Internal knowledge base guide

An internal knowledge base is a centralized repository that allows employees to quickly access information and resources, significantly reducing repetitive inquiries by providing easy access to FAQs and standard operating procedures. This promotes better internal collaboration, enhances workplace efficiency, and lowers operational costs. Additionally, AI enhances internal knowledge bases by enabling service teams to swiftly create content, identify gaps, and incorporate AI-powered bots for improved support.

Your business is a treasure trove of information. But storing it across different inboxes, personal files, and within your mind doesn't benefit the company as a whole and can cause confusion, frustration, and inefficiencies on your team. Luckily, an internal knowledge base compiles all that information into a single solution and is accessible to anyone who needs it.

The right internal knowledge base (KB) software can empower your workforce to find solutions on their own. Learn how to create and use an internal KB for your company and how it can facilitate employee experience management.

More in this guide:

• Why do you need an internal knowledge base?
• Benefits of using internal knowledge base tools
• What features should be included in an internal knowledge base?
• How to create and structure an internal knowledge base
• The 5 best internal KB software
• How to choose the right internal knowledge base software
• Best practices for an internal knowledge base
• Frequently asked questions
• Try AI-powered internal knowledge base software for free

Similar to how customers benefit from external knowledge base software to learn about your product or service, employees also require an internal knowledge base to excel in their roles. Implementing a knowledge base focused on internal use helps ensure that all employees have access to the same information. Employees can use it as a self-service feature, eliminating the need to hunt around for what they’re looking for.

A company knowledge base can benefit your operations in many ways. Here’s a rundown of some of the advantages the best internal knowledge bases offer:

Boosts employee productivity

Internal knowledge bases can dramatically improve employee productivity by serving as a centralized repository of information, ensuring that employees have immediate access to the resources they need. This eliminates the time spent searching for documents, instructions, or best practices scattered across various platforms or held by individuals.

Maintains service quality while scaling and lowering costs

Internal knowledge bases can help scaling businesses maintain service quality by providing a single source of truth, ensuring that employees can access consistent, accurate information. This centralized repository minimizes errors and discrepancies that can arise from relying on multiple, fragmented sources of information.

Additionally, generative AI integration allows for rapid content creation and revisions, keeping the knowledge base current without requiring extensive manual effort. Ultimately, this helps teams do more without increasing costs.

Empowers HR teams to deliver great service at scale with AI

AI-driven tools can automate tasks that HR teams regularly encounter, such as answering payroll questions, onboarding new service reps, and managing compliance training. Additionally, AI chatbots can answer routine questions 24/7, freeing HR professionals to focus on strategic initiatives and personalized employee interactions.

This streamlined approach to knowledge sharing enables HR help desk systems to efficiently support a growing workforce, enhance employee satisfaction, and maintain high service standards.

Protects sensitive information

Internal knowledge bases play a crucial role in safeguarding sensitive business information. By centralizing confidential data like financial records, trade secrets, and customer details in a secure knowledge base, they minimize the risk of unauthorized access.

Furthermore, businesses can implement access controls to restrict information based on employee roles and permissions. This focused approach prevents sensitive information from being scattered across unsecured personal devices or email inboxes, significantly reducing the vulnerability to data breaches and leaks.

Every business has different priorities, but these are some of the most important features an internal KB should have:

• Generative AI content creation and knowledge management tools: These tools use artificial intelligence to automatically generate, organize, and manage content within the knowledge base. They streamline the content creation process, ensuring that information is up-to-date, accurate, and well-structured.
• AI agents: These advanced chatbots interact with users, answer queries, and provide assistance by leveraging the knowledge base. They use natural language processing (NLP) and machine learning to understand and respond to user questions, resolve requests, and reduce the need for human intervention.
• Security: Ensure that the knowledge base is protected from unauthorized access, data breaches, and other cyber threats. These features include access control, encryption, authentication protocols, and regular security audits.
• Generative search: AI can build on traditional search functionality by understanding the context and intent behind user queries, delivering more accurate and relevant results. It can also generate summaries and suggest additional resources, making it easier for users to find comprehensive answers quickly.
• Article multiplacement: Place the same piece of content in multiple categories or sections within the knowledge base so relevant information is easily accessible to different audiences, improving content discoverability and usability.
• Employee portal solution: This centralized hub provides employees with access to the knowledge base, company resources, tools, and communication channels.

What to include in your company’s internal knowledge base is entirely up to you and the needs of your employees. Really think about what everyone needs to be as productive as possible.

Implementing an effective internal knowledge base involves more than selecting software and populating it with information. You still need to determine a structure for organizing your information. While AI can significantly streamline this process, careful planning is still essential. Follow these steps to ensure information can be shared effectively and accurately throughout your organization.

1. Use AI and support data to identify topics to write about

AI can analyze patterns in employee queries, support tickets, and usage metrics to pinpoint common questions and recurring issues employees face. By leveraging this data, organizations can proactively develop knowledge base articles that address these specific needs, thereby reducing the volume of repetitive inquiries and enhancing the overall efficiency of support teams.

