The fastest way to improve an AI agent isn't a better model. It's better information. An agent that can look up your real services, your tone of voice and your approved facts will beat a smarter agent that has to guess.
Plain files are enough
The knowledge base I help maintain at work is a set of simple Markdown files, one topic per file. No special software. Markdown is easy for people to edit and easy for AI to read.
Help the agent find the right file
As a knowledge base grows, the hard part becomes finding the right page. Ours uses a routing guide that tells the agent which file answers which kind of question. It's the difference between a library with a catalogue and a pile of books.
Write down who the agent is
I wrote our agent's identity and tone-of-voice standard: who it speaks for, how it sounds and what it never says. That one document does more for consistency than any amount of prompt tweaking.
Keep it honest
- Only put in facts you'd be happy to see in front of a client.
- Give every number a source.
- Mark what is internal so it never ends up in public content.
- Update files when things change, and delete what's out of date.
People still review
A good knowledge base makes AI drafts dramatically better. It doesn't make them final. Someone who knows the subject should still read everything before it goes out.