# What Is a Knowledge Base for an AI Assistant?

Source: https://insertchat.com/glossary/knowledge-base

> A knowledge base is the business information an AI assistant answers from. Learn what to include, how to keep it current, and how gaps show up in conversations.

A knowledge base is an organized collection of information that people or software use to answer questions. For an AI assistant, it is the business’s own content, such as web pages, documents, price lists, policies, and written answers, that the assistant searches before replying, so its answers reflect that business instead of general internet knowledge.

## How a knowledge base powers an AI assistant

When you add sources, the system splits them into passages and indexes them for search. At answer time, the assistant retrieves the passages relevant to the question and writes a reply from them, a technique called [retrieval-augmented generation](https://insertchat.com/glossary/retrieval-augmented-generation). The quality of answers is capped by the quality of the sources.

The best knowledge bases are specific: real prices or price ranges, service areas by town, what is and isn’t included, cancellation rules, and what to do in urgent situations. Contradictions between an old PDF and the current website are a common source of wrong answers, so remove or refresh outdated sources.

## Example: an interior design studio

An interior design studio adds its services page, a PDF describing its three design packages, and written answers about consultation fees and travel radius. A visitor asks whether the studio does single-room refreshes outside the city. The assistant answers from the package PDF and the travel-radius answer, then offers a consultation slot. This scenario is illustrative.

## Knowledge in InsertChat

InsertChat’s [knowledge base](https://insertchat.com/product/knowledge) accepts website pages by crawl or sitemap; PDF, Word, PowerPoint, text, and ebook files; CSV and Excel spreadsheets; scanned PDFs and images read with text recognition; audio and video files, which are transcribed; and questions and answers you write. One knowledge base serves calls, chat, texts, email, and WhatsApp.

Website sources can refresh on a schedule that depends on your plan, and Knowledge gaps lists real customer questions the assistant couldn’t answer well. Start with [how to build your assistant’s knowledge base](https://insertchat.com/blog/prepare-your-assistants-knowledge), or see the [interior design setup](https://insertchat.com/industries/interior-design).

## What should I put in my AI assistant’s knowledge base?

Services, prices or ranges, hours, service area, booking and cancellation rules, common questions with your real answers, and instructions for urgent situations. Specific beats long.

## How often should a knowledge base be updated?

Whenever prices, services, hours, or policies change, and after reviewing questions the assistant couldn’t answer. A monthly review catches most drift.

## Related terms

- [Retrieval-augmented generation (RAG)](https://insertchat.com/glossary/retrieval-augmented-generation): Retrieval-augmented generation, or RAG, is a technique where an AI system first searches a set of documents for passages relevant to a question, then writes its answer using those passages.
- [AI hallucination](https://insertchat.com/glossary/ai-hallucination): An AI hallucination is a response from an AI system that sounds confident but is false, made up, or unsupported by its sources, such as an invented price, policy, or appointment time.
- [Fallback intent](https://insertchat.com/glossary/fallback-intent): A fallback intent is the response a chatbot or voice assistant uses when it can’t match a message to anything it knows how to handle, or doesn’t have the answer.
- [Website chatbot](https://insertchat.com/glossary/website-chatbot): A website chatbot is a chat window on a business’s website where an automated assistant answers visitors’ questions in real time.
- [Conversational AI](https://insertchat.com/glossary/conversational-ai): Conversational AI is technology that lets software hold a natural conversation with people by text or voice.

## Related InsertChat pages

- [AI knowledge base](https://insertchat.com/product/knowledge)
- [How to build your assistant’s knowledge base](https://insertchat.com/blog/prepare-your-assistants-knowledge)
- [AI front desk for interior designers](https://insertchat.com/industries/interior-design)