Inviting an external guest to a Zoom meeting

When you schedule a new meeting with your Emerson Zoom account, the Security settings will default to requiring attendees be logged into Zoom to join. This additional layer of security means that any guests (expected or not) would, at minimum, need a registered Zoom account in order to participate.

All Emerson students, faculty, and staff have access to a licensed Zoom account with their Emerson credentials. However, if you send your Zoom link or invite to anyone outside of Emerson College (e.g., a guest speaker, a vendor, or a friend), they will need to set up a free Zoom account before joining the meeting.

Luckily, doing so is easy and should only take a few minutes!

Instructions for Non-Emerson Guests

Signing Up

  1. Go to https://zoom.us/signup in a browser window (desktop or mobile).
  2. Zoom will ask you to fill in your date of birth.
  3. On the next page, enter your email address and click Sign Up.
  4. You will receive an email from Zoom (no-reply@zoom.us). In this email, click Activate Account.

Accessing Your Free Account

  1. You can sign in to your Zoom account on the web at any time, at zoom.us/signin.
  2. You can also download the Zoom Desktop Client for Mac, Windows, ChromeOS and Linux, as well as the Zoom Mobile App for iOS and Android from Zoom’s Downloads page.
  3. We recommend reviewing Zoom’s Quick Start guide for new users in advance of the meeting to familiarize yourself with controls, set your profile photo, and confirm the name you would like participants to see when joining a meeting.

Joining an Emerson meeting

  1. There are many ways to join a meeting, but the easiest way is to click the join link that the meeting host provided. You can also click Join in your Zoom client and enter the meeting ID and passcode.
  2. Make sure you are signed in to your free Zoom account.
  3. If the meeting host has a Waiting Room enabled, you’ll see a message that states Please wait, the meeting host will let you in soon. Once the host allows you in, you’ll be all set!

Changing the authentication requirement

New meetings will default to this setting for security purposes. However, if you do not want the authentication requirement on for a particular meeting, you can turn it off manually beforehand:

  1. Go to zoom.emerson.edu in a browser window (desktop or mobile).
  2. Click Meetings on the left hand side and find the meeting that you would like to change.
  3. Click Edit.
  4. In the Security section, uncheck Require Authentication to Join.

If you’d like to further restrict your meeting to Emerson guests only, you can do so by selecting Emerson College Zoom in the drop down menu under Require Authentication to Join. If this is selected, all participants will need to have registered for, and be logged into, their Emerson Zoom accounts to participate.

Authentication exceptions

If you would like to limit your meeting to Emerson guests only, but permit specific non-Emerson guests to join, you can add an Authentication Exception to your individual meeting sessions, using the external email addresses of the invited guests.

  1. Go to zoom.emerson.edu in a browser window (desktop or mobile).
  2. Click Meetings on the left hand side and find the meeting that you would like to add an exception to.
  3. Click Edit.
  4. Under Security, make sure Require Authentication to Join is checked.
  5. Next to Authentication Exception, select Add.
  6. Enter the guest's name and external email address.
  7. Click Add Participants to add more guests.
  8. Click Save when you're done.
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