8 Best Practices for Stress-Free Funeral Streaming

By Leader Contributor Natalie Kuri, Partner Success Manager at OneRoom

Benjamin Franklin put it best: “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” 

Although the Founding Father of the United States coined this phrase to remind Philadelphians about the importance of fire awareness, nearly 300 years later it can still apply to many aspects of modern life — our industry included.

I wholeheartedly believe in the power of recording an online funeral service and making it accessible to families and loved ones, who are both present and virtual. As a Funeral Director myself, I would like to equip you with the tools you need to successfully record and live stream a service. Recently, I had a conversation with Neil Sleight, our Performance Assurance Manager at OneRoom, who admits “Technology can be scary. But a little prep can set you up for success.” 

Building up your confidence with technology begins with the repetition of recording everything and getting ahead of scheduling.

Reduce potential headaches by considering these best practices:

1. Practice makes perfect: Schedule a “test service” until you are comfortable. Be sure to type “test” as the decedent’s name to prevent being charged.
   
   
2. Share the invite: Send an email to family members with the invite to the live stream so that they can create their own recipient list, even if the link will be posted on your website. This is especially helpful for very private services, as you are now giving control to the family of whom they specifically would like to invite to their loved one’s service.
   
   
3. Include the deceased’s obituary link: Add it to your scheduled event. 
   
   
4. Add extra time: When scheduling a service, allow for additional time, should you forget to extend. We recommend at least 15 to 30 minutes.
   
   
5. Connect your audio system: Sound comes from your system. Double-check volume levels are set correctly and that wireless mic batteries are charged.
   
   
6. Speak clearly: Gently remind celebrants, family, and friends to speak into the microphone during the service.
   
   
7. Recognize virtual attendees: Consider asking the celebrant to acknowledge those who are unable to physically attend the service.
   
   
8. Make it known you’re recording: Inform all guests that the service will be live-streamed and/or recorded. You can do this by placing a framed notice by the register book, with an elegant notice by the door, or in your email correspondence.

Proactive Support and Automation with OneRoom

More than 10 years of industry experience has lent OneRoom ample foresight into the most common roadblocks that arise when recording or live streaming a funeral service. 

When an event is scheduled, our team runs automated health checks on OneRoom equipment as part of our OneRoom Care program. This helps us identify any potential issues long before an event takes place, leaving ample time for us to solve the problem.

“These steps are important and help build assurances as we lead up to the actual ceremony,” explains Sleight.

During OneRoom’s automated health check, we look at:

1. Camera status: When you schedule an online funeral service, we send that schedule to the cameras so that they know to record to an SD card, just in case the internet goes down and you can’t live-stream. We check that the cameras received this notification.
   
   
2. Hardware readiness: Two hours before a scheduled event, we see if our hardware is online and ready while ensuring that our team has time to reboot and contact you in case of any internet issues occurring at your location.
   
   
3. Backup recording: Post-event, we confirm there were no SD card or camera issues. We also make sure that the backup copy of your service was recorded successfully.

We take these precautions quite seriously because the service we provide our partners and their client families is of the utmost importance to us. Remember, at OneRoom, we’re in it together.

About the Author: Natalie Kuri, Partner Success Manager
Natalie has been a licensed funeral director for over 20 years in New York and more recently in Texas. She served client families in different roles throughout her career ranging from daily operations, embalming, leading teams in preneed sales, managing cemeteries and crematories as well as presenting to other professionals at events. Natalie joined the OneRoom team in 2020 as a Partner Success Manager, leveraging her skills from the industry to onboard and train new customers while continuing to develop customer relationships.