How to create procedures in Confluence Cloud

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Struggling to create procedures in Confluence that people actually follow? With the right approach, you can build clear, effective procedures that ensure consistency and maintain a standardised service across the board.

Whether you want to create simple or more complex procedures, this guide covers both options.

Option 1: Creating a one-page procedure

⚠️ Note: This works best if your procedure is pretty short, simple, and easy-to-follow. If you have a complex, multi-step, or branching procedure, move on to option 2!

Step 1: Create a new page

1. Go to your chosen Confluence space.

2. Click the Create button at the top of the page.

3. Select Page.

Step 2: Add your content

Here are some best practices to help you create a clean and structured one-page procedure.

• Use appropriate headings: Create a logical hierarchy for your procedure (e.g. H1 for the title, H2 for subheadings). This helps users to quickly find the right step.

• Add images or screenshots: Add more visual clarity and context to your procedure (such as showing where to click).

• Create callouts with the Panel macro: If you