A knowledge base is the organization's second memory — and like any memory, it misleads when cluttered and stale. These rules come from watching our users work:
Authoritative copies only. The most common mistake is uploading three versions of one policy. Decide the reference copy before uploading; a document's new version should replace the old one, not sit beside it.
Topical separation over one big warehouse. Several focused bases — “HR policies”, “product docs”, “support knowledge” — make answers sharper and sharing simpler: each colleague reaches only what they need.
Human-readable names and structure. “travel-policy-2026.pdf” beats “Scan_0023.pdf”; a document with clear headings produces better answers too.
Real text, not pictures. Text-based files (textual PDFs, Word) give the best results; don't expect miracles from low-quality image scans.
An owner and a review date. Give every knowledge base an owner and a simple cadence: say, at each quarter's start, expired documents get removed or refreshed. An ownerless knowledge base slowly turns into an archive nobody trusts.
Test with real questions. After every update, ask five real questions and compare the answers against the documents — five minutes, full peace of mind.
The step-by-step guide to your first knowledge base is in the docs.