Meet Now meetings are a useful alternative to traditional scheduled Live Meeting sessions. With Meet Now, you create a "virtual office" to which you can invite meeting partipants at a moment's notice, for example, to present information, to collaborate on documents, or to share an application from your computer.

You can start a Meet Now meeting from Microsoft Office Outlook, if you have installed the Microsoft Office Live Meeting Add-in for Outlook, or by using the Live Meeting Manager.

Before you start using Meet Now, make sure that your Live Meeting account and your Meet Now options are set up. For more information about setting up Live Meeting, see How To Set Up Live Meeting. For more information about Meet Now options, see How to Set Meeting Options.

This topic contains information to help you:

• Start a Meet Now Meeting by using Outlook
• Start a Meet Now Meeting from the Live Meeting Manager
• Start phone conferencing
• Import a document
• Send invitations from the Live Meeting Console

It also explains what to expect when you start a Meet Now meeting.

Start a Meet Now Meeting by using Outlook

The simplest way to start a Meet Now meeting is by using Outlook. To start a meeting in this way, you must install the Microsoft Office Live Meeting Add-In for Outlook.

To start Meet Now from the Outlook Add-in

1. Start Outlook.
2. On the Live Meeting Add-in Toolbar, click Meet Now. Live Meeting creates an e-mail invitation that you can send to the meeting participants.
3. In the To box, enter the e-mail addresses of the people you want to attend the meeting.
4. Click Send to send the invitation.
5. Live Meeting displays the Live Meeting Console, entering login information, if necessary. You are now ready to conduct the meeting.

For more information about conducting a meeting and interacting with the meeting attendees, see How To Conduct a Meeting.

Start a Meet Now meeting from the Live Meeting Manager

1. In your Internet Browser, enter the URL of your Live Meeting conference center. If you do not know the URL of your conference center, contact your Live Meeting account administrator.
2. On the Login to Live Meeting Manager page, enter your user login in the User Login box, and then enter your password in the Password box. If you do not know your user login or your password, contact your Live Meeting account administrator.
3. Click Login or press the Enter key.
4. On the My Home page, under Meet, click Meet Now.
5. When the meeting console is displayed, you can invite participants to the meeting. On the Attendees menu in the Live Meeting console, click Send E-Mail Invite.
6. In the Attendees box, enter the e-mail addresses of the meeting participants who you want to attend the meeting as attendees. In the Presenters box, enter the e-mail addresses of the participants who you want to invite as presenters. Each participant's invitation will contain a link that the participant can click to join the meeting as an attendee or a presenter. Presenters can load resources, displays slides, and collaborate on documents. Attendees have fewer privileges than presenters, and they typically just view the meeting proceedings.
7. In the message body, type any additional information that you want to send about the meeting. Live Meeting automatically appends the meeting URL and phone conferencing information to the invitation.
8. Click Send Message to send the invitation.
9. Live Meeting displays the Live Meeting Console. You are now ready to conduct the meeting.

Start phone conferencing

To use audio with your Meet Now meeting, you can either call the other participant (if only one other participant is attending) or you can use phone conferencing.

If you have configured phone conferencing in the Audio section of your Meet Now Options, Live Meeting displays the Phone Conferencing information in the meeting console. If you do not have a phone conferencing account set up, contact your Live Meeting account administrator.

To start phone conferencing

• Using your telephone, dial the phone conferencing number. Alternately, you can use the Join Conference feature if it is configured for your account. Once you are connected to your phone conferencing number, enter your participant code. When you are prompted, enter your leader code.

Import a Document

Importing documents is a useful way to share information and collaborate with others during a Meet Now meeting. You can import any document that was created using a Microsoft Office application or any other application that supports printing.

To import a document into the Live Meeting console

1. On the Live Meeting Share menu, choose one of the following:
   • Share Document to Edit
   • Share Document to View
   Then, browse and select the document you want to share, and then click Open.
2. If the document requires conversion to Microsoft Office Document Image (MODI) format, Live Meeting displays a message describing this step. Click Continue, and then wait for the document to be imported to the Live Meeting console.
3. To display the document, in the Resources pane on the left-hand side of the console, click the document that you want to share. If the document contains multiple parts (for example, several slides in a presentation), each part is displayed in the Thumbnails pane.

Now that the document is loaded and phone conferencing is set up, you are ready to meet with meeting participants. For more information about conducting a meeting, see How To Conduct a Meeting.

Send Invitations from the Live Meeting Console

After you have started a Meet Now meeting, you can use the Live Meeting console to invite others to join you.

To send a meeting invitation from within the Live Meeting console

1. From the Attendees menu in the Live Meeting console, click Send E-Mail Invite.
2. In the Attendees and Presenters text boxes, enter the full e-mail addresses of the attendees and presenters you want to invite (for example, someone@example.com).
3. Enter a subject for your meeting.
4. If you want, in the Message text box, type a message about the meeting. This message is included with the invitation.
5. Click Send Message, and then click OK.

What to Expect When You Start a Meet Now meeting

When you have the add-in and click Meet Now in Outlook or click Meet Now in Live Meeting Manager, Live Meeting will determine if your have the Live Meeting console and, if so, if it is up to date. If you already have an up-to-date version of the Live Meeting console installed, Live Meeting will start the console for you. If you do not have the console already installed, or if Live Meeting finds a version that is out-of-date, it will display the Meeting Installer page.

If you see this page, click Install the Windows-based Live Meeting Console, and then click Run. When the installation is finished, Live Meeting will attempt to start the meeting console. If the console does not start automatically, follow the instructions on the Meeting Entry page to start the console and enter your Meet Now meeting.