As you know, globalization has drastically changed the way we communicate today.
Virtual meetings have now become a norm in workplaces, and many rely on video communication to conduct their businesses.
BlueJeans, WebinarJam, and Zoom are some of the best video conference apps that allow you to arrange team meetings, webinars, and presentations.
All three are popular tools and offer nearly the same products, but there’re some areas where they have an advantage over others.
If you rely heavily on virtual meetings, this guide will help you decide the ideal video conference app for your business.
Here, I am going to compare five common features of BlueJeans, WebinarJam, and Zoom. But before I dive into them, let me give you an overview of these tools first.
About BlueJeans
BlueJeans is a cloud-based video conference software that offers a simple interface, data security, and personalized features. The tool is widely popular in the United States and it’s mostly preferred by mid-to-large enterprises.
With BlueJeans, you can conduct secure group meetings, organize live training, and share screens with your team members.
The app has intuitive features and great audio quality. More, it works well on both Desktop and Android and integrates easily with collaboration tools. You can also connect BlueJeans to your workplace system for presentations through its Gateway product.
Key Features
- BlueJeans virtual meeting product provides you access to video and audio control, permits, screen sharing, and extends collaboration tools.
- Through its webinar feature, you can arrange a large-scale event and invite up to 150k attendees.
- BlueJeans rooms and Gateway product allows you to take your virtual meeting into your real-time conference room.
- The tool also shares a separate telehealth product to connect doctors with patients over video and offers a virtual clinic experience.
About WebinarJam
As you’d have probably guessed, WebinarJam is exclusively designed for hosting small to mid-scale webinars.
You can also directly connect with your customers, encourage them to share their feedback, and even invite them to take the lead. The cloud-based app provides a seamless virtual experience and offers intuitive features to engage your audience.
Through WebinarJam, you can schedule events, send notifications, and share a live product page to drive traffic to your site.
If you often organize presentations, WebinarJam is an ideal tool for you.
Key Features
- WebinarJam supports both YouTube Live and Facebook Live and is compatible with several devices.
- The tool has a capacity for up to 5000 attendees and offers six slots for presenters.
- It allows you to engage your audience on chat, broadcast messages, and run polls.
- The app automatically records your event to later analyze your performance.
- WebinarJam also offers a page builder that gives you a perfect opportunity to promote your products live.
About Zoom
Zoom is a widely popular video conference platform for brainstorming ideas, running workplace meetings, and connecting with anyone in your company.
It allows you to conduct private conferences and host live events, giving you access to tons of features to improve the user experience.
With Zoom, you can essentially build a proper virtual meeting place for your remote team.
The software also has an in-house marketplace, where you can shop all the third-party tools compatible with the app.
Key Features
- Zoom meeting provides you with high-quality media, in-build collaboration tools, engagement features, and a chat room.
- You can additionally make phone calls, record meetings, and get transcriptions.
- Its Webinar product offers you an excellent experience with a virtual background and noise cancelation option. You can invite up to 50k attendees and conduct virtual events on Facebook and YouTube live.
- Its Zoom Room feature allows you to create a virtual workplace in your real-time conference area.
- Zoom also provides a marketplace to buy third-party tools.
BlueJeans vs WebinarJam vs Zoom – Features Comparison
Like I mentioned above, all three tools offer similar powerful functions. But since their features are largely tailored to their target market needs, their services vary slightly.
Let’s compare the key areas.
1. User experience
BlueJeans has a pretty simple user interface. Its dashboard displays three visible CTAs allowing you to join and host a meeting.
With a one-page setting form, you can quickly schedule your meeting and start your virtual conference right away.
You’ll also find all essential actions at the top of the app screen. It helps you easily share your screen with your team, adjust video and audio controls, and lock your meetings. More, Unlike Zoom, every action in BlueJeans is displayed separately to avoid confusion.
What makes BlueJeans particularly good is its audio quality. The app uses an audio compression tech called Dolby Voice to make your voice audible irrespective of the device you use.
WebinarJam also has a remarkably simple UI.
While its webinar registration process might be comparatively lengthy considering the product’s nature, once you’re in, you can easily navigate the app.
Everything you need to run a successful webinar is within reach. And if you stumble somewhere, you can access its training videos.
As for its video and audio quality, WebinarJam produces excellent video streaming quality, but BlueJeans and Zoom are relatively better.
Zoom’s interface is similar to BlueJeans. But since the tool offers more functions, some might find it fairly complex.
While I wouldn’t call Zoom overwhelming, you might have to explore it a bit to get familiar with all the available features.
The app’s video and audio quality, on the other hand, is superb and the tool’s user experience precedes both BlueJeans and WebinarJam.
Which one is better?
It depends on your requirements.
If you prefer a simple UI, BlueJeans, and WebinarJam are excellent choices.
The software provides you with straightforward actions and doesn’t bombard you with overwhelming features.
Regarding user experience, Zoom is better.
