Create a Wiki Knowledge Base using WordPress with our Step-by-Step Guide

In the age of information overload, navigating through documentation or guides becomes time-consuming. Surprisingly, the WordPress wiki knowledge base comes to your rescue. It makes the entire process of information storing, organizing, navigating, and collaboration very smooth. 

Whether you are a brand wanting to offer streamlined user documentation or planning to create a knowledge base of your products, our guide will help you leverage the complete potential of WordPress wiki.

This knowledge base is beneficial for users to understand all the products or services on a website. Moreover, a knowledge base is also great for new employee training.

Here, we will provide a step-by-step guide to creating a wiki knowledge base using WordPress that helps you organize content and provide great collaboration options to users.

But, before that, let’s understand the basis of the WordPress wiki knowledge base and the benefits of adding WordPress knowledge base plugins to the site.

What is WordPress Wiki?

A wiki is a web-based collaboration platform that enables users to create, edit, store, and modify content in an organized way. The content comprises media, documents, or tutorials organized well in a searchable database for quick navigation. 

A WordPress wiki is a website heavily utilized for user documentation, resource training, and creating a product knowledge base. It makes the entire task of creating a wiki knowledge base super easy by providing a user-friendly platform for collaborative content creation.

Lastly, WordPress wikis work similarly to other wikis available online. However, it runs on the content management system.

Essential Benefits of WordPress Wiki Knowledge Base

Are you running a big organization or a business? Do you have comprehensive blog posts or product documentation on your WordPress website? Do you feel overwhelmed in managing all of these documents? If the answer to these questions is YES, you need a WordPress wiki knowledge base.

Here are some of the most essential benefits of WordPress wiki:

1. Store Information in One Location: Wikis enhance the entire internal system by managing various emails, documents, databases, etc. It even lets you store all the blogs, documents, webpages, etc., in one location. 

2. Find Any Information Easily: All the employees and users leverage documentation to find information on the website. However, with time, various blogs, product pages, etc., become cluttered. Hence, it becomes challenging to find anything. With WordPress Wiki, users can find multiple things on the website through a search bar and clickable navigation.

3. Collaborative Editing:  A wiki knowledge base encourages collaborative editing. It enables many users to work on a single page and contribute and update content at the same time. Ultimately, it leads to better teamwork and knowledge sharing.

4. Leverage Organization Elements like Categories and Tagging: As mentioned before, your audience can use different filters and search labels to find anything in the knowledge base. However, if you want more control over the WordPress knowledge base, you can set specific tags and categories. 

5. All Your Stakeholders & Users Become Knowledgeable: A detailed knowledge base helps customers understand your product well. It even helps your employees become familiar with the product and serve customers better.

6. Content Management is Super Easy: You just require the internet, browser, and wiki’s URL to make changes in the knowledge base.

7. Version Control: With the help of version control, you can view all the changes you have made in the previous versions. You can even revert to the specific version and store the history of edits for accountability.

Prerequisites to Create a WordPress Wiki

Here are some of the most crucial things you require to create a wiki knowledge base for your WordPress site. 

1. WordPress Site

First and foremost, you require a WordPress site. To get started, download and install the free WordPress CMS on your PC. Then, activate the WordPress plugin directly from the host.

2. WordPress Hosting

There are a vast number of popular WordPress hosting services available in the market. You can choose the best WordPress hosting for your WordPress wiki, considering features, functionalities, budget, and future goals.

3. Content 

When all the content of your WordPress knowledge base is ready, such as FAQs, documentation, links, and other resources, you can quickly publish it online.

4. Theme or Plugin

Basically, you have two main ways to integrate wiki on your WordPress site: Plugins and Themes. 

Let us look at them in detail.

How to Create a WordPress Wiki?

1. Using a Plugin

If you already have your website on WordPress and want to make a wiki knowledge base, a plugin is the most suitable option. 

There are a range of wiki plugins available in the market. You can leverage any of them to create a knowledge base for your WordPress site. However, there is a chance that the plugin might not work with your existing WordPress theme. To make it work, you need to make several customizations in the styling and functionality. 

For this blog, we will utilize the Heroic Knowledge Base Plugin. Why? It is one of the best knowledge base plugins you will find online.

Here are some things that make the Heroic Knowledge Base Plugin better than other plugins in the market. 

• AJAX predictive live search enables all your site visitors to find anything easily.
• Get user feedback without any hindrance for creating and modifying your knowledge base articles.
• The plugin allows you to interact with customers from anywhere on the website.
• Analytics help you understand what users look for in your knowledge base. You can write content they are looking for to increase visibility and traffic on the site.

Now, let’s get straight to creating a wiki using the Heroic Knowledge Base Plugin.

Step 1: Install the Heroic Knowledge Base Plugin

Initially, you need to install and activate the Heroic Knowledge Base Plugin. Go to the WordPress plugin directory and do the same. 

After completing this, you will be able to view a welcome screen. Here, you will view the range of knowledge bases with dummy content. You can choose any of them or create your own knowledge base.

Step 2: Write a Knowledge Base Article (Skip this if you already have one)

After activating the plugin, you can instantly start creating a knowledge base article. However, the plugin provides some options to make some modifications.

Go to the WordPress dashboard and then Knowledge Base -> Add New Article. 

After this, you can write an article using the desired WordPress editor.

Moreover, on the right side, you can also include necessary categories and tags.

Please note that these categories and tags will remain stuck to your defined knowledge base and won’t affect any other KB.

Besides this, the plugin allows you to configure various essential things below the text editor. These include file attachments and user feedback voting options.

Lastly, hit publish to make your article live.

