Knowledge Base

Set up a self-service knowledge base so your customers can find answers before opening a ticket — reducing support volume and improving satisfaction.

Overview

The Knowledge Base (KB) is a public or gated section of your Deskuss portal where customers browse FAQ articles organized into categories. It acts as the first line of support by letting visitors search for and read articles without needing to contact your team.

Enabling the Knowledge Base

The KB module is off by default. To activate it:

Categories & Sub-Categories

Categories organize your articles into logical groups. Each category can contain sub-categories for deeper nesting.

Creating a category

1. Go to Deskuss → Knowledge Base → Categories
2. Click Add New Category
3. Fill in the fields:
   • Name — displayed on the portal (e.g., "Billing & Payments")
   • Slug — auto-generated from the name; editable
   • Description — short text shown below the category heading
   • Parent Category — leave blank for a top-level category, or select a parent to create a sub-category
   • Sort Order — numeric value controlling display order (lower appears first)
   • Icon — optional Dashicons class for visual identification
4. Click Save Category

Managing categories

From the categories list you can edit, reorder, or delete any category. Deleting a category does not delete its articles — they become uncategorized. Sub-categories are also shown indented in the list for easy navigation.

Articles (FAQ)

Articles are the core content of your Knowledge Base. Each article answers a single question or explains a specific topic.

Article visibility levels

Every article has a visibility setting that controls who can see it:

Creating an article

Featured articles

You can mark articles as Featured to highlight them on the portal homepage. Featured articles appear in a prominent section above the category grid, making them the first thing visitors see.

Article fields reference

Search

The Knowledge Base includes a full-text search engine that indexes article questions, answers, and keywords. Customers type a query and instantly see matching results — no page reload required.

How search works

• Question match — articles whose question text contains the search terms
• Answer match — articles whose answer body contains the search terms
• Keyword boost — articles with matching keywords are ranked higher
• Results respect article visibility — customers never see Internal articles

Configuring the search box

You can display a KB search box directly on the portal homepage. This encourages self-service before a ticket is created.

1. Go to Deskuss → Settings → Knowledge Base
2. Toggle Show Search Box on Portal Homepage to On
3. Optionally set a Placeholder Text (e.g., "Search for answers…")
4. Save settings

Keyword optimization

When creating or editing an article, add relevant keywords in the sidebar. Think about alternate phrasings customers might search for. For example, an article titled "How to reset my password" could include keywords like login, forgot password, access, account locked.

Example keywords for a "Password Reset" article:
forgot password, login issue, account locked, reset, access denied, cannot log in

Portal Homepage Integration

The customer-facing portal homepage can display KB content in two ways:

1. KB Search Box

A prominent search input at the top of the portal. Customers type a question and see instant results without navigating away. This is the fastest path from question to answer.

2. Featured Articles Section

Below the search box, featured articles are displayed as cards with their question title and a short excerpt. These guide customers to the most-read or most-helpful content.

Managing Content

Bulk actions

From the Knowledge Base → Articles list, you can:

• Select multiple articles and change their visibility in bulk
• Move articles to a different category
• Delete articles permanently
• Toggle the Featured flag on or off

Reordering articles

Drag-and-drop reordering is available on the categories list. For articles within a category, set the Sort Order field — lower numbers appear first. You can also reorder from the articles list by clicking the Sort column header.

Editing vs. revising

Articles do not have built-in version history in the free version. If you need revision tracking, use the WordPress Revisions feature — Deskuss articles are stored as a custom post type and inherit WordPress revision support automatically.

Settings Reference

All Knowledge Base settings are located under Deskuss → Settings → Knowledge Base:

// To disable the KB programmatically:
add_filter('deskuss_kb_enabled', '__return_false');

// To change the default articles per page:
add_filter('deskuss_kb_articles_per_page', function() {
    return 20;
});