What to put in your AI chatbot's knowledge base: a checklist

An AI assistant answers from what you give it. Give it vague or outdated content and it gives vague or outdated answers. Here's a checklist of what to include, roughly in order of how often customers ask about it.

The essentials

• What you do, who for, and where (service area or address).
• Prices, or at least starting prices and what affects the price.
• Opening hours, including holidays and exceptions.
• How to book, buy or get a quote, with the exact link or phone number.
• Contact details for reaching a person.

The questions behind the questions

• Policies: cancellations, refunds, deposits, guarantees.
• Logistics: parking, delivery, what to bring, how long things take.
• Eligibility: ages, areas, requirements.
• Payment: methods accepted, plans, insurance.

Write answers the way customers ask

Question-and-answer pairs work especially well because they match how people actually phrase things. “Do you take walk-ins?” with a direct answer beats a paragraph that mentions walk-ins in passing.

Mistakes that cause bad answers

• Old information left in: last year's prices or a closed location. Remove it; don't just add the new version alongside.
• Important facts only in images. Add them as text.
• Contradictions between pages. The AI can't know which one is right.
• Nothing about what it shouldn't do. Tell it to hand off medical, legal or complaint questions to a person.

Keep it current with almost no effort

1. Let the assistant re-read your website automatically (weekly is plenty for most businesses).
2. Check the list of questions it couldn't answer once a week and add answers.
3. Update it the same day you change prices or hours.