Future-proof your knowledge base for your company

Catherine Heath | December 19, 2016

The idea of future-proofing your knowledge base is founded on imagining how your self-service support strategy will develop over time, and the needs you will have for your knowledge base in the future.

It requires applying an integrated awareness of your company’s strategy and planning your knowledge base accordingly. 

Your content for today’s customers will be different from your content next year. Your content needs to be able to scale effectively.

Organizing your content

Organize your content in a logical way so that you can add extra subcategories as your knowledge base becomes more complex. 

Think about your support content as a whole in relation to your customers’ perception of your business. 

Avoid categorizing your content based on internal team structures as these are very likely to change. 

Ensure that your customers are treated to a consistent impression of your company with your knowledge base. 

Avoid duplicate content

Your knowledge base is only useful if helps your customers to find your information. This is why you need to label your content correctly with relevant titles to help you avoid duplicate content. 

Avoid publishing content that’s practically the same article under a different title, and make sure your team coordinates over content production. 

Make your categories broad but descriptive

Your categories should be broad enough to capture all your content but also narrow enough to still have meaning. They should expand effectively as your content strategy grows and you fill your knowledge base with more documentation. 

Your categories should describe your content and also be mutually exclusive with your other categories. This will enable your users to navigate your knowledge base without getting confused. 

Anticipate future content

Anticipate the future content that you’ll produce by leaving spaces for it within your knowledge base content structure. 

Ideally, you should create a plan of your knowledge base including categories and subcategories. This will help you organize your content logically as you post regularly. 

Conclusion

Always keep your customer at the forefront of your knowledge base strategy to help you stay on track. Don’t be afraid to revise and review your content if it’s not working for you. 

Enlist a knowledge leader or documentation manager to have oversight of your knowledge base and to guide it consistently towards the future. 

With a thorough plan and insightful categorization, your knowledge base can scale with your company. 

Ensure your customers are gaining a consistent and cohesive impression of your company, rather than trying to mirror your internal structure with complete accuracy.

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