What Is a Knowledge Base and Why Do You Need One?

Feeling inundated with the data and constantly searching for a small piece of information from the huge pile of documentation? A knowledge base can solve your problem! It organizes all your important information in a central repository, and you can quickly find it with quick search capabilities, reducing clutter and boosting productivity.

This article will explain a knowledge base, why your company needs one, and how to use it. By the time you finish reading, you’ll understand how a knowledge base can simplify your work and keep everyone—including millennials—happy with fast, easy access to information.

What is a Knowledge Base?

A knowledge base is a central hub for storing and retrieving essential information, documents, and resources. It helps teams collaborate by sharing insights, encourages continuous learning from past experiences, sparks new ideas, and adapts as your organization grows, keeping all information current and relevant.

Types of Knowledge Bases

The two types of knowledge bases are:

Internal Knowledge Base

Companies use an internal knowledge base as a private platform to help staff collaborate and centralize company info. It stores resources like company policies, training materials, project specifics, and best practices, all intended for internal use. 

External Knowledge Base

An external knowledge base, also called a customer-facing knowledge base, is a public site where customers and potential clients can find details about a company’s products and services. It can be accessed online and includes help articles, FAQs, how-to guides, and user manuals.

Why You Need a Knowledge Base?

A knowledge base influences how a company handles its data. Think of a central hub where staff can find the information they need—this saves time. 

Gartner reports that good use of a knowledge management system can lower operating costs by 25%. This means customers can quickly and easily find the information they need. 

Bernhard Reiterer, Founder of Smart Ident, says, “Better use of Document360 has made our knowledge base a stronger business card for our customers.” 

The perks go beyond internal. A well-set-up knowledge base helps customers self-serve better by giving quick answers, leading to happier and more loyal clients. 

Additionally, a well-tuned knowledge base can increase website visits, helping your business grow. David Ingram, Senior Technical Writer at Mindful by Medallia, says, “Since we moved our knowledge base to Document360, both internal and external users prefer it over their documents.” So, improving your knowledge base isn’t just smart—it’s key to keeping customers happy and increasing product use.

Benefits of Having a Knowledge Base

A knowledge base improves your internal processes and boosts customer experience and satisfaction. But that’s not all, here are some of the benefits of having a knowledge base:

Increase the Productivity of Your Team

Think of a central place to store and find all your key info. That’s what a knowledge base does—you won’t need to dig through emails or ask around anymore. It helps team members talk to each other, gets new hires up to speed quicker, and lets you fix problems. 

Reduce Onboarding Costs

Knowledge bases act as your team’s go-to resource for getting new people up to speed. Fresh hires can access all the essential information at their own pace, which helps them become more productive.

Since fresh hires can access information at their own pace, training time will be reduced, and you can cut onboarding costs by up to 50%. This will allow you to save more money while enhancing productivity.

Take a look at how Document360 simplified VIEW’s new customer onboarding:

Improves Knowledge Sharing and Collaboration

A knowledge base acts as a bridge to better collaboration, boosting teamwork and making the team more productive. 

Employees across departments can also add their tips and insights, making the resource even more valuable, which in turn reduces silos. 

Store Company Knowledge and Improve Company Valuation

A knowledge base acts as your company’s brain, keeping all your important information in one tidy place. Think about finding rules and the best ways to do things —you get more done and mess up less. Smart leaders make smarter choices, which impresses investors. As your company grows, so does the knowledge base. It changes how things work, protects key ideas, and makes your company worth more. Companies that manage knowledge well are 2.5 times more likely to lead the market, says APQC. 

Reduce Customer Support Cost

Customers enjoy getting fast answers!

Self-service options cut costs and save time; a knowledge base plays a key part in making this happen. 

After implementing Document360, we observed significant time savings and a remarkable reduction in support calls and tickets by 15%, says Fastmag’s CEO . Fewer tickets allow your agents to tackle complex issues, which lowers labor costs and increases productivity.  

With a knowledge base, you can cut your support costs by up to 33% and boost overall effectiveness. This helps both your team and your budget.

