A New Direction at Benzo Free

We’re making some important changes to Benzo Free this week, and I want to let you know about them.

Social Media — A Lesson Learned

It has recently come to my attention that there has been some concern about the rapid increase in “likes” and “follows” on the Benzo Free Facebook page over the past several months. When I learned of this concern last week, I investigated the issue and uncovered a somewhat surprising source.

It appears that by using Facebook’s own direct advertising to promote our page, Benzo Free has inadvertently acquired a number of “likes” from individuals who apparently have no interest in our content. I want to assure you that acquiring this type of attention was not an intentional act. Benzo Free has never sought artificial “likes” through any source, nor would we ever consider any such action. It’s not who we are.

Still, this is on me. I should have seen this happening. I am new to social media advertising and I was too naive to question its results. In my efforts to remedy the issue, I have taken a hard look at where we should go from here. What is our core focus? Where are our strengths? And, is social media right for us?

Getting Back to Basics

When I launched Benzo Free, my primary goal was to help those who struggle with benzo dependence and withdrawal. My intention was to do this through three key vehicles: the book, the podcast, and the website. As you might have noticed, the Facebook page didn’t even make the list.

I set up a Facebook page out of a false sense of necessity. I convinced myself that a social media presence was required for Benzo Free and the more attention our page attracted, the more time I had to commit to it. I lost focus and learned a valuable lesson. Now, it’s time to get back to basics.

Effective Friday, June 14th, the Benzo Free Facebook page will be taken offline.

It’s no longer needed. There are already many excellent social media resources dedicated to benzos and you can see a list of them in the resources section on our website. They do amazing work and provide tons of wonderful information. Benzo Free will continue to support these organizations and work closely with them going forward.

As for the podcast, don’t worry, it’s not going anywhere. In fact, the podcast will now become our core area of focus and will benefit from less distraction. In addition, the website will receive some much-needed updates and grow to support the benzo community.

So, How Can You Follow Us?

You can stay up-to-date with Benzo Free in three ways:

1. Subscribe to our mailing list— The best way to follow Benzo Free going forward is to subscribe to our email newsletter. This will become our primary communication vehicle where we’ll announce new episodes of the podcast and share other updates.

2. Subscribe to our podcast on one of our carriers — See a complete list of our podcast carriers on our podcast page. We won’t have a new podcast this week (June 12th) since we doubled up last week, but we will be back, with a renewed focus, on Wednesday, June 19th.

3. Visit our website — Visit our website anytime to learn about what’s new at Benzo Free.

Help Us Spread the Word

I appreciate your help in letting others know about Benzo Free. Although we won’t have a direct social media presence for a while, I value the attention it can bring. Feel free to share our podcast and blog posts with others who might find them helpful. We will include social media icons on each post to make this easier.

Thank you to all of you who have listened to the podcast, read our blog, or visited our website. You are the reason why Benzo Free exists, and I am more grateful than ever to have such loyal and caring friends.

Keep calm, taper slowly, and take care of yourself, D :)