AI can also identify knowledge gaps, suggesting new topics that align with emerging trends or common pain points. This data-driven approach ensures that the knowledge base evolves with the organization's needs, providing targeted, high-impact resources that drive productivity and user satisfaction.

2. Leverage AI to help you write content faster

Generative AI can expedite content creation by automating the drafting process. It can transform raw information and data into coherent, well-structured articles. This technology can also write complete articles, expand bullet points, and revise out-of-date content. Moreover, generative AI can handle repetitive or complex documentation tasks, allowing human writers to focus on tailoring the content to meet specific needs.

3. Try AI-powered search functions

Employing advanced algorithms and NLP allows AI-powered search functions to understand the context and nuances of user queries, delivering more precise and relevant results. It can also learn from previous interactions to continuously improve its search capabilities and personalize results based on user behavior and preferences. This intelligent search functionality ensures that employees quickly access the most pertinent information, reducing frustration and downtime.

4. Consider your audience

Businesses operating in multiple regions often require separate knowledge bases to effectively address the diverse needs, languages, and cultural nuances of their global workforce and customer base.

Tailoring knowledge bases for different regions ensures that content is accurately translated and culturally relevant, providing clear and understandable information to all users. This localization helps maintain consistent messaging that resonates with local audiences, adheres to regional regulations, and reflects market-specific practices.

5. Structure content so it’s well organized

Internal knowledge bases are usually structured in three ways:

• Structure it by department: Customer service, HR, and IT—among others—have their information separated so it’s easy to find.
• Structure it by role or user type: New employees, management, and engineers all require unique reference material, so it can be beneficial to cater to their needs.
• Create sections based around frequently asked questions: Centralizing related questions—like IT issues, expenses, or benefits—can help users get ahead of follow-up questions.

These are just a few broad options for structuring your KB. Depending on your content depth, you’ll likely need a more granular hierarchy, like adding article categories.

6. Measure and update content continuously

Regularly analyzing usage metrics, agent feedback, and search queries helps identify outdated information, content gaps, and areas needing improvement. This ongoing evaluation ensures that the knowledge base evolves with the organization's needs, industry changes, and emerging trends, providing employees and customers with the most current and effective solutions.

Here are five internal knowledge base providers and the key tools they provide for managing content.

• Zendesk
• Help Juice
• Document360
• Confluence
• Nuclino

1. Zendesk

Zendesk offers a robust knowledge base system as part of its service desk software that enables employee self-service. With native generative AI, internal support teams can quickly generate a library of help articles and company documentation. AI can use employee engagement data to identify content gaps and recommend new topics.

Companies have full control over the look and layout of their knowledge base, including the employee help desk system it resides in. Teams can collaborate while writing articles, pulling in subject matter experts to fact-check and improve information. Content blocks further improve knowledge management by allowing you to make a single update to content and see the change published across every page the block is linked to.

Zendesk’s knowledge base seamlessly integrates with the Zendesk ticketing system to streamline support operations. Zendesk AI agents are available 24/7 to answer questions and suggest relevant articles, so agents are never left waiting for assistance. Additionally, HR and IT team members can quickly add AI-sourced article recommendations to support tickets, ensuring consistent information and faster resolution times.

Enterprise-grade security tools give managers granular control over information access. You can permit entire departments, individual employees, and external partners to view, edit, and publish content so everyone can view the information that is relevant to their needs without compromising sensitive employee and company data.

Pricing: Plans start at $19 per agent/month, billed annually. 14-day free trial available.

Explore more Zendesk pricing plans.

2. Helpjuice

Helpjuice is a cloud-based knowledge base software solution. Its no-code content authoring and formatting tools allow users to create and structure articles using a drag-and-drop interface. Furthermore, Helpjuice offers rich text formatting options, image and file embedding, and PDF integration.

Another notable feature of Helpjuice is its article versioning system. This tool tracks all article changes, allowing users to revert to previous versions if necessary. This provides a traceable record of content evolution for situations where regulatory compliance or historical reference is required.

Helpjuice also includes resources to extend the availability of articles. For instance, it provides the ability to set up automatic translations for articles, catering to a multilingual audience. Additionally, granular access controls allow administrators to restrict article visibility based on user roles or permissions.

Finally, Helpjuice offers built-in analytics that tracks user search queries and content engagement, providing insights into what information is most sought after and how effectively the knowledge base is serving its purpose. Businesses can use analytics to measure the impact of their knowledge base at different points in time to see how many potential help tickets were avoided.

Pricing: Plans start at $120 per month for four users. A 14-day free trial is available.

Recommended reading: Learn how Helpjuice integrates with Zendesk.

3. Document360

Document360 is a self-service platform that includes tools for managing internal knowledge bases. The software lets businesses create, organize, and publish documentation, including standard operating procedures, FAQs, and employee handbooks. It provides tools for categorizing and structuring content so employees can find the information they need.

Additionally, Document360 offers a business glossary feature, which serves as a centralized repository for defining key terms and concepts relevant to your organization. Beyond internal knowledge management, Document360 caters to external audiences as well. It includes built-in SEO tools to make articles discoverable in public search engine results.

Document360 analytics features include automated health check metrics that identify potential issues within your knowledge base, such as outdated content or broken links. Health checks can also include analyzing an article’s readability, content relevance, and keyword optimization.

