Knowledge base software (KBS) is a tried and true solution for organizations to create, store and manage content for their company-wide initiatives as well as for their external facing clients. KBS help companies gather a library of useful information to optimize performance and gear everyone into alignment, so operations can run smoothly for all parties.
Knowledge base tools enable high-quality content to be generated and accessed quickly and conveniently, producing a low stress environment where transparency and engagement are both encouraged.
There are tons of KBS solutions on the market, and we wanted to give you the low down on the pros and cons of top-rated products, so you can decide what you might want to integrate within your own establishment.
A KBS is an online platform that uses a knowledge base to solve complex problems and extract the appropriate information from users to provide optimal results. Think of knowledge base software as a help center of sorts.
Essentially, it’s a tool to aid in the creation, organization, and management of content for either internal or external sources–in other words, colleagues or customers, or both.
Within a knowledge base, a user should be able to discover exactly what they are looking for, or stumble upon information they didn’t know they needed to know but can find useful. Knowledge bases are generally maintained by a select few authoritative team members with unique permissions, yet the content within knowledge bases can be consumed by a wider audience–as opposed to wiki guides, which can be manned and operated by a whole community.
Old-school knowledge base software solutions might take on the form of physical documents, such as binders, or clearly labeled and subcategorized filing cabinets. In this day and age, cloud-based documentation systems are the only way to get by when you have a team of employees from all over the globe, perhaps working remotely, that need access to internal documents and centralized resources.
Whether you are a one-man show or working for an organization that employs thousands of people, the way you store information from the get go will, in part, will directly determine the level of success of your product or service.
Think about it this way; if your office is a mess, with papers escaping every drawer, with no alphabetization, organization, etc., how is anyone supposed to find anything or get work done? If information is not discoverable and cohesive, it can get misconstrued and problematic.
Customer support might come up with different answers to the same problem if there isn’t a clearly labeled FAQ or How-to guide that they can locate quickly when on the line with an angry customer. Likewise, you don’t want to have your customer come to a dead end when using your product or service only to find that there is no associated support for their particular issues.
Knowledge bases not only harness consistency within company resources and information, but also encourage transparency and make information and important updates readily available so that everyone can stay on the same page.
What’s more is knowledge bases can reduce training time for new employees as scripts, employee handbooks, HR information, Wi-Fi passwords, company policies, meeting dates and notes, and other info can be located and retrieved in a standardized format.
Aside from B2B and B2C organizations, most college campuses possess a knowledge base to provide students with quick access to information about their school system. Within their knowledge bases you’ll find everything from resources, network and connectivity information, account information, school guidelines and politics, to event details and sports team scheduling. New and returning students alike can look to the knowledge base for FAQs and answers to any of their burning questions.
It’s important to house knowledge in one place to not confuse those who the knowledge is intended for. This software is intended to help internal teams or individuals keep track of their own content, how-to guides, information, codes of conduct, values, company roadmap, and so much more.
Make your own quick-start guide with Almanac’s KBS.
The benefits of a knowledge base solution are boundless, though below we’ve listed a few indispensable reasons to invest in one. Knowledge base software…
Implementing a KBS within your organization is a no-brainer–especially if you’re looking to scale.
The title might be intimidating, but it’s truly quite simple; the repository of helpful information that knowledge base software encompasses gives customers and employees a way to search and locate answers to commonly asked questions relating to a product or service, all by themselves.
Wondering how to change your password? You’ll be able to find it within the knowledge base. Uncertain how to provide affiliate links? Head on over to the knowledge base.
No one is left in the dust when there is an unexpected bug reported, and everyone will have access to the newest, most up-to-date content, so people aren’t having to sift through old or cluttered information. If you need to go back and see versions of a file, you can do so without impacting current docs.
Whether you work for the company or are a customer who utilizes a company's service or product, the knowledge base will take on the form of a website, and you’ll be able to plug in keywords that will lead you to a solidified answer. In order for a company to thrive, especially when starting from ground zero, utilizing a tool to keep content organized and aid in getting employees to understand where all information can be found is vital.