Step 3: Set Proper Ordering for the Archive Page

In general, the plugin creates a knowledge base for your homepage on the URL:

yourdomain.com/knowledge-base

This is how it looks in the Astra Theme:

In order to rearrange any of the categories or articles, you have two options:

• Knowledge Base -> Article Ordering
• Knowledge Base -> Category Ordering

By this, you can rearrange the articles using the drag-and-drop functionality. Lastly, click on the ‘Save Order’ button to ensure changes are reflected.

Step 4: Integrate Knowledge Base Widgets

The Heroic Knowledge Base Plugin offers some of the best widgets to display knowledge base information in the sidebar or any other place on the website. 
To include any widget, go to Appearance -> Widgets and drag the widget as needed.

Step 5: Modify Things As Per Need

Now, your knowledge base is live. However, you still have options to make modifications to the functionality. 

To do the same, go to the settings panel, then Knowledge Base -> Settings.

Here are some of the things you can modify in the settings.

• Sort how you want to display your knowledge base articles.
• Decide how many articles you want to display for every category.
• Integrate a custom CSS styling.
• Ability to modify the URL slug of your knowledge base.
• Restrict access to your knowledge base.
• Include a transfer URL to send visitors to your human support solution.

2. Using a Theme

Leveraging a WordPress theme is another excellent option to create a knowledge base. 

This option works well in two scenarios:

• When you are not going to use your primary website for the knowledge base.
• When your site only comprises a wiki Knowledge Base page.

There are a more comprehensive number of themes available in the market. Here is the list of the most popular ones.

1. Flatbase – A premium WordPress theme with responsive designs and many customization options.
2. KnowHow – It lets you create a knowledge base promptly.
3. KnowAll – Create a professional knowledge base effectively.
4. MyKnowledgeBase – Lightweight and mobile-friendly WordPress theme with customizable templates.
5. Lore – A premium WordPress theme that is lightweight and simple to use.

You can install any of the WordPress themes to create a knowledge base.

Step 1: Install WordPress

First and foremost, you need to install WordPress. In case you want a wiki other than the primary website, you need to install WordPress on the subdomain or directory. The method to install a theme will depend heavily on the hosting provider.

As soon as you create a subdomain or directory, you can install WordPress. The best way to install WordPress on the website is through a one-click installation feature.

Step 2: Decide a Wiki Theme and Install It

After the WordPress installation is done, you need to install the theme. You have two options: Free and paid. 

To install a free theme, visit the Appearances -> Themes and click on Add New. Now, search for the theme with the name and click Install -> Activate.

To install a paid theme, go to Appearances -> Themes –> Add New, and choose the option Upload Theme. Lastly, activate the theme after uploading it.

Step 3: Theme Customization

When the theme gets installed, it’s time to customize & personalize it. For the same, visit Appearances-> Customize. 

Make customizations into the WordPress theme as needed, then click on Publish to make it live.

Step 4: Add Wiki Knowledge Base Content

You can include content into the wiki theme in a similar way as you do in any WordPress theme.

Based on your WordPress theme, you can include content under the Pages or Posts. Other than this, you may have a specialized content type.

Besides this, you can use any of the popular Theme editors to add or edit the content as needed. Lastly, click on Publish to ensure it gets live and users can view it.

Get Heroic Knowledge Base

Final Words

As of now, you must have gotten a gist of how WordPress wikis are great for storing a vast amount of information and providing users with information about various essential things in a more organized way. 

We hope you have understood the benefits of the WordPress Wiki Knowledge Base. Also, you have become familiar with creating a dynamic Wiki Knowledge base using the plugin or the theme. We especially recommend you create a wiki using the Heroic Knowledge Base Plugin.  

So, what are you waiting for? Create a Wiki Knowledge Base that is a dynamic repository of knowledge, encouraging collaboration and efficient information sharing.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. What are the most crucial elements of the Wiki Knowledge Base?

Here is the list of elements you should check when building a WordPress wiki using a theme or plugin. 

• Search Bar: It allows you to search anything using any keyword.
• Robust Organizational System: It helps you to organize content using various menus, tags, categories, topics, and breadcrumbs.
• Main Pape with Crucial Topics: The homepage can be highlighted with the help of headings.
• Internal Linking: It helps the users move from one part of the page to another without any hassle.
• Better Editing Tools for Collaboration: It should be easy to make any corrections, edits, and additions to the Wiki content for a group or just one admin.
• Login system with authentication: There should be an authentication module whether you are working on a public or private wiki.

2. Which popular sites use the WordPress Wiki?

Some of the most well-known sites that have already created WordPress wiki knowledge base are as follows.

• Fandom: The platform creates a wiki for the most popular TV shows, movies, and more.
• WordPress Codex: The site offers a wiki for various WordPress topics. It helps anyone to learn new things about the content management system through multiple articles.
• Kinsta Resource Center: Kinsta is one of the leading hosting providers worldwide and has also created a knowledge base featuring valuable resources related to WordPress, Kinsta, hosting, and more.

3. Which are the best WordPress plugins for creating a wiki knowledge base?

Here are some of the best WordPress plugins that you can utilize for creating a Wiki knowledge base are as follows:

• Yada Wiki– A free WordPress Plugin that helps create a wiki Knowledge base.
• Echo Knowledge Base– It offers modern features to robust wiki Knowledge base with ease.
• BetterDocs– A freemium WordPress knowledge base solution trusted by more than 30,000+ people worldwide.
• BasePress – Best Knowledge Base plugin to create customer support documentation on your site.
• weDocs Plugin – A user-friendly plugin to build a knowledge base using drag-and-drop functionality.