It’s essential to have a well-organized Answers knowledge base so Agents can access Answers to frequently asked questions as quickly and successfully as possible. Here are some recommendations to help you get the most out of your knowledge base:
- To start, gather your Customers’ most common questions so you can develop dedicated Answers that address the issues that most Customers have.
- Produce content that varies by response length, Channel, or language to ensure that your Customers are served with the right message on the right Channel.
- Add internal Reference Answers, such as standard operating procedures, into Answers alongside the Customer-facing responses.
- If you roll out new Channels over time, build upon your existing Answer content to minimize workload and ensure a consistent brand voice across Channels.
See Create and Edit Answers to learn how to add and manage Answers.
General best practices #
Here are a few tips to keep in mind when creating your Answers knowledge base:
- The more specific you make the Answer title and content, the easier it will be for Agents and Customers to find the Answer they’re looking for.
For example, if your company has multiple Answers about your return policy, be specific in the way you name and write each of these answers so Agents and Customers don’t have to spend time filtering through the search results to find which of the three return policies they’re looking for.
- Utilize Variables to automatically pull essential information, such as Customer First Name, Agent Name, Customer Phone Number, etc., into an Agent’s reply. This will enable faster response times and prevent accidental typos in key details.
- Create Placeholders to send personalized responses to Customers, including an [order number] or [acknowledging the Customer’s issue]. Agents can’t send a reply until Placeholders are filled in, so you don’t need to worry about Customers receiving unfinished responses.
- Be mindful of the character limit for each Channel and consider the tone you want Agents to have when they’re communicating Answers across different Channels.
For example, Reference Answers (which can be used as phone scripts) and Email Answers tend to go into more detail and are longer in length, while Messaging Answers (which can be used for text and social) should be much more abbreviated.
- Include images in Public or Email Answers to illustrate your Customers’ instructions better.
Finally, encourage your Agents to leverage Answers as much as possible to help increase productivity and ensure proper information is shared.
Answers authoring best practices #
- Don’t create Answers for the sake of having content. Try to create Answers that your Agents or Customers need.
- Agents – Try to understand the repetitive responses your Agents give Customers. Create Internal Answers to help Agents find what they need to help Customers quickly.
- Customers – Create Public Answers that your Customers will use. Try to understand what questions your Customers are asking. Create Answers with repeatable and solvable content so your Customers can help themselves. For example, if Customers frequently ask about your refund policy, create a Public Answer about your refund policy.
Using Answers in Rules #
- Think about using specific Answers Trigger and other automated actions. For example, if an Agent uses an Answer for “How do I cancel my order, ” a Rule automatically applies the Topic of “Cancel.”
- You can also use an Answer to create a Task automatically. For example, using the Answer “How do I get a return label?” would create a Task due in two hours to create and send an email with a return label. This is perfect for if/then scenarios where the same action is taken in a given workflow.
Answers use case tips #
Agent signatures
- Include your company logo in email signatures for Email Answers.
Embed CSAT surveys
- With the <agent ID> variable, you can embed a hyperlink to a CSAT survey into an Answer used by your team(s) for their signature. For example, a Qualtrics hyperlink in the Answer would look like: https://[company].qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_/<agent_id>.
Organize Answers
Having a lot of Answers can get overwhelming, especially when trying to locate the ones you need when you need them. Here are a few ways to help organize your Answers.
- Pre-pend with a type or category. For example, if you have specific Answers for your return department, you can use “RETDEPT |” to pre-pend all relevant Answers. When Agents type in RETDEPT in the Answers search field, they will only get that subset of Answers. Remember that these acronyms should be fairly unique so they don’t pull in other results.
- Agents should mark Answers they use frequently as favorites.
Contact directory
- Use a Reference Answer to create an internal directory of commonly used contacts with email addresses or phone numbers.