Higher customer satisfaction

Picture needing help and getting it, without any wait.

That’s what a knowledge base gives your customers. It lets them find answers on their own, making them feel important and respected. They can access clear, correct, and in-depth info, reducing frustration and leading to better experiences. This simple access and ability to help themselves builds trust and loyalty. Customers like a company that gives them the tools to fix problems. 

In a nutshell, a well-made knowledge base boosts satisfaction by offering fast, dependable, and easy-to-reach support whenever they need it.

Reduce Customer Wait Times

A knowledge base works as a quick problem-solver, cutting wait times and boosting satisfaction. Bain & Company finds that fast replies can boost retention by 5-10%. 

With instant access to FAQs and troubleshooting guides, your support becomes more productive and useful, changing long waits into quick fixes. It’s like having a helper on hand 24/7. HubSpot reports that 90% of customers think a quick response (30 minutes or less) matters a lot. Fast fixes for enhanced user experience…

To sum up, a knowledge base boosts your team’s productivity, reduces expenses, enhances collaboration, preserves crucial information, and increases customer satisfaction. It’s a wise investment that yields benefits in numerous ways.

What to Include in Your Knowledge Base?

Here’s what you should include to make it thorough and useful:

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

FAQs give answers to questions that users or customers ask. Think about the queries your support team hears most. For example, if you run a software company, an FAQ might tackle the question, “How do I reset my password?” FAQs help save time by offering quick fixes to common issues.

Document360 FAQ section helps users find answers to common problems quickly, making it a key part of their support plan.

Tutorials & How-to Guides

How-to guides and tutorials give you a clear roadmap to use your products or services. These guides cover everything from simple jobs to tricky processes. They help customers get the hang of your product and use it well.

Example: Document360 is full of how-to videos, such as how to navigate from your onboarding page, use Eddy-AI Assistant, etc. These tutorials are incredibly valuable for visual learners.

Community Section

A community section gives users a space to talk, ask questions, and swap tips. This can be a forum or a social media group where people lend a hand to each other. It creates a feeling of belonging and can ease the workload on your support team as folks find answers from other users.

Example: The Apple Support Community is a great spot where users share fixes and advice, improving the overall support experience.

News and Updates Section

Keeping your users informed about the latest news and updates is crucial. This section should include information about new features, updates, upcoming events, or any changes that might affect users. It keeps your audience engaged and informed.

Example: Slack’s updates page regularly informs users about new features and improvements, ensuring everyone stays up-to-date.

Reference Documentation

Reference documentation provides detailed technical information about your products or services. This can include API documentation, system requirements, troubleshooting guides, and more. It’s particularly useful for developers and advanced users who need in-depth information.

Including these elements in your knowledge base creates a powerful resource that helps users find the information they need. A well-structured knowledge base enhances your company’s efficiency and productivity—a win-win!

Best practices for managing a knowledge base

Creating and managing a knowledge base isn’t just about filling it with information; it’s about making sure the information is useful, accessible, and up-to-date. Here’s how you can achieve that:

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Advanced Search functionality to find answers, optimized for devices

You type “how to reset pa” and before you’re done typing, you get the exact guide you need. This happens because clever algorithms get what you’re asking and can handle different words that mean the same thing. You can narrow down your search using filters and sorting choices. Want to sort by when something was posted or how popular it is? No problem – you can find the most helpful articles in no time.

Imagine a clean easy-to-use search that fits your screen. You’ll find what you need with just one tap, no eye strain or endless finger-flicking is needed. As you type helpful suggestions pop up to guide you to the right info.

Address the User’s Pain Points

Look into common problems through support tickets, surveys, and feedback. Create clear, action-oriented articles that fix them, such as step-by-step guides with pictures, that fix these issues. Use words that click with users to make the content feel familiar. Give practical fixes, steering clear of fuzzy instructions. Keep checking feedback to ensure the content stays on point. By zeroing in on user headaches, you build a more effective, user-friendly knowledge base, boosting user experience and cutting down on the need for direct help.

