Live Q&A Guide

Introduction

Viafoura’s Live Q&A allows publishers and organizations to host live, moderated discussions between audience members and designated hosts.

Participants can submit questions, react to others, and view responses in real time, while moderators maintain control over what is visible to the public.

Ideal for Ask-Me-Anything sessions (AMAs), live interviews, expert panels, or event coverage.

Features of Viafoura’s Live Q&A Tool

• Real-time updates: Questions, replies, and reactions appear instantly without page reloads.
• Audience participation: Authenticated users can submit questions, reply, and engage through likes/dislikes.
• Host roles: Staff can join as Hosts with a 'Host' badge and elevated permissions to answer questions as official responses
• Event states: Manage events as “Live” or “Concluded”.
• Announcements: Pin messages to the top of the discussion for event updates or introductions.
• Pre-moderation support: Maintain quality and relevance through content review workflows.
• Moderation controls: Allow the automated moderation system to approve or reject questions and replies, or review and approve all audience submissions before they appear publicly.
• Answered filter Keep answered questions organized and easy to find.

To Create a New Live Q&A

Viafoura Live Q&A require our script to be present on the page it will appear on. Refer to our Getting Started guide for instructions.

In your CMS, create a new article or event page where the Live Q&A will appear.
Add a title, description, and any event details you want to display on your page.

In the article body, at the position you want the Live Q&A to appear, paste the following code snippet:

<vf-livequestions class="viafoura"></vf-livequestions>

If your publishing platform does not automatically generate a unique container ID for the event, include it manually:

<vf-livequestions class="viafoura" vf-container-id="[UNIQUE-ID]"></vf-livequestions>

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Note
Each Live Q&A event must have a unique ID to correctly load and track the event data.

This can be derived from the article slug, date, or a manually assigned identifier.

Launching the Event

Once the Live Q&A tag is properly added to the page:

1. Load the page using an Admin/Staff-level account.
2. The Live Q&A setup container will automatically appear for users with sufficient permissions.
   From this setup container, staff can configure key event details including

• Event Name
• Event Duration
• Auto join as Host
• Reply Settings
• Moderation Settings

Configure your Live Q&A Event

Event Display Name

The name used internally to identify the Q&A. It may default to the article/page title but can be renamed.

Event Duration

The event duration is for display purposes only to inform the audience on the intended event length. This will not automatically start or end the event, that must be completed by the Admin, Staff, or Hosts.

Set yourself as host

During event setup, the user initializing the Live Q&A has the option to automatically set themselves as a Host for the event. Other staff members can also join the event as Hosts once it has been set up and initialized.

Enable Replies

Allow audience members and hosts to reply within question threads.

Pre-Screen Questions and Replies

All audience submissions always pass through Viafoura’s auto-moderation system. When pre-screening is enabled, questions and replies are held for manual approval and only published once a moderator approves them in the Live Q&A moderation tab or Viafoura moderation console.

Once the event setup is successfully completed ('Start Event'), the Live Q&A will initialize and become visible to your audience with the event in Live state.

User Type	View Shown After Setup Completion
Staff/Admin/Host/Moderator
Audience Member

If the setup is not completed, the Live Q&A will remain uninitialized — meaning audience members will not see the Q&A interface until an Admin/Staff user completes the event setup.

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Note
If you don’t see the setup container or event controls, verify that you’re logged in with the appropriate permissions (Admin/Staff).

Host Management

The Host Management section allows eligible staff, moderator, and admin users to manage the public host list for a Live Q&A event.

Join or Leave Host Role

After a Live Q&A event has been created, any staff, moderator, and admin user can add themselves as a host by navigating to the page where the Live Q&A is embedded. In the Host Management section, select 'Join as Host' under your profile to be added to the event’s host list.

A host can remove themselves at any time by selecting 'Leave Host Role'.

Once joined, the user will appear publicly as a host for that Live Q&A event and will be able to participate with host privileges (answering questions).

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Note
There is no limit to the number of hosts that can be added to a Live Q&A event. As more hosts are added, the public host section will expand to accommodate them and may take up more space within the Live Q&A experience.

Remove a Host

Authorized staff, moderator, and admin users can also remove any host from the event’s host list when needed. This is useful if a planned host is no longer available to participate, such as in cases of illness or a scheduling change.

Removing the host ensures they are no longer displayed publicly as a host for that specific event and keeps the host list accurate for participants.

Posting Questions and Answers

When the event is live:

• Audience members can submit questions through the "Ask a question" input box.
  • (If Pre-screen enabled) Moderators review submissions in the Live Q&A moderation tab or Viafoura moderation console.
• Approved questions appear in the Questions tab.
• When a host answers a question, the question (and its nested replies) will also be found in the Answered view.
• Both hosts and audience members can reply and engage in real time.
  • Only hosts can mark replies as answers.

Post Order and Hierarchy

Live Q&A uses a defined post hierarchy to make it easier for participants to follow the most important content during an event.

Questions tab

Within the Questions tab, posts are displayed in the following order:

1. Announcements appear first and are always pinned to the top of the feed. If there are multiple announcements, they are ordered with the newest announcement first (at the top).
2. Questions appear below announcements and are ordered with the newest question first (at the top).
3. Answers appear directly beneath the related question and are prioritized above replies. The earliest answer appears first, with any additional answers shown below it in chronological order (newest answer at the bottom).
4. Replies appear beneath all answers associated with that question. Replies follow normal chronological order, with the oldest reply shown first (at the top) and the newest reply shown last (at the bottom).

