Product documentation along with Customer specific changes for different customers

[Aakash Maheshwari]

I want to create a documentation for my product which is a SaaS based software. My product has a base version having multiple modules and features inside those modules. Also, there are frequent changes that happen as my product is in a continuous improvement process.

My product is a SaaS based software where I customize my software product to the meet the requirement of different customers. So, in summary, there are some features in my software which are common for all the customer but there are also features which are specific and different for each customer based on their requirement.

Is there any way in confluence where I can create my document in such a manner that the common features are accessible to all the customer and also, they shall be able to view the documents of those features which are specific to their requirement?

Also, any changes in the document for my base product  shall get updated for all the customers as well?

[Anshuman Dash _K15t_]

Hey @Aakash Maheshwari 

That’s a great question! 

The best approach in Confluence is to use conditional or variant-based content:

• This allows you to maintain a single source of truth while showing different “views” of your docs.

• Here’s an overview that explains the concept: Conditional Content in Documentation

And, If you’re open to using apps, there are tools that can make this a lot easier:

• Scroll Documents (for managing versions, variants, and translations in Confluence).

• Scroll Viewport (to publish those variants as a polished online knowledge base).
  Here’s an example from our own docs, where we use variants to differentiate between deployment types: help.k15t.com/scroll-docs (see the toggle at the top-right).

This way, you maintain one documentation set in Confluence while tailoring what each customer sees.

Hope that helps!

Cheers!

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Disclaimer: I’m part of the team that created the documentation guide and the apps mentioned above.

[Bill Bailey]

Hello @Aakash Maheshwari 

If you don't mind that everyone sees the specific features of other customers, then you can just basically have pages in your page tree of documentation that has a notation in either the heading or page title, For example "Special Feature (Customer X).

All customers would all see the same documentation.

If you are wanting to restrict the views so that a customer see the common documentation, but only they can see their specific features, that is also possible BUT will require that each customer has an account on you Cloud instance, and then set view permissions based on the user account (could also be administrated via groups to make it easier).

In this scenario, all customer would see the same common documentation but only be able to see documentation for their special features (and not that of other customers).