One Key Reason That Made Zoom Very Successful

Initially, when Zoom was making all the news and noise in the market by achieving 30 times more sales amid pandemic, I could not understand what is so special about Zoom. Why do most of the users prefer Zoom? And why has Zoom become the native term for video calls? 

What made Zoom successful?

I felt Google Meet was the same; it works better with Google Suite and Gmail. Yet, Zoom was getting all the recognition and was seizing the market.

Zoom’s success was unbelievable. Zoom’s founder, Yuan’s net worth, jumped by 112 percent to $7 billion in three months. With biggies like Microsoft, Google, and Cisco having their video conferencing platforms; only one platform exploded during the pandemic. So, what was the logic behind the explosion?

As I started using Zoom frequently for my work and attended a few webinars/workshops, I was dazzled with the platform. I realized that its success is not just because of market luck, but because of one principal reason.

This one thing has been applied by many other successful products and companies like Amazon Kindle, Bose Speakers, Salesforce, and more.

As I read more about the background and story of Zoom and its founder Eric Yaun my point of view became clearer and stronger.

Yes, there is one thing if applied in any business, it can give you an edge in the market and can drive enormous success.

Zoom picked up one problem or pain point to solve and have built solutions for everything around it. It built solutions for even the most niche and granular cases. It covered video calls and conferencing from all angles and perspectives.

Pick up one problem and solve all the aspects around it comprehensively, no matter how big or small.

Zoom’s feature set covers all aspects of video calls i.e. recording, background, webinar, breakup rooms, messaging, and more.

It studied all behaviours in an actual meeting and designed it in Zoom to deliver it in the virtual world.

It delivers the same experience digitally and delights its customers.

Here are 5 things that show how Zoom embraces all aspects of video calls and establish the reason behind Zoom’s success.

1. Zoom have build solution for all use cases for video conferencing

Zoom covers every use case around video calls or conferencing. Various audience groups use Zoom for various applications.

Corporates use Zoom for video conferencing and meeting. Event organizers and marketers use Zoom for webinars. Several colleges and other institutes use Zoom to conduct online classes. Users use Zoom for personal calls with friends or families. Zoom delivers the best solution for many users and applications w.r.t video conferencing and video calls.

2. Comprehensive design of every feature

Zoom has the most extensive list of features than most of the competitors. And each feature delivers a polished experience.

One of the key examples is Zoom webinar. It is so detailed that it is one of the biggest reasons behind the swift growth of webinars. Zoom has nailed the delivery of webinars with functionalities like separating the speaker from the participant, keeping participant data hidden, having actions like Q&A, and raising hands. It delivers a smooth, webinar experience.

Another example of a prominent feature is breakout rooms. How many times does it happen that between a meeting the group is broken down into smaller groups? And Zoom has created a solution for this. Where you can go to breakout rooms, i.e. many smaller groups and then get circle back as a bigger group.

Zoom has dived into every action of each feature or use case and has designed the most comprehensive solution.

3. Easily Accessible 

Google Meet works best with Chrome and Gmail. Microsoft is better for Outlook users, and Facetime is only for Apple users. However, Zoom delivers the same experience across all platforms. Zoom is the most platform-agnostic video conferencing product. It’s like Spotify for music.

During the launch, Zoom was one of the first cloud-based video conferencing solutions, with no dedicated on-premises hardware necessary.

Any third-party platform can easily integrate Zoom into its platform. Like an online course website can integrate Zoom into their product seamlessly. Zoom also provides multiple add-on products like payment gateway and more.

Zoom can be accessed easily and is flexible to be used in multiple formats or systems.

4. Follow what you preach

Has Microsoft, Google, or Cisco stopped physical meetings in their company and have shifted everyone to their respective platform? No.

Everyone is talking about the fundamental change to virtual meetings, but none of them has applied it within their organizations.

However, Zoom follows what they preach. All internal meetings in Zoom are virtual on their platform. All meetings of Eric with their investors happen on Zoom.

If you are launching a product that plans to change a certain process then you should be the first one to follow it 100%. Zoom is following the concept of virtual meeting 100% within their company.

5. Obsessed with that one thing for years

Yuan was an immigrant from China who stepped into the U.S. in the mid-’90s. He saw from his college days that technology would allow portable, easy-to-use video calls for people to stay connected. And this became his obsession.

When Zoom started, it was true to its mission with video-first mentality. While other companies, like Skype, went audio first and then adjusted to video, Zoom was focusing on videoconferencing from the start itself.

So, all these years working on making video calls easy and building a comprehensive solution for it finally proved to be fruitful. When people needed a platform to adapt to remote working, there was only one that stood out: Zoom. 

Finally, focussing on one problem comprehensively is what made Zoom successful. 

If you are working on a product or pain point, then get absorbed by it. Get obsessed with the problem. Live the problem and your solution. Build a solution that solves all aspects of the problem. Your chances of success will increase. 

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