be set up as speakers on the parent level to claim the host role.
If the same speaker is associated to the non-tagged sub-session (presentation level) and also to the tagged session (typically parent level), the speaker will only receive ONE single email - the one for the tagged session with the host key. If you only added speakers to the non-tagged sub-session (presentation level) and no speaker to the tagged parent session, nobody will receive a host key. If emails were already sent out in such a case and you realize after generation that you needed to add someone to the tagged session (typically parent level), even if it's an existing sub-session speaker, you can still do that after the fact. The system will recognize that the tagged session has changed and the next time you toggle Generate Virtual Sessions to ON, the newly added speakers will receive the email with the host key included.
Your speakers will the see the email to be received from:
From: ATIV Software <alerts@ativsoftware.com>
Subject: Your Session <date>: <title>
The email also contains an option to see the start time in the user's timezone, as well as details how to test audio and video. It asks the speaker to confirm that they completed the test. This is not a requirement but gives you, as the organizer, a good idea, which speakers are reading the emails and are prepared.
Note: If you are using CTI or ScholarOne as your Abstract Management Vendor, it is not possible to assign a speaker to the parent level via those systems. All speakers can only be listed in sub-session presentations. In this case, your Project Manager at ATIV can provide you with a Google Sheet with two columns: One for Session IDs and one for Speaker IDs. Fill in the session IDs for the sessions you want to set up as Zoom Meetings (tagged with keyword Virtual) and the Speaker ID (or multiple IDs separated with a comma) for the speakers you want to add to the parent level so they receive the host key. The Project Manager can then associate those speakers to the sessions on the parent level. The Speaker IDs you add this way must be speakers already in the speaker table in the CMS. You cannot link to Speaker IDs that are not in the data.
Example Email for a speaker on the tagged session level since the HOST KEY is included. Speakers associated to non-tagged sub-sessions receive the same email but WITHOUT the host key.
Zoom Webinars
For Zoom Webinars, all speakers associated to the tagged session (generally parent session) or its sub-sessions (presentation level) typically receive two emails: one from ATIV and one from Zoom. They only need one of these as both contain the panelist link. The Zoom email is a great backup and we recommend having your Zoom settings set up so that Zoom sends an additional reminder email 1 hour before the webinar.
Webinar Email from ATIV
When the EventPilot CMS creates the Zoom Webinar (see timing above in the Zoom Meetings section), the CMS sends an email to all speakers that are associated to either the tagged parent and non-tagged sub-sessions. All these speakers are set up as panelists in the Zoom Webinar.
Your speakers will the see the email to be received from:
From: ATIV Software <alerts@ativsoftware.com>
Subject: Your Webinar <date>: <title>
The email contains session details, an option to see the start time in the user's timezone, a countdown/timer link, as well as details how to test audio and video. It asks the panelist to confirm that they completed the test which is not required fro them to - it simply helps you to understand which speakers read your emails and are prepared with the Zoom client on their computer.
Example
Webinar Email from Zoom
Upon Webinar creation, Zoom sends a specific email to all panelists listed in the webinar.
Your speakers will the see the email to be received from:
From: Name <no-reply@zoom.us>
Reply to: the email associated to the zoom license under which the webinar is generated
Subject: Panelist for <Session title>
Notice the Reply to: field - whichever email addresses you used to set up your Zoom licenses will appear.
The email contains the personalized URL the panelist must use to enter the Webinar as a panelist.
If the panelist accesses the Webinar as a participant, the host can promote the participant to the panelist role. Please check Zoom Support on the current maximum number of panelists per webinar.
Use the Zoom Support instructions to customize email templates from Zoom.
Speaker Confirmations
Both the session speaker and the webinar panelist emails from EventPilot ask for confirmation.
In the Sessions tab in the CMS > Add Ons > Virtual Sessions, you can see which speakers have confirmed for which session and resend invitations.
Do attendees receive emails?
Attendees do not receive emails from ATIV or Zoom about meetings or webinars. Attendees join the Zoom sessions via the Online Planner or the native apps. The session detail view in the Planner and in the native apps contains the JOIN link for attendees. It becomes available a few minutes before the official session start.