This structure helps ensure that official host responses are surfaced prominently while still preserving the natural flow of audience discussion beneath them.

Answered filter

Within the Answered filter, questions are displayed based on the most recent answer, with the latest answered question shown first (at the top).

• The question appears first
• All associated answers are shown beneath the question
• Replies are collapsed by default beneath the answers

This view is intended to help users quickly scan answered questions and review the host responses first.

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Note
Replies from staff or hosts are treated the same as audience replies in the thread hierarchy. They do not receive special priority or placement and will appear in normal chronological order with other replies.

Editing and Removing Posts

Audience members, Hosts, and Staff can manage their own content in real time:

• Edit: Update a question, answer, announcement, or reply you’ve posted.
• Remove/Delete: Remove your own post from the event.

In addition to managing their own posts, Hosts and Staff users can also edit or remove posts made by other users or fellow hosts when necessary to maintain event quality and moderation standards.

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Note
Edited posts keep their original timestamp for transparency, and an edit indicator is shown to users. The audience edit window can be adjusted in the Viafoura Admin Console.

Moderation (Live Q&A)

All audience submissions in Live Q&A — including questions and replies — first pass through Viafoura’s Auto-Moderation System, and, if pre-screening is enabled, are then reviewed by human moderators.

This automated layer applies the moderation rules and configurations set in your Viafoura Admin Console (e.g., banned words, thresholds, and filtering logic).

After the Auto-Moderation check, posts are either held for manual review (if Pre-Screening is ON) or published immediately if approved by Auto-Moderation (and Pre-Screening is OFF).

Key Moderation Details

• The Auto-Moderation layer operates site-wide and is configured through the Viafoura Admin Console.
• Pre-Screening ensures moderators review all posts before they appear publicly.
• Post-Screening (pre-screen disabled) allows instant publication, while still leveraging the auto-moderation layer to filter out risky or disallowed content.
• Moderators can override any automated decision through manual actions in the Live Q&A moderation tab or Viafoura moderation console.

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Note
For the best moderation workflow, it’s recommended to review your Auto-Moderation Settings and Pre-Screen Settings in your Viafoura Admin Console before enabling Live Q&A on a public site.

Moderation Flow

1. User Submits a Post
   The post first passes through the Auto-Moderation system.
2. If Pre-Screening is Enabled (ON):
   • The post is held in a “Pending Review” state.
   • The submitting user sees:

     “PENDING REVIEW”

     
     

   • The post remains hidden from the public 'Questions' tab until a moderator approves & publishes.
   • Once the post is approved, the author of the post no longer sees the "PENDING REVIEW" status on their post.
3. If Pre-Screening is NOT Enabled (OFF):
   • Posts are immediately published after being filtered & approved through the Auto-Moderation system. The author of the approved post no longer sees the "PENDING REVIEW" status on their post.
   • If flagged by auto-moderation, the post will be held for review by a moderator (depending on your site’s configuration).

Moderator Actions

Moderators can take the following actions on any audience post:

Action	Description/Behaviour	What the Author of Post Sees	Example
Approve	Published: The post is approved and made visible to all users.	The “Pending Review” tag disappears and the post appears live. No message is shown.
Spam	Not Published: The post is flagged as spam or unwanted promotional content. It appears published to the original poster but is hidden from all other users.	The post still appears visible to the submitting user only. No message is shown.
Violation	Not Published: The post is flagged for violating site or community guidelines.	“VIOLATES COMMUNITY GUIDELINES"

Methods a Moderator Can Take Action

1. From the post menu directly in the Questions tab

2. From the dedicated Moderation tab within Live Q&A

3. From the Viafoura moderation console (similar to Commenting)

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Note
Moderation actions are synced across the Live Q&A experience and the Viafoura moderation console. Any moderation action taken in one surface is reflected in the others, helping ensure moderators are always working from the same current post state. All moderation actions are also logged with timestamps in the Viafoura moderation console for traceability and reporting.

Ending a Live Q&A Event

When the event concludes, moderators or hosts can click “End Event” to stop new submissions and "Conclude" the event. Before the action is finalized, a confirmation prompt will appear to ensure the event is not ended unintentionally.

Once confirmed, the event transitions to a Concluded state — users can still read existing content and react (like/dislike), but can no longer post new questions or replies.

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Note
Staff, Admin, and Host users can continue posting announcements, questions, answers, replies, and reactions while the event is in the Concluded state.

Additional Live Experience Features

Live Q&A includes real-time experience features that help participants follow the conversation as answers are being written and posted.

Host Is Answering Indicator

When a host begins replying to a question, a Host is answering indicator appears on the post. This lets the audience know that the question is actively being addressed in real time and helps encourage users to stay engaged while the response is being prepared.

Show New Answer Notification

When a new host answer is posted, an inline Show new answer notification will appear within the Live Q&A experience. Selecting this notification brings the user directly to the newly posted answer, making it easier to follow live responses as they come in without needing to manually search through the thread.

Tips for a Successful Live Q&A

• Start with a short announcement post to welcome participants.
• Keep answers/replies concise and on-topic for readability.
• Conclude with a final post thanking participants before ending the event.
• Test event setup with your team before going live to ensure the experience is seamless.

Next Steps

See the Installation Guide to add Live Q&A to your site. Visit the Moderator Console documentation for moderation workflows and permissions.