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Best practices to ensure an effective knowledge repository for clients

Business Cloud Collaboration
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knowledge repository best practices

 

We’ve come a long way since postal letters, fax machines and telephones. Now that we’re living in a world where information can be accessed at the click of a button, we expect our machines to be able to keep up, which has ultimately lead to today’s instant availability of social media, instant messaging and corporate cloud-based tools.

The problem is, we no longer have the patience to wait for the information that we need – both in our personal lives and professionally. Looking at the latter – you could, ironically, take time to build up a comprehensive knowledge repository within your existing portal. Doing so will ensure important information can be made easily accessible for clients, heightening their customer experience.

What might start as a small collection of frequently asked questions, may lead to a rich database of information – from login details to user support guides and external links. All of which can be made instantly available to clients from within the security of their client portal.

It’s a great start by deciding to create a knowledge repository – it’s another task to make it as useful as possible for clients. Read on for best practices on making the best use of a newly created knowledge base.

Keep titles short and specific

There’s no need to overcomplicate your content titles. Use simple and concise language, so clients will understand exactly what to find when they click the link. Examples can include ‘Invoice Software Login Information’, ‘How To Upload Documents Into Company Name Portal’, and ‘Company Name Frequently Asked Questions’. It’s up to you with how complex you make your repository, however, simple titles should keep things organized – no matter the amount of content you’ve included.

Link to other internal and external content

When you’ve gone to the trouble of setting up a repository for clients, you can utilize the rest of your portal by linking to other internal documentation and pages, making it even easier to navigate around and find the information that is needed. And linking away from your portal will be equally as valuable, say, if your clients need to access external tools or websites quickly and with ease.

Make the most of the search bar

“Where can I find information on this?” “What about this?” “Can you show me how to do this?” – there is no point in setting up a knowledge repository if you aren’t going to make it as user-friendly as possible for clients. By adding tags to your content, clients will also be able to type their query into the universal search bar to get their answers (so long as you carefully crafted your titles to use simple and concise language – see point 1).

Keep it neat with templates

You can make it just as easy for yourself when creating the content, as it is for your clients to access it. Copy and pasting templates will improve the speed at which you are able to make information available to clients. For instance, you can effectively break down larger categories, such as common questions or how-to guides, by duplicating an existing page (or setting it as a template) and simply editing the content within your copied pages. It’s simple and effective.

Remember to audit your content

Finally, to maximise the potential of your repository, content should always be kept up to date. Conducting content audits, whether that’s monthly or even yearly, will ensure that clients are not being provided with out-of-date information, which is counterproductive and can cause unnecessary inconvenience to both yourself and your clients.

A well-maintained knowledge repository allows important content to be made available online and from within a secure and central location. And so when clients are able to utilize a repository in order to retrieve information themselves, without being left on hold or having to send follow-up emails, their sense of satisfaction will increase their loyalty to your business; proving to be a win-win situation for all.

Clinked can help you keep your information in one place, with customized and secure portals. Clients can access their documents, discussions, events, a repository of information and more – all from a centralized environment. Get started today.

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