Support: Facebook Group, Forum or Comments?

Thanks so much for all your lovely supportive comments recently after I announced the Clinic Changes. I felt terrified but now I feel you all have my back, which is very comforting.

As promised, I have been thinking about how we can set up a support system where I can act as moderator but essentially we can help each other. That way, hopefully, it takes the heat off me and we can tap into the huge wealth of experience, kindness, support and knowledge of our Purehealth and TrulyGlutenFree families. Many of you are experts in your own condition and what I am trying to do is encourage us to share what we know and help each other out.

We could just continue with the blog and page comments (eg TGF Chat, Stories, Food), but I have discovered the search doesn’t cover the comments, only the pages and posts, and an awful lot of the useful stuff is in the comments. Very frustrating! So, I propose we need a better, more searchable, system and we need to make sure it works for you. I can export existing comments into a forum if I can work out how so we won’t lose them!

Here are a few real-life example questions from this week so we can explore the best system to set up:

First, you have gone gluten free and have read somewhere that oats are OK. Are they? Where do you ask? 

This is a general non-specific question that could be on a public TGF group area. Anyone could answer it. I would probably link to the several blog posts I have written on the subject if I see it, but, equally, someone else might have a useful comment to make.

This could be either a TGF open forum area or on a public TGF Facebook group page. The benefit of it being on an open area is that, when someone else wants to know, it will be there. 

Second, you are following the Barrier Plan and want to check whether you need to take both lots of probiotic in stage 1. How do you find out? 

This is a question specific to the Barrier Plan and will mean nothing to anyone not following it! This, I would assume, is best posed in a closed ‘Barrier Planners’ area, which could either be a special protected area in the forum or a secret Facebook group, to which people will be invited on purchase of a plan. (A secret Facebook group is one where nobody can see the group exists; a bit different to a closed Facebook group where people can see the group and who belongs to it but can’t see posts).

Anyone on the Barrier Plan might be able to help and say what they did or I will answer. If this is on an open area, the danger is that people just think ‘ooh, I’ll have a go at that’ without reading the accompanying safety info on the product, dosage etc – which is the reason they are done as downloaded plans so you have to read it! Next time someone wants to know the answer to that question, there will be a searchable topic in the Barrier Planners area so they can find it. Eventually, most common questions will have been answered and it will act as a kind of FAQ for the plan. 

Third, you have ordered a Candida test and you’re not sure if taking antibiotics is going to mess up the results. What do you do?

This is probably likely to be emailed to me and that’s fine as I have promised to still facilitate tests and do all the work that comes with them. It could be asked in a Tests area of the open forum/facebook group and then anyone else wanting to know the same thing can find out.

So, you see the kinds of issues. How do you think it would work best for you? Please vote and give me some clues so I can decide. My current thinking is a secure forum with open and closed areas on the Purehealth clinic site, but I’m happy to be educated/persuaded so it fits what you prefer! I’ll let you know the outcome, of course. Thank you for your help.