The ticket deflection system can recommend answers within the knowledge base to users who would otherwise reach out for support. Businesses can set this system up to ask qualifying questions to narrow down issues. Finally, Document360 supports documentation workflows with collaborative editing tools, version control, and approval processes so teams can control the content creation experience.

Pricing: Plans start at $149 per project/month, billed annually. A free plan and a 14-day free trial are available.

Recommended reading: Learn how Document360 integrates with Zendesk.

4. Confluence

Confluence, developed by Atlassian, is a team workspace software that lets groups create and share knowledge. Its real-time page editor allows multiple team members to edit and update pages simultaneously. Team members can see each other's edits, reducing the risk of version control issues. Employees can also leave comments on the page, including visual elements like GIFs and emojis.

Confluence Spaces act as virtual workrooms where teams can organize related content around specific projects, departments, or topics. This lets marketing, product, and business strategy teams have dedicated places to work without the clutter of other departments.

Furthermore, Confluence offers built-in databases that function as flexible tables to store and manage data within your knowledge base. Businesses can use this for anything from customer contact lists to product specifications.

Confluence natively integrates with other Atlassian products, like Jira, a project management tool. This integration allows teams to link Confluence knowledge base articles directly to Jira issues or projects, connecting workflows and making information available across platforms.

Pricing: Plans start at $600 per year, billed annually. A free plan and a seven-day free trial are available.

Recommended reading: Learn how Confluence integrates with Zendesk.

5. Nuclino

Nuclino software offers a centralized hub for project and knowledge management. The knowledge base provides pre-built templates for various content types, such as wikis, meeting notes, or product roadmaps. The version history feature allows users to see past versions of any page or item, enabling them to revert to previous versions if needed.

Additionally, the audit log tracks who made changes and when, providing a record of activity for compliance purposes or understanding collaboration patterns. Nuclino offers editing restrictions to control access and manage user permissions. This ensures that only authorized users can create or edit specific content, preventing accidental modifications or unauthorized access to sensitive information.

Beyond core knowledge base functionalities, Nuclino incorporates project management features so teams can create tasks, assign them to members, and track progress within the same platform. The Nuclino Sidekick is an AI-powered assistant that can help employees brainstorm ideas, write messages, and create images based on user prompts.

Pricing: Plans start at $5 per user/month, billed annually. A free plan and a 14-day free trial are available.

Internal knowledge base tools specialize in different applications. Here are some questions to consider when looking for the best software to suit your needs.

Assess AI capabilities

AI can significantly enhance both content creation and retrieval processes. With advanced AI features, you can leverage generative AI to quickly produce and update content, streamlining your knowledge management system and ensuring that information remains current and relevant.

AI-driven search and recommendation systems can further optimize content retrieval by intelligently identifying and presenting the most relevant information based on context and user queries. This integration accelerates content creation and improves efficiency in finding and utilizing knowledge, leading to a more productive and well-informed workforce.

Consider its scalability and configurability

Scalability directly impacts your ability to accommodate future growth and changing organizational needs. If software is rigid in its offerings and unable to grow, it can create pain points for customers and employees rather than solve them. Whether you have more employees using the internal knowledge base, a growing team to manage it, or increased content hosting needs, the software must expand and adjust with you.

Prioritize a low total cost of ownership

While the up-front cost of the software itself is important, it's equally vital to consider the long-term expenses associated with implementing and maintaining an internal knowledge base. Your total cost of ownership (TCO) will go up if the initial setup requires upgrading your infrastructure or hiring a system admin. Similarly, if it takes weeks to train your team and comes at an additional cost, it will affect your TCO.

Look for a fast time to value and ease of use

Time to value refers to how long it takes to realize the benefits of implementing internal knowledge base software. Look for a solution that offers a straightforward setup process, user-friendly interfaces, and intuitive configurations. If the software is easy to use, it makes the onboarding process a breeze so your employees can start using it sooner and adopt the new platform into their daily workflows.

When you start creating your business’s internal knowledge base, you might encounter growing pains as you discover what works and what doesn’t. Here are some tips to cut down on the learning curve so you can optimize the knowledge base faster:

• Control access: Designate specific permissions for different user groups or individuals to protect sensitive information. For example, HR documents might be restricted to HR personnel, while the sales team can access sales data.
• Incorporate AI-powered bots: AI-powered bots can instantly respond to employee queries by identifying and delivering relevant KB articles, providing accurate and timely solutions without human intervention. By leveraging NLP, chatbots and AI agents can understand the context of inquiries and offer information drawn directly from the knowledge base, ensuring response consistency in responses.
• Design it to reflect your brand: Tailor the content's appearance and tone to align with your brand’s fonts, colors, and logo. The KB maintains a cohesive look that reinforces the company's brand image among employees.
• Establish content approval and publishing workflows: A well-defined process ensures that content aligns with the company's messaging and streamlines the path to publication so all checks and balances are employed as quickly as possible.

As your business’s policies change and documentation needs to be updated, it’s important to periodically revisit and revise your practices so your knowledge base is as effective as possible.