Hello, hello.
Sharon here from Sharon's Tutorials.
What is the one tool that I recommend everybody should use
before each and every Zoom virtual meeting
or call that they have?
I'll give you a clue.
It's the Zoom test feature.
Now you might be thinking, really?
Why do I wanna use that?
I've used it like once before,
and what's so special about that?
Think about it, Zoom are giving you this free tool to use
whenever you like, however many times you like.
You don't need a Zoom account to use it.
It's completely free, as I mentioned before.
You can use it to test your audio, your microphone,
your webcam, your background,
to make sure there's nothing offensive
or confidential behind you before every single meeting.
You can position post-it notes around your monitor
to remind you of what to say.
So then, you sound more confident
and you look like you know what you're talking about,
a bit like me.
Now, you don't have to be new to Zoom to use this.
I personally use this test feature
before every single meeting that I have.
And think about it,
there may be different tweaks
that you need to make.
And perhaps you're not in your usual virtual environment,
the little set up that you have
in your home office or wherever,
to do these virtual calls.
You might be in a hotel foyer, for example.
So you need to see what's going on in the background
before your actual call.
You might be using a different laptop or a new webcam,
or there might be two of you
that need to be on the meeting,
so you need to set yourself up in a position
that both of you are visible on screen
before the actual meeting.
There's different variances before your meetings
that you can test and check
before you actually have a proper call or a proper meeting.
And if you are new to Zoom,
then this is the perfect chance to familiarise yourself
with the Zoom controls and settings
and tools that are available to you.
So you can check out the chat feature, the reactions button,
the virtual backgrounds, the video filters.
You can set everything up before your actual meeting.
And like I said,
you don't need a Zoom account to do this either.
What if you don't have a Zoom account and you've been asked
for a job interview and it's over Zoom?
How do you know what you're gonna look like
before the actual interview?
The first time you see yourself on camera
could be the first, could be the time
that you're actually in the interview
and everybody else is seeing you at the same time.
So, go use this test feature
to make sure that you're positioned correctly on the screen.
Make sure that your background is okay
and suitable and professional looking
before the job interview itself.
Using this test feature gives you the confidence
to go into each meeting
knowing that you look and sound the best you can.
So you might be thinking,
well, yeah, Sharon, that's all well and good,
but what is this Zoom test feature exactly?
So it's basically a meeting where Zoom is the host,
and there is one participant and that's you.
Nobody else is on the call.
Nobody can see what you're doing at all.
It lasts for three minutes, after which you get kicked off
or you can leave beforehand if you want to.
But here's the thing, after those three minutes are up,
you can go back into the test website again,
launch a new meeting and have another three minutes,
and another one and another one, and so on.
There is no limit to the number of times you can use
this test feature.
That's what I think makes it really handy.
So if you want to know how to use this test website,
join me over on Zoom and I'll show you.
Okay, so you need to go to zoom.us/test
to launch the meeting,
and then click Join.
And there I am.
Hello, again.
So this opens up the Zoom meeting.
You can see, these are all the tools that you get to use
and play around with.
So you have your audio settings here.
So you can just literally go in
and make sure that everything works okay.
And in your video, you have the video settings as well,
what you use.
And you can choose your video filters if you want to.
You can have a play around
with the different filters that are there.
You have virtual backgrounds.
You can have play around with all the different backgrounds
or upload your own one if you want to.
It's just a really good way of familiarising yourself
with the actual layout and the features that you have.
So your participants, if you click on participants,
the window opens up here on the right hand side
and you can see there's just literally me and that's it.
And the chat, opens up the chat box here
and you can have a go at typing messages out and everything.
Now, there are a couple of limitations in the test meeting,
one of those is the Share Screen.
So if you happen to click on the Share Screen,
it will tell you that Zoom has disabled this.
So you're not allowed to do that.
And you can't hit the Record button either,
so you can't record the session either.
The reactions, as I mentioned before, there's the thumbs up.
So hit the thumbs up if you like this video,
so YouTube knows to share more of my content.
I really appreciate it.
And when you're done,
and all your settings are done,
and you're happy with the way everything's set out,
you can just click Leave,
and you can leave the meeting
before the end of the three minutes.
Or at the end of the three minutes,
a little notification will come up that says
that Zoom is now finishing the meeting in five seconds.
And it just, you just get kicked off.
Another limitation is the layout of the view layout.
In a normal Zoom meeting, you would have functions
at the top here of your different view layouts,
your gallery view, your speaker view, etc.
So there isn't that option available
but then there's only you on the call,
so there's not gonna be a different layout available
to you anyway.
And obviously, you can enter full screen if you want to,
but I'm not gonna do that,
'cause I think you've had enough of seeing me.
So, yeah, what do you think?
Do you think, do you use the Zoom tests?
Do you think it's a good feature to have?
I just can't praise it highly enough.
I use it all the time.
So I really hope you find this helpful.
If you want to know how to change your name
before or during a meeting in Zoom,
click here to watch my video there as well.
And I hope you found this really helpful
and make sure you use it before your next Zoom meeting.
Until the next time.
Bye for now.