MeetingBurner launches out of beta to seriously undermine WebEx and GoToMeeting

Online meeting service MeetingBurner has launched out of beta with free meetings for up to 15 people, paid meeting options for up to 1,000 people, and mobile support, the company announced this morning.

MeetingBurner faces steep competition in the online meeting space, including competitors like Cisco’s WebEx, Adobe’s Connect, Citrix’s GoToMeeting, and AnyMeeting. So it has done what is natural for an underdog — undercut the competition with strong pricing and features. The company debuted in beta this past August and gave its service away for free to help it “build good will and word of mouth,” President John Rydell told VentureBeat at the time.

But with its full launch, the company is taking a big step toward being a profitable business with paid online meetings. The company’s goal is to offer the most features at the lowest price, and at a glance, it is winning that race. Its three pricing tiers are as follows:

• MeetingBurner Free – Free. Up to 15 participants in online meetings, integrated phone conference line, email support, and no advertising.
• MeetingBurner Pro – $39.95 a month. Everything in Free model + up to 50 participants, full telephone support, meeting recording, enhanced security encryption, and more.
• MeetingBurner Premier – $99.95 a month. Everything in Pro model + up to 1000 participants, telephone support, autopilot meetings, PayPal integration, meeting analytics, and more.

By comparison, WebEx, Connect, and GoToMeeting do not offer a free a version of their software for small businesses. AnyMeeting offers ad-supported presentations for free, but it also added paid ad-free options recently. On the fully paid side, WebEx costs $49 per month for a max meeting size of 25 participants and GoToWebinar (GoToMeeting’s larger version) costs $99 a month for a 100 participants. When you move over to the 1,000 participant level, the contrast becomes especially noticeable — WebEx doesn’t have an established price for meetings of this size and makes you call for a quote, while GoToWebinar costs a staggering $499 per month for 1,000 participants. MeetingBurner provided the following chart that sums up the 1,000-person level well:

“About 75 percent of our small business clients come from GoToMeeting and WebEx,” MeetingBurner CMO Chris Van Dusen told VentureBeat. “Our pricing structure beats the crud out of the big boys.”

Some of the best features MeetingBurner offers include not having to download any software, fast start up speeds, Skype call-ins, and an analytics tool to get real-time feedback on how well the meeting is going. The company also has a brand-new iOS app for iPhone and iPad that allows participants to attend meetings on the go. The company’s interface is also optimized so that most Android device owners can attend via the browser.

Ladera Ranch, Calif.-based MeetingBurner is a division of larger company Networx Online and has ten employees on its team.

Business group in online meeting: Yuri Arcurs/Shutterstock