Why Online Whiteboarding Boosts Collaboration

We are increasingly visual beings. We like to see and touch things in 3-D to make the most tangible creative experience possible. So then we lose it when we go to the increasingly frequently used two-dimensional world, right? We don’t have to if you make your virtual world tangible through an online whiteboard.

We at Quote Roller are working hard to not only make our service as valuable for you as possible, but to point out products, advice, services and ideas that we value, too. With offices in Minsk, San Fran, Barcelona, and New York, we use RealtimeBoard to push for better creativity and collaboration. That’s why we asked them to write a guest blog to introduce themselves to you.
This a guest post about whiteboarding benefits by Kseniya Maksimova, RealtimeBoard Marketing Manager, especially for Quote Roller.

We live in a world of “visuals.” Teams love gathering around whiteboards in their offices, marking up great ideas. For sure, nothing can replace either face-to-face interaction or vivid brainstorming around a table. However, against the background of the dramatic boom of the virtual world, we have no choice but to work together online. Though Google Docs and Basecamp already exist, they seem too organized, thus, giving us less freedom for creative thinking.

People collaborate infinitely around visual materials, i.e. websites, landing pages, newsletter layouts, logos, product interfaces and design. And sometimes the whiteboard on the wall over your desk becomes too small for placing all your creative insights. Well, I’m not against office whiteboards, but if life could be easier, why not make collaboration better?

Let’s look through five reasons to use whiteboards in the web.

1. Feel free to add any content

Really, there are no limits in online whiteboarding. There’s infinite room for your content — no restrictions in borders, media types and locations, which is marvelous for creative teams. Images, videos, documents, free-hand drawings and Post-Its are collected all over the board in the way you want to organize the visual content.

2. Stop routine emailing

Productivity is essential for any company. How many emails and comments have you sent discussing the last iteration of your website? Yes, endless updating gets monotonous. Luckily, there is a way out of this mess. As the team gathers dozens of visuals in one place — an online whiteboard — the entire discussion is always in front of your eyes, thus, you avoid an immense portion of emails.

3. Keep the key information in sight

When collaboration spins around one centralized spot, you don’t miss any vital points. In RealtimeBoard you can stick comments to any piece of content and start conversations with the team right on the board.

4. Easy to involve your team in sharing ideas

Whenever you’re ready to introduce the discussion, let your designers and creatives join the task. Attach whiteboard projects to the workflow, simply adding the URL of the board in the task description in your project manager, like Basecamp, Trello or Jira. As your peers follow the link, they’ll see what’s going on at their first glance. Mainly, they will see how the current version of the visual project has been working out so far and what parts need improvement.

5. See the big picture

Having your work in one piece is something that makes a lot of sense. No matter how huge the project is, not one of your workmates misses the vision on the horizon and is aware of the direction that you’re striving toward.

All the reasons mentioned cover three main dimensions:

1. Content: You have endless space to gather multimedia files and put every little piece together into one big picture

2. Collaboration: Cut off a cobweb of emails in your inbox and pull the team into real-time collaboration

3. Access: Share your boards with colleagues and teammates all over the world — just give them a link

As RealtimeBoard provides you with an endless blank whiteboard, it may seem a bit overwhelming the first time. Nevertheless, the tool gives you templates, such as SWOT analysis, Osterwalder’s Business Model Canvas, calendar, agile task manager and many others, which makes it much easier to take the first step.

Offline whiteboard remains a great tool for engaging your colleagues into the conversation. But when it goes to the web and works smoothly with other management tools in your company, it will make your collaboration rock!

Check out what you can create with RealtimeBoard!