The app is easy to set up, offers plenty of integration options, and is rich in functions.
2. Moderation Functions
A host leads not only the meeting but also moderates it to make sure everything is running smoothly.
Considering this, you’d want a video conference tool that offers you more control.
BlueJeans provides several moderation functions to meet your needs.
You can mute video and audio, pause your broadcast, record your meetings, and leave without ending the conference.
In the event where you might require multiple moderators, you can create a separate chat room exclusively for admin communication, as well.
WebinarJam shares more audience and engagement control features.
Apart from the abovementioned actions, you can monitor the chat room and ban any participant. WebinarJam also allows you to broadcast your messages and highlight points in sticky notes format.
Zoom extends advanced control functions specifically in video and audio areas.
You can refine background audio, polish your appearance digitally, change background templates, and automatically turn off video during the meeting.
Which one is better?
Zoom.
The tool comparatively offers a wide range of moderation options.
3. Collaboration Features
Engagement is key to a successful presentation.
Since video conference doesn’t give you the real-time experience, most tools offer intuitive features to improve the user experience.
BlueJeans allows you to share your screen and videos to encourage group discussions.
You can also add notes and transcripts to highlight key points. Use a whiteboard to brainstorm ideas, and exchange files with the participants.
To increase engagement, you can have any member share screens and files.
Zoom is extremely rich in collaboration features.
Inside each button, you’ll probably find a list exhibiting five more actions.
For instance, in the screen sharing option, you can run PowerPoint slides in the background, display multiple windows, and enable captions.
Not only that, you can share your cell phone screen as well.
WebinarJam works slightly differently than Zoom and BlueJeans.
Whereas Zoom and BlueJeans aim at virtual meeting experiences, WebinarJam centers on promotions.
For example, one of its powerful sharing features is the page builder. It allows you to create your offer page with a CTA button attached.
It’s an incredibly useful function for marketers hoping to generate leads.
You can also add a countdown timer to incite urgency. WebinarJam additionally provides engagement features such as polls to receive feedback.
Which one is better?
All three target different audiences.
BlueJeans collaboration features are ideal for executive meetings.
A team that prefers advanced sharing options would like Zoom. Entrepreneurs looking to educate and promote their products and services will love WebinarJam.
4. Participant Size
Participant size may not matter much if you use video tools merely for private meetings, but this feature is incredibly important for those who regularly plan events.
All three platforms offer different participant numbers based on their pricing plans.
In BlueJeans, you can add up to 100 participants to its basic plan but can invite as many as 150k attendees.
The bad news is BlueJeans places restrictions on the actions your attendees can perform.
For instance, in a small group meeting, your attendees can share their views and participate in the discussion.
But if you invite more than 500, your audience might only be able to view your screen.
WebinarJam participants range is between 500 to 5000.
While you may not be able to host as many large events as you could on BlueJeans, you can relatively invite more people to participate.
As the tool is designed particularly for webinars, you can also call up to five people from your audience to co-present and connect with the rest of your audience on live chat.
Zoom provides a maximum capacity of 10k participants with access to a chat forum to engage your audience.
More, it offers a free plan where you can invite up to 100 participants and 25 hosts within spending a penny. You’ll not find this feature on BlueJeans or WebinarJam.
Which one is better?
This is a slightly tricky question.
As BlueJeans provides access to a large audience, naturally, it would be the ideal choice. But WebinarJam is more feature-rich, and Zoom is budget-friendly.
If you can’t compromise on participants, Blue Jeans is the obvious answer.
Otherwise, I suggest exploring other functions before you make up your mind.
Pricing
BlueJeans Pricing
BlueJeans offers flexible plans. Its virtual meeting plan starts at $19, and its webinar subscription costs a minimum of $82 a month.
The platform additionally shares separate plans for its Gateway product—a third-party service to connect your room’s system to Microsoft Teams—which begins at $99 a month.
I suggest taking a 14-day free trial to explore the BlueJeans app.
WebinarJam Pricing
WebinarJam pricing structure is much more straightforward. It offers three plans for solopreneurs, small businesses, to enterprises and charges between $499 to $999 per year.
WeibinarJam doesn’t offer any free trial but extends a 30-day money-back guarantee.
Zoom Pricing
Zoom comparatively provides the best and diverse plans to its users. For instance, Zoom Phone charges between $10 to $20, while its webinar plan reaches as far as $8,400 a month.
Its starter plan is free of cost, and you can sign up for it right away using merely your email address.
Which one is better?
Zoom is the obvious winner. While BlueJeans and WebinarJam offer competitive prices, they’re not freemium tools.
Conclusion
Everyone looks for particular features while choosing a video conference app.
A business owner would need an uninterrupted conversation with its client.
A team lead would probably want a secure meeting for data privacy. A subject expert may like to have a webinar app that allows unlimited users.
Everyone has their preferences.
Keep your preferences in mind before picking out the best tool.
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