NetApp
Nomination Details
NetApp Knowledge Base (KB) remains the primary repository of support content for all NetApp Products and Services. We initially redesigned and hosted our Knowledge Base (KB) on the CXone Expert platform in May 2020, and have since made continuous improvements to enhance the site's user experience for both employees and customers.
In our commitment to providing a best-in-class user experience, we embarked on a second redesign of the site in May 2023, focusing on improving the Site Taxonomy and Hierarchy. This enhancement allows for easier navigation and better organization of information.
Additionally, by leveraging CXone Expert APIs, DekiScript, and customized scripts developed by the NetApp KCS teams, we have created a dynamic and intuitive platform that caters to the evolving needs of our customers, employees, and Knowledge Management (KM) program – Knowledge Centered Services (KCS).
We are thrilled and proud that our unwavering commitment to delivering a world-class user experience on our Knowledge Base site and the broader Digital Support platform has been acknowledged through multiple industry recognitions. The recognition we have received reinforces our position as a leader in the industry and validates the efforts we have invested in creating an outstanding self-support platform. We are grateful for the recognition, and it motivates us to continue raising the bar and exceeding expectations in delivering top-notch user experiences.
Awards and Recognitions
Knowledge Management and Site Awards
• CXone Expert KCS Award (2022) Innovation Award (2023) and Most Admired Award (2022, 2023)
• Knowledge Management and Intellectual Capital Excellence Award 2022
Digital Support Awards
• Association of Support Professionals (ASP) support site wins 6 years in a row: 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021 2022, 2023
• Technology & Services Industry Association (TSIA) Award 2023
• Notable: 2020 ASP Overall Best Support Site Award
• Stevie® Awards for multiple Customer Service categories and levels in 2019, 2020 and 2021, 2022, 2023
• Award details can be found at https://mysupport.netapp.com/site/info/aboutsupport
Key New Features Added in 2023
Site Taxonomy and Hierarchy Changes
In 2023, the KB team revamped the entire site taxonomy. The site hierarchy was completely changed to a customer centric design, where Categories, Guides, and Knowledge Articles were organized based on customer usage patterns.
The out-of-the box category and guide pages had limited options for article widgets. For instance, the Recently Created and Recently Updated tabs, did not have any timestamp, making it difficult to understand the recency of the articles. We customized the category and guide pages using a script and CXone APIs to show the Recently created and Recently Updated KBs along with the timestamp from the CXone Database.
Another innovative change in the platform was done using Javascript, CSS, and HTML. We added custom tabs to our guides and pages which gave us the flexibility to add different content formats (Resolution guides, videos, etc) into the Guide page, providing users all the relevant content for a product area within the Guide. This feature is not available in the native UI, and has been a significantly used addition to the site.
New and improved Website Design
Guide Page with Time Stamp for Recently Created Articles
The taxonomy and hierarchy changes required the team to
• Redesign 90+ pages during the release activity
• Move 8k articles to new guides via script
• Add Value Added Content (VAC) for 30+ Product pages
• Add Resolution Guides, KBTv videos at Product level
• Customize tabs for Recently Added and Recently Created articles
Also, we were able to accomplish these vast changes to the site with
• 0 mins downtime during the entire activity
• 0 dependency on IT and CXone Expert team
• No additional cost or IT development during the entire project
• API issues identified during the release activity were immediately fixed.
Robust Auto-Archival (through in-house script)
To ensure that our knowledge base only has the most relevant content and to improve searchability and findability of documents, we have started archiving content that is obsolete or has low usage. We were able to bulk archive close to 3000 articles from various guides, while adding the required metadata to ensure the archived articles are clearly differentiated in the repository.
Script automated archival
We developed an in-house script that helps reduce the manual effort by automating the archival process. The script checks identified archived content stored in an external repository. Based on the page IDs of the articles, the script moves the articles into the appropriate Archival folders, changes confidence to Archived, and adds the word ARCHIVED to the Title of the KB.
Script helped solve tool limitation
The Expert tool allows only publishers to access archived pages, which was a blocker for us, as we require all pro members to be able to access archived content, and retrieve it, if they need to use it to solve a customer issue. The script helps us control the visibility of archived articles and allows all promembers access them, if required. This flexibility is important for our Knowledge Centered Service (KCS) program and practices.
Script to Update Title & URLs
The Expert tool allows all characters in the URL, which caused challenges for us as some special characters would result in a broken URL, especially in touchpoint implementations. We have more than 1000+ engineers creating content, and to enforce all of them to use the right characters in the title was a challenge.
To overcome the issues caused by the inadvertent inclusion of undesired special characters in the title, we developed a script to strip all the special characters and convert them to “ _” (underscore) which helped us solve the problem and improve our ranking on Google
Enhancements to Existing Features
Over the past few years, we have created multiple dashboards (general and personalized) using CXone Expert APIs, DekiScript and custom Java script. These dashboards help us manage feedback, track author activities, and address audit process gaps. This year we enhanced our Feedback dashboard with additional capabilities.
Feedback dashboard
The Feedback Dashboard allows the NetApp KB team and the Knowledge Domain Expert (KDE) teams to track, assign and close feedback within 24 to 48 hours of receiving them. In addition, it allows us to segregate feedback as technical, non-technical external, and Internal so that we can prioritize and forward the feedback to the right SMEs to address. In 2023, we enhanced the dashboard by adding closure codes. Closure codes help us understand the quality of feedback submitted by our support team. It helps us identify if the feedback was valid or invalid and whether or not it contributed to the improvement of the database.
Results & Impact
Our efforts to continuously improve the CXone Expert platform has resulted in the following outcomes.
The taxonomy changes have improved the site navigation and findability of relevant content. Our archival activity has cleared our database of outdated content, making it lean and efficient. Ensuring quick addressal of feedback has built trust with our customers; they are confident that their feedback is being regularly monitored and addressed at the earliest. Given below are some metrics:
1. >3.5M monthly page views to our digital support sites and >700K monthly page views on the KB site.
2. Our language sites bring us >75,000 page views each month.
3. ~30% increase in logged in users to the KB site
4. 98% of support journeys include digital channels and we see a >50% success rate
5. 250 feedback processed every month on an average
6. ~40% increase feedback submitted per month when compared to 2022
7. >90:1 Contact Ratio across our 5-Channel Support Delivery model (Contact Ratio is the number of Digital Support Engagement (web sessions) seen for every Assisted Support Case that is opened) (Goal was 30:1)
8. Article reuse rate: improved by 25%
9. <5% of all answers are assisted support cases
10.Our KB CSAT scores are at 4.4/5 11.% of customers rating our site as good or excellent 95%
Sites
Team
Ryan Mathews
Padma Prasad
Rajesh Panda