How to have remote appointments

Water Cooler
#1

So you all are familiar with my story by now. I’m trying to build a financial services practice where I charge both a “financial planning” fee and an AUM fee (as well as charging for tax compliance, too). Nothing new.

I’m trying to figure out how to have a “remote appointment” with somebody. EG - I live in West Texas and they live in Houston, some 550 miles away. I’m obviously not meeting them at my office. So how do you meet remotely?

I’ve seen other people use Gotomeeting. And I’ve heard of Zoom, but never used it. If you had to have a meeting with someboy a million miles away, how would you do it? Feel free to give details, such as “it’s important to have a webcam that shows your face, so they can see you” or…whatever you’ve seen that works.

Any advice is appreciated. Tank.

edit - I forgot about Skype and Google Hangouts.

#2

Skype

#3

GoToMeeting or Skype.

The latter’s free; the former’s not.

#4

Somebo d y,riiiiiiiiiight??? :stuck_out_tongue: :wink:

#5

Zoom is good

#6

What do these things offer? Just a basic screen share? Because I can use glance.net for just a screen share.

Is there a way where you can “doodle” on your screen, John Madden-style? Because when I have face-to-face meeting, I like to use a dry-erase board a lot.

#7

i used skype a long time ago. but whats wrong with facetime?

#8

Do you also offer cam services?

#9

AOL?

#10

Add a second camera and a video mixer to switch between them real time

#11

I use Skype for these types of meetings. I would just send a pdf of documents to the client before the meeting so that they have any information / doc needed to review.

#12

Skype isn’t the best but probably the easiest. Webex feels cleaner but I think it may be pricey.

#13

There’s this new invention called the SPEAKING TELEGRAPH. You should look into it :+1:

#14

If you have a touch pen, I am sure you can “doodle” on many programs like Acrobat or something.

#15

How many clients do you have that need to do the remote appointments? How many appointments per quarter, per year?

#16

^Right now, none.

But when I do get somebody who’s 300 miles away and they want an “appointment”, I don’t want to be scrambling to try and figure this stuff out.

And I don’t have a webcam–at least not yet. I can get one, but I don’t know if that’s beneficial or not. I kinda like seeing the other person, but I’m not quite as good looking as most AF-ers.

So like I said, with Glance, I have a basic screen-share with up to 5 people and a teleconferencing line. I don’t know what else there is, and whether or not any of it is worth paying for.

#17

Ok fair enough.

I have a web cam on my laptop that I use for skype meetings in my office. We also have one set up in the boardroom connected to the flat screen if were hosting more than one person for the meeting.

For now, you could just get yourself a webcam and hook it up to your computer and test it to make sure your familiar with how to use it etc. - so when you actually have to use it your good to go. I would suggest just use the existing tools you have (Glance, Skype once signed up) to see how it goes, before just going out and spending money, but that’s just me.

#18

Your business is getting disintermediated by robo-advisors, etc. But for now many people still like having a human being look after their wealth and give them advice. For this they will pay you a fee on assets, service fees, and transaction fees. Is it too much for them to expect a face-to-face? That personal touch has a chance of cementing your relationship and holding off the robo-hordes. Chunk your meetings together into a few days and just go see them.

#19

^ ya I would agree if he had say a have dozen clients in Houston you could book three meetings a day for a couple days then just fly back.

#20

Its going to be interesting to see what happens when the markets tank at some point and all the investors who are using a robo-platform are going to have no one to call, and have no idea what to do.