3 Tips for Getting Quick Answers to Your Forum Discussions

The E-Learning Heroes community is a fantastic spot for support and resources, but sometimes there’s a lot going on! Since no one wants to feel like they’re shouting into the wind, how do you make sure your forum discussions get noticed? Here are a few tips that can help your discussions grab the community’s attention and get you some answers lickety-split!

Tip #1: Start by Searching

Since E-Learning Heroes is all about asking questions of your fellow e-learning pros, chances are someone else has already asked, and likely answered your question. So before you draft a new discussion thread, try entering a few keywords into the E-Learning Heroes search bar to see if anyone else has posted a similar discussion.

To access search, simply click on the search field anywhere on E-Learning Heroes and type your search terms and hit the Enter button on your keyboard.

E-Learning Heroes will return a list of relevant results in the form of links to how-to and support articles, discussions, series, downloads, and more. 

To narrow your search, just use more specific terms. To broaden the results, simply remove search terms. For more power tips on searching E-Learning Heroes, check out this in-depth article: Using E-Learning Heroes Search Feature to Find What You Need in a Snap.

What about when you find outdated results, or you’re coming up empty after trying different search terms? That could mean you need to strike up a brand-new discussion, open a support case, or maybe submit a feature request. I’ll walk you through each of these options when we get to Tip #3!

Tip #2: Location, Location, Location

E-Learning Heroes is a fantastic spot for starting and participating in conversations. I like to think of it as a bustling metropolis full of different neighborhoods where people gather to share ideas and help each other out.

In E-Learning Heroes, those neighborhoods take the form of discussion forums. You’ll find all of our discussions conveniently grouped under the “Discuss” menu option.

And just like in any big city, with E-Learning Heroes you’re always better off asking for advice from the locals. For instance, a request for help with troubleshooting a trigger in a Storyline 360 project might languish for awhile if you post it in the Building Better Courses forum since that forum tends to focus on general e-learning and instructional design questions. Likewise, community members might be a bit slower to respond to questions about general e-learning or instructional design ideas when they’re posted in software-specific forums.

So how do you know which discussion type goes where? Here’s my rule of thumb:

• Looking to discuss general course building or instructional design questions like “How do you write learning objectives?” or “What tools do you use for project management?” or “What is your design process?”—post those in the Building Better Courses forum. 
• Have a question about how to work with sliders in Storyline 360? Can’t figure out how to change the labels of the process block in Rise 360? Post those discussions in the relevant software forums, either the Storyline 360 forum or the Rise 360 forum. You'll find that E-Learning Heroes gives you access to forums for help with all Articulate 360 products.

These forums are a great way to tap into friendly ELH locals—the folks with software-specific expertise—who can offer up quick answers to all your software how-to questions.

Tip #3: Choose the Best Approach for Your Needs

Before you start drafting a forum discussion, it’s helpful to organize your thoughts and consider what kind of outcome you’re looking for. Do you need immediate help, or do you just need some fresh ideas from another developer? Let’s talk about a few important questions that can help you sort out the best approach for your needs.

Am I looking for technical support?

When you fall off your bike and badly scrape your elbow, the first thing you look for is a bandage—not tips on bike safety—right?

The same logic applies when you hit technical snags with your projects. Whether you’re on a deadline and faced with a technical glitch or struggling to recover from your own user error (hey, we’ve all been there ...), go straight into triage mode and ask our support team for help! Contacting our support team gives you the ability to share your project files with us privately and gets you quickly connected to someone with hands-on technical knowledge. 

There are several ways to contact our support team, but I find typing articulatecase.com into my web browser’s address bar is quickest. Simply fill out the form with as many details as you can and attach any relevant project files.

Am I suggesting a feature?

If you’re working along in Storyline 360 and thinking, “I wish Storyline 360 could do X” or “I wish Y feature was faster or easier to use … ,” by far the best way to share your ideas with us is with a feature request.

That’s because a feature request gives you a chance to explain the problem in your own words, right to our developers. It also gives you a way to tell them how a new feature or an enhancement to an existing feature will solve the problem(s). 

Curious what happens to feature requests after they’ve been submitted? Check out How We Manage Feature Requests.

Do I need tips, ideas, or best practices from my fellow e-learning pros?

Sometimes you just need a fresh pair of eyes on a tricky interaction or a few pro tips for working smarter in Storyline 360. Those make for great, productive discussions.

It’s helpful to keep in mind that most people prefer to skim over content, only deep-diving into the conversations that really catch their eye. This means your goals should be twofold: 1) to entice people to read and respond to your discussion, and 2) to give people just enough detail to be of help or to participate in a good conversation with you—without being overwhelming.

With those goals in mind, here are a few pointers for making sure your discussion posts are both enticing and effective!

• Make it snappy. I know it might sound gimmicky, but giving your discussion a snappy title that’s concise while still providing context for your question is the perfect way to invite others to read more, dive deeper, and engage in helping you. 

• Keep it concise. When you’re new to the neighborhood it’s natural to have a lot of questions. But even the nicest, most welcoming neighbor will be overwhelmed quickly if you ask for all these things at once!
  
  When writing the body of your discussion, aim to summarize your needs in one concise sentence. If you’re struggling to do that, take a step back and edit yourself before you post your discussion. Focus on prioritizing the need-to-know items over the nice-to-know. Generally, you’ll find that grouping related points—even if you end up posting them as separate, discrete discussions—will make it easier for you to keep track of the responses and easier for others to answer you! 

• A picture is worth a thousand words. Troubleshooting a complex interaction can be challenging for the best of us. But when asking the community for help, a lengthy explanation of the behaviors you’re seeing (or not seeing) can take that process from challenging to confusing. That’s where some supporting visuals can do the heavy lifting. 

Our "new discussion" form lets you add screenshots, hyperlinks or video, and attach project files.

When posting a new discussion, choose the link icon to hyperlink selected text in the body of your post. To add an image or a video, click the image or video icons. And to add a file attachment, simply click the Add Attachment button in the bottom left of the text field and then select the appropriate file.

These are just a few pro tips for getting in touch with us and for getting quick answers to your forum discussions. What ELH discussion tips do you have to share? We’d love to hear your ideas and feedback!

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