Set the hierarchy of Content for easy navigation

A well-structured knowledge base is like a library where every book sits in its right spot helping users find info and making their experience better.

How can you make this happen?

• Put articles into groups like “Getting Started” and “Troubleshooting,” with sub groups such as “Account Setup” under “Getting Started”
• Pick titles like “How to Set Up Two-Factor Authentication” instead of just “Security.”
• Add breadcrumbs like “Home > Getting Started > Account Setup.”
• Put in a search bar to find things.
• Stick to the same layout for articles starting with a summary then step-by-step instructions, and ending with related articles.

This ensures that users have a smooth and productive experience.

Use powerful visuals

A picture tells a thousand words in a knowledge base. Visual aids make complex info simpler and improve user experience. Use:

• Screenshots and GIFs to show steps.
• Video tutorials for tricky procedures.
• Infographics for eye-catching summaries.
• Consistent style to make sure all visuals match branding rules.

Infographics, screenshots, and videos make instructions clearer and more interesting, like watching a video guide instead of reading a long text manual.

Keep your knowledge base up-to-date with user input and product changes

Update regularly based on user feedback and product updates

Your information center should always grow. Frequent updates ensure content stays current and correct. How?

• User Input: Let users score articles and give ideas to make them better.
• Change Tracking: Log all updates and go back if needed.
• Content Check: Update popular or much-discussed articles.
• Team Effort: Add new or changed features to the knowledge base

Measure the effectiveness using Analytics

Analytics reveal how well your knowledge base is performing. This insight helps you refine content and show its value.

• Monitor page views and time spent on articles to see what users engage with most.
• Check if users are finding and using the information they need to solve their problems.
• Gather user ratings and comments to understand what’s working and what isn’t.
• Measure how the knowledge base impacts support tickets or product usage.
• Review and share performance reports to make data-driven improvements.

Analytics keep your knowledge base relevant and effective, enhancing user satisfaction and efficiency.

Examples of Top-Notch Knowledge Bases

Spotify

An excellent example of a well-designed integrated knowledge base that is easily accessible and contains all the necessary help is Spotify. 

It is quite informative and covers almost everything, from how to download and install the application to some of the most frequent problems users are likely to encounter. It also contains articles, tutorials, and frequently asked questions addressed to both inexperienced and experienced customers. 

Spotify used its own music experts’ knowledge base and insights. With OpenAI’s Generative AI, the DJ can share this commentary with app users. Unlike ChatGPT, which uses information from the entire web, Spotify’s focused music knowledge base ensures the DJ’s comments are relevant and accurate.

Ahrefs

Ahrefs is one of the best SEO tools, and it has an extensive knowledge base that can guide users on how best to use the tool. It comprises pages with articles containing manually written instructions, video tutorials, and online webinars dedicated to the fundamental and relatively complicated features of the interface, armaments, and ranking and optimization tools. 

Ahrefs’ knowledge base is designed so that a user can easily search the database and enhance his/her SEO knowledge. As of today, the site of Ahrefs is visited by over 1 million users every day. With over 5 billion pages in its index, it gives a perspective of the vast information that is available.

Stripe

Its knowledge base is famous for its clarity and richness, with the developers so that they can implement Stripe’s payment services. It ranges from a clear and detailed API reference section, tutorials, or the API help and supports frequently asked questions and answers section. 

Stripe offers a knowledge base for both developers and business owners for clarity. Stripe has handled billions of dollars for millions of businesses globally, thus pinpointing the extent of dependency on its cogent reference library.

Besides, these knowledge bases are useful not only as information sources but also as tools for improving the user experience by offering hints on possible answers to the encountered problems and guides on efficient utilization of the tools.

Conclusion

A knowledge base is not just an addition to your business; it’s a remarkable asset that can enhance productivity, reduce costs, and improve customer satisfaction. By investing in a well-structured knowledge base and adhering to best practices, you’re setting the stage for a more informed team and happier customers.

An intuitive AI-powered knowledge base software to easily add your content and integrate it with any application. Give Document360 a try!

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