Creating a knowledge base isn’t a walk in the park. It requires meticulous planning, editing, and revising, and most assets will never be static–you’ll need to update them as processes, scripts, and operations within your company change.
In order for a knowledge base to be functional and efficient, you or your designated staff members will need to conduct research to determine what your needs are. Ask yourself questions like….
Once you’ve answered a few guiding questions, the fun part comes next. You’ll get to do a little online shopping and A/B testing to decide which knowledge base software is best for your business. It might be helpful to write a table of contents or guidebook for your knowledge base on a piece of paper or whiteboard, or get going on designing an outline to create a simple structure for your knowledge base in a tool like Almanac.
Once you’ve created your first document, you’ll want to head on over to formatting and create a distinctive theme with a hierarchical pattern that you’ll use across all articles, posts, and assets. Consistency is a very critical element of knowledge base management, but just keep in mind you can change this overarching theme later on if it falls out of alignment with your brand.
Certainly, there are innumerable other aspects of knowledge base creation you’ll want to consider, but that will typically be determined once you get well acquainted with your knowledge base software.
In the competitive world of online repositories, you’ll come to find that they can take on many different shapes and sizes and contain a variety of elements and properties. Some go by monthly subscriptions, some are annual.
You might be drawn to a product that offers more flexibility, where assets are customizable. Or, you might gravitate towards The majority of these products are easy-to-use, however some are a bit more demanding when it comes to learning the system.
As if conjuring up the contents for your knowledge base isn’t a big enough ask, then you have to face the overwhelming task of narrowing down what knowledge base is right for you. That’s why we’ve crafted a dynamic list of knowledge base software products–that way you can place all your focus on the meat of your knowledge base.
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Almanac is a sophisticated yet intuitive self-serve knowledge base software that makes it easy for individuals and teams to collect and manage content, communicate, collaborate, and improve overall productivity. It operates as a centralized hub for coordinating community initiatives, assigning tasks, critiquing products and workflows, creating and collecting files, as well as managing ideas and releases.
You can integrate with your essential applications and choose from over 3,000 open-source templates, so you can get moving with projects efficiently. Almanac’s user-friendly and elegant interface makes work even easier.
One of the main differences between Almanac and other knowledge base software products is their status reports on individual documents. With Almanac, you can use structured workflows to ask for feedback or approval, and share read recipients. It makes collaboration a lot smoother and clearer for everyone involved in the project.
This chart makes it super helpful to see how Almanac works in comparison to other knowledge base platforms:
Another exquisite feature of Almanac is the ability to crowdsource improvements without being disruptive to the main documents. Get feedback, assess, and incorporate easily.
Almanac gives companies a safe and robust space to share critical data and confidential company info. If your company requirements for a knowledge base software are extensive, Almanac will do wonders for you.
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Helpjuice is designed to scale customer support via intuitive help centers. Their analytics features are powerful and beneficial for organizations looking to improve their processes and understand customer interactions on a deeper level. And with multi-language support, Helpjuice offers language options for their global customers.
On the downside, Helpjuice has restrictive color schemes and overall a little outdated UI. User controls and permissions can also be a hindrance to users.
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Zendesk is a popular, reliable, and scalable service that helps your customers get the support they need to stay happy and feel heard. The set-up is simple: you’ll be able to use automation and AI to route your support tickets to the correct channels, taking a load of manual work off your plate so your organization can fry bigger fish.
You can solve customer support tickets coming in from a variety of channels–SMS, phone, email, web, and social media, without having to switch contexts across different platforms. Want to get to know the opinion of your team or users?
Zendesk has tons of self-help community features such as forums, surveys, and polls to give you the inside scoop to suggestions, issues, and feedback from those who use your product the most–or the least.
A couple pitfalls of Zendesk, however, include their own ironically poor and slow customer support–if you are having issues with set up or have questions, it might take a minute to get a response. Users also find it a bit challenging to keep track of progress of support tickets–they can get lost in the matrix.
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If your company’s website application is Wix, you’ll want to investigate Wix Answers, as the platforms and set up are quite similar. Wix Answers is a solid tool for those who need support in building their page, and the design is clean and customizable.
It’s a good service for those who want to help their customers discover answers and solve problems with ease. Analytics are on par and will give you insight into your customer's needs and concerns, and you can personalize your site with or without code.
Note, if your requirements are demanding and require a lot of upkeep, you’ll want to look at a service that offers additional automations and triggers. Internal communication is also a nuance, as notifications, in-line comments, and direct tagging aren’t quite at the level of sophistication that other knowledge base software products have.
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Bloomfire’s cloud-based knowledge engagement platform can serve as a useful and optimized outlet for you to create and share resources in various forms–PDF’s, PowerPoints, videos, etc. In building up this content, you can design a powerhouse of educational materials for your employees and customers. Bloomfire is a highly organized user base that features auto-tagging and AI-driven search suggestions, content recommendations, content moderation, and more.
However, discoverability and overall search functions of Bloomfire are lacking according to customers; Unrelated content is presented to users, providing additional barriers when trying to solve problems. The integration department is also inadequate when placed alongside competitive products.
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Confluence (proprietary software) fuels collaboration with avenues for announcements, challenges, feedback, suggestions, and a space to ask questions. Confluence’s social features enable employees to use their voice and share their knowledge, in turn building a positive company culture.
The platform is also protected by privacy controls and data encryption, so you never have to worry about top secret files or imperative data getting breached. If you use Jira to report and track the progress of bugs, Confluence is a solid choice.
A disadvantage of Confluence is the effort it requires to navigate the system overall–there is without a doubt a learning curve when it comes to understanding the product. Confluence also has a heavy reliance on third party plug-ins because its native features are narrow.
There’s a strong chance you’ll need to develop your own plug-ins in order to fulfill all of your company needs, meaning you’ll need a Java developer on-deck. If your business has more advanced needs, you’ll likely need to self-host, so looking to products like Almanac that have greater capabilities might be a wise decision.
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Notion’s comprehensive and practical asset management software offers calendar management, budget management, performance metrics, and countless other capabilities that will allow your company to flourish.
With Notion’s project planning, scheduling, tracking and workflow functions, all of your employees will feel on top of their tasks and you will be able to create strategic internal processes. Get granular on individual and team progress and manage roadmaps with tactical visuals.
Despite how reasonable and straightforward Notion is, it also comes with a set of impediments that deem it unfit for certain corporations. If you need a platform that provides high level privacy controls and encryption, avoid Notion–your files are not ciphered or secure. Likewise, if you’re looking for a product that encourages collaboration and streamlined communication, Notion might not be the solution for you.
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Click Up is a visually stimulating task management service that offers free training and 24 hour support to ensure you make the most out of the app. With Click Up, you’ll have completely customizable fields, statuses, assignees, hot keys and shortcuts to make the entire experience tailored to your specific needs.
Click Up also offers real-time editing and mentions, 2 way calendar sync, and progress tracking that can help set expectations for your team.
Hierarchy within Click Up can be confusing to grasp, as there are many ways to store and create files, including spaces, folders, lists, tasks, etc. It is a complex platform and thus has a steep learning curve. There are also minimal capabilities when it comes to tracking when exactly work is completed, so while progress is being tracked, it isn’t that easy to identify who has done what and when for how long.
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Intellum’s personalized knowledge-based service will allow you to produce a resilient resource center for customers, partners, and employees to get educated on what your company has to offer. You’ll be able to use rich forms of media such as video tutorials and courses. You can also reward desired behavior with Intellum’s gamification features which will motivate your employees and customers to take initiative. With Intellum, you should expect excellent customer service.
While there’s no denying that Intellum will help your company make knowledge a renewable source, their reporting is notoriously unreliable and requires heaps of manipulation and scrubbing for information to be accurate and useful, which will add extra steps to your already full plate.
Collaboration features present additional problems, as users don’t get notified of when someone is also working on or editing the same media and there aren’t any indications of individual contributions or version histories.
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A customer community platform for B2B SaaS and subscription based companies, Insided prides itself on its ability to drive and build digital customer engagement. Insided helps companies harness ideas and feedback to refine products and scale.
Put ideas in the pipeline and generate polls to determine which ideas take precedence, then set release dates and watch your ideas come to life. Once released, get updates on latest releases to track in real time how your launches are doing.
Insided may be an uncomplicated and easy to use product, though it does have its flaws. Due to its infrastructure, analytic functions fall short. Formatting within Insided can also be touchy, and customization of documentation is meager.
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With Stack Overflow, you can view your schedule and tasks in unique formats such as timeline view and board view to get a clear visualization of what needs to be done when. It also provides site statistics–dissecting these analytics will benefit your online reputation and improve your infrastructure altogether.
Customers claim to have issues with clutter within the support system–while answers to critical questions can be found, there is a lot of repetition and duplicate questions and answers, which clouds discoverability. Users also have difficulty understanding the interface when they’re first starting out with the platform.
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Zoho is a suite of software that is a complete customer relationship management solution for growing businesses and enterprises, and offers tons of productivity features. It can integrate with an extensive list of third-party applications, and makes it simple for customers to deploy a first-rate customer support system for their clients. The features for the knowledge base such as snippets make rapid fire generation of important documents a piece of cake.
Zoho’s interface can be intimidating to those who are more entry level. As a whole, Zoho is a complex system and requires a bit of training in order to make the most out of its services. Another pitfall of Zoho is lack of customization options when it comes to automation, workflow, and UI.
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Document 360 is a software solution to help increase your knowledge at low cost. It can provide useful analytics to direct your team on where traffic is coming from and how long users are spending on specific pages, and you can easily store, share and locate information. It is also user-friendly, aesthetic, and clean.
However, low prices generally come with lack of features, and formatting, importing content, and integrating other platforms is quite limited. Document 360 is a supplemental tool but unlike other KBS’s it is not an all-in-one solution; you’ll need to connect your knowledge base to third-party help desks, chatbots meaning you’ll have to shell out more dough and use more platforms which can be more time-consuming.
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Known for their exception customer support, Happy Fox is a help desk ticketing system that enables fast and reliable support for their clients customers. Happy Fox software provides one unified space for community forums, self-service knowledge bases, and support ticket systems to live. While it is a robust system with supportive live chat and progressive surveys and feedback systems, Happy Fox lacks performance metrics and campaign and email management, which can be a problem for businesses who heavily rely on data to improve internal processes.
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Happy Fox offers a pricing calculator that spits out quotes depending on certain factors including what department your team is in as well as how many agents you have. Below are a few
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Slab’s cloud-based solution has highly-rated live chat support and customer service. Their system gives users quick access to information and ability to categorize content into groups like “weekly planning notes,” “internal wiki guides” and “product roadmaps.” Slab lets you easily toggle between your third-party app integrations like Slack, Dropbox, or Google Drive.
A few limitations of Slab include text formatting restrictions. Currently, it also has limited integration options and embedding less file types than competitors.
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Evidently, one of the main benefits of knowledge base software is that it facilitates knowledge management and knowledge sharing. Whether you are just starting out or have an established company and are looking to transfer your current workflow to a more efficient platform, it’s important to do some research and cross-referencing to identify what KBS best suits your particular needs. Don’t be afraid to A/B test out a few freemium options before going all in!
All KBS’s aside, Almanac puts forward an unbeatable and eclectic range of features that will make creating or transferring a knowledge base system a seamless experience, no matter how tech-savvy you are. Don’t hesitate to try out the beta version to see how your operations can improve.
