Knowledge base: defined by the Sticky-Marketing.com monthly magazine

People increasingly use the term "Knowledge base" especially where IT is concerned.

A knowledge base is a collection of data organised so it can easily produce "information" from which "knowledge" can be derived.

If for example you were doing Internet marketing, some of the data you might gather to build a knowledge base, might include:

A list of key terms for your product or offering.
A list of relevant Internet Search Engines & directories.
Regular dated checks of the ranking of your web pages in those engines against the key terms.
Extended Apache log files including referrers.
A list of all your web pages and their key subject matter linked to key terms.
A list of inward links to your webpages.
A list of paid placements including how much and where.
How much time (and therefore money) was spent maintaining and developing your site against specific objectives. E.g. obtaining a good ranking in Google, Lycos, MSN etc.
Up to date comparitive cost data for enquiry generation by traditional marketing means.

This is all still just unconnected data. It is not yet information and certainly not yet valuable knowledge or a "knowledge base".

It is what you do with your data that determines whether you obtain valuable knowledge from it and can honestly describe youself as having a "knowledge base".

To continue the Internet marketing example, with which I am familiar, collating and linking the data you have collected can allow you to start to obtain bits of knowledge in almost real time:

What Return on Investment is your current resource allocation getting you?
What if you were to change your focus?
What is your current comparison of the cost effectiveness of traditional marketing communications compared to pay for placement, or search engine compatability work, or website development to improve visitor return rates.
Current conversion rates from different promotion / communication strategies.
The effectiveness of different pay for placement strategies for your particular offering. (it is unlikely the Internet strategy followed by a company like Sony for their consumer products will be the optimum for your company if you are selling industrial components to users distributors or OEMs).

As soon as you realise that the data available to you can be interlinked, as soon as you decide you want the answers to such questions (and more) from your data, you can start to build a knowledge base which, assuming many of the data inputs are automated, will expand the knowledge you have available to support ongoing commercial decision making in a professional manner.

28/02/2002 Use your browser back button or
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