Invite a Guest Host to Join or Take Over Your Live Sale

Have an influencer, creator, or co-host you wish could hop on a live with you or take over a live broadcast from wherever they are? With Multi-Source, now they can! Multi Multi-host multihost

With CommentSold’s Multi-Source live sale option, you can add an additional host feed to your broadcast. It’s a great opportunity to bring in guest speakers, influencers, or personalities to boost viewership, engagement, and purchases. You can interact with your guest, ask questions and demo products, or have the guest take over the live sale as the primary talent.

Multi-Source gives you full control over the guest host experience–from when they’re live with your main host to how their feed appears to your shoppers. When you’re ready to remove their guest spot, you can bump them back to a “waiting room” area where they can hang out until you invite them back on stage or you can remove them from the broadcast completely.

Below, we walk through the process of inviting a guest host to your live sale and how to manage the guest host feed once you’re live.

What’s Different About Going Live With Multi-Source

• Two feeds in one. Your main and guest feeds appear in the same frame, and you can control how they look. Options include fullscreen, split screen, and picture-in-picture.
• No CS Broadcast app needed. You’ll use links from your Multi-Host Live Sale Overview to launch a browser-based camera on the device(s) you’ll use to broadcast.

Go Live with a Guest Host

Step 1: Choose Multisource Live Sale Option

1. Select Live in the side menu of your CommentSold dashboard.
2. Select Multisource Live from the options listed at the top of the page.

Step 2: Start Main Host Feed

Your first step on the Live Sale Multi-Source Overview is to start your main host’s feed. At this stage, you’re simply transmitting the audio and video feeds for the main host to the Live Sale Overview for a preview–these feeds are not live yet.

There are three ways to start the feed: by scanning a QR code, copying and sending a link, or using the device where you or a team member are managing the sale.

1. Scan QR Code. Scan the QR code using the camera on the device that the host will use to transmit the audio and visual feeds. A main host will be prompted to log in using their CommentSold credentials.
2. Copy Link. Select this option to copy the browser-based broadcast link to your device. You can then text or email it to the main host’s device. This is a great option if your main host is in a different location than the team member managing the live sale. A main host will be prompted to log in using their CommentSold credentials.
3. Go Live on This Device. If the main host plans to use the device where they’re viewing this page to broadcast their feeds, they can select this button or select the QR code to launch the browser-based broadcast window in a new tab.

Step 3: Send Guest Host Their Stream Link

Once you have the main host’s stream preview visible on your Live Overview, you can send your guest host a link to start their stream. Unlike your main host, a guest will not need to log into CommentSold.

A guest’s link is only valid for the specific live sale they’re invited to. The link will expire once the live sale ends, or if you remove the guest from the live sale.

1. Select Invite Guest at the bottom of the Live Stream Setup section.
2. On the Live Link Invitation pop-up, you have two options:
   • Scan the QR Code. Scan the QR code using your device’s camera and choose the option to Share the link. This will allow you to send the link to the customer via email, text, or other options available on your device.
   • Copy Live Link. Copy the live link to your desktop clipboard, then paste it in a message or email to the guest host.

Once the customer receives and taps their link, it will launch a browser window on their device. There they will see the option to Join Stream.  On the broadcast camera screen, they’ll need to approve microphone and camera permissions. Then they can tap the red record button to send their feeds to your Live Sale Overview. Please note that at this time, the customer is not live. You will still need to add them to the live sale “on-air” broadcast, which we cover in the next section. Note: Guests can select the Settings icon at the bottom of the screen to change out their video and audio sources, if available. For example, a guest could choose their Airpods or bluetooth headphones as their audio source rather than use their device’s microphone.

Steps 4 & 5: Product Selection and Where to Go Live

Similar to the standard Go Live process, you can proceed with choosing the products you plan to feature during the live sale. You can choose a product selection or add products on the fly.

Once you select your products, you’ll indicate where you wish to go live (e.g., website, mobile app, Instagram, etc.). Once live, the team member managing the live sale will be able to add the guest host to the live sale.

Add Guest Host to a Live Sale

Once you start a live sale, your guest host moves into a “backstage” or “waiting room” area. You will need to manually add their broadcast stream to the live sale when ready.

1. Locate the guest host feed to the right of the main feed and select Add to Live.
2. In the Add Guest to Live pop-up, choose how you wish the guest feed to appear:
   • Full screen. The solid blue option on the left will show either the main host or guest host as the primary feed. You can select the rotate icon on the right side of the pop-up to reverse which host appears full screen.
   • Split screen. Divide the screen equally between the main and guest hosts. Feeds stack on top of each other and selecting the rotate icon on the right side of the pop-up changes which feed appears at the top.
   • Picture-in-picture. Have the guest host feed appear in the bottom-right corner of the host’s feed. Select the rotate icon on the right side of the pop-up to swap the main and host feed locations.
3. Once you choose your desired appearance, select Add to Live.

Once a guest host is live, you will see a red recording icon in the top-left corner of the guest host’s feed. Your main preview will also reflect the view you just chose. 

A guest host’s audio will become part of the live sale broadcast even if the guest host is not visible (i.e., you have the view as fullscreen with the focus on the main host), and vice versa.

Manage How Multiple Host Feeds Appear

Beneath the main feed, you’ll see three options that control how the main and guest host feeds appear. These options are identical to those offered when you added the guest host to the live. When you select an option, you’ll launch a preview window that will allow you to preview the change before pushing it live.

• Full screen. The solid blue option on the left will show either the main host or guest host as the primary feed. 
• Split screen. Divide the screen equally between the main and guest hosts. Feeds stack on top of each other.
• Picture-in-picture. Have the guest host feed appear in the bottom-right corner of the host’s feed. 

With each option, you can select the rotate icon to the right of the options to switch perspectives (i.e., feature the guest host feed as primary with the host feed as the picture-in-picture image). Once you’ve selected the new layout, select Change Layout.

What Your Guest Sees While Live

The “on-air” or live experience for your guest is designed to give them as much information and context for the sale as possible so they can feel confident interacting with the host and customers.

Your guest sees:

• Live Sale Overlay. Guests will see the current featured product in the live sale overlay. This is identical to the overlay shoppers see and lets the guest know which product is being discussed.
• Your Host. Guests will see the main host’s feed in the bottom right corner of their screen. This is the same feed shoppers see and allows the guest to see what the host is doing.

Remove a Guest Host from a Live Sale

You have two options when removing a guest host from the live sale: send them back to the waiting room or end their broadcast feed completely.

1. Select the red X in the top-right corner of the guest host feed.
2. On the Remove Guest Host from Live pop-up, select your desired option:
   • Send to waiting room. This option sends a guest back to the “backstage” or “waiting room” area where they can wait to be added to the live sale again. Simply select Add to Live to add them back.
   • Remove and deactivate invite link. This option removes the guest host and ends their feed. A removed guest host cannot use their invite link to rejoin the live sale.
3. Select Remove Guest Host.

Once you remove a guest from your live sale broadcast, their feed will refresh to show the Nice work! message pictured on the right. Guests will not be able to rejoin the live sale using the original invite link.