About ISC

Internet Systems Consortium (ISC), a small non-profit organisation that has been operating since 1994, creates and maintains Internet infrastructure software. They develop and distribute open-source Internet networking software packages for service providers and enterprises. They make three different software packages to help the Internet run safely and seamlessly. Their products help to manage the Domain Name System and track and assign the IP addresses that in turn make the Internet work. Though ISC is a non-profit organisation, they fund their operations through customer support contracts for their software.

The challenges faced

Suzanne Goldlust, Marketing Manager of ISC.org, reports that ISC used a different knowledge base product before Document360. Their previous knowledge base, which they began using in 2012, had many features but was challenging to use and maintain. In 2018, ISC began looking for another tool that was easier to navigate for both end-users and ISC staff.

• Their documentation should be frequently updated but only by their non-technical staff.
• Though the system was good, they had to spend hours on training the non-technical staff on how to use the tool.
• The previous tool was not that user-friendly, and it was highly time-consuming

The business needs

ISC’s open-source software can be downloaded and used by anyone on the Internet for free, but the company only provides support to paying customers. However, both customers with support contracts and general Internet users needed to be able to access certain basic information about ISC’s software. Document360 provided ISC with good product features to manage its knowledge base effectively. By choosing Document360, they offer how-to guides, best-practices advice articles, security updates, etc. Their major business needs are:

• A public knowledge base to help all their customers.
• A tool that is intuitive and easy to use.

How Document360 helps to support their business

Since migrating to Document360 in 2019, ISC.org has seen significant improvement in its knowledge base. With the features available in Document360, it was easy for them to make their documentation look better, which helped their customers to answer their queries more easily. This cut down the number of support tickets and gave the support staff time to respond to more complex issues.

Document360 has a much easier user interface than the previous tool we were using.

Depending on the content of an article in the knowledge base, different ISC team members are involved in editing and writing the articles in Document360. The marketing team oversees the process, while the engineering and support team members contribute technical information. Although ISC does not have a fixed review process, its goal is to review all the knowledge base content every six months. Document360’s tag manager is a valuable tool.

The built-in templates are very helpful for ISC’s documentation, and Suzanne emphasizes that it is a big feature for their business. For instance, in the event of a software vulnerability, ISC must diagnose the issue and create a patch, and then publish the details for their customers. They accomplish this using template in Document360, which allows them to streamline the process.

According to Suzanne, “Document360’s user interface is easy to navigate, and the search function works well.”

Closing line

Looking back at the journey with Document360 since 2019, Suzanne mentions that many of ISC’s feature requests have been implemented by the Document360 team, which has made ISC a happy customer. Other feature updates have also benefitted their business.

Suzanne concludes,

Document360, in general, has made our knowledge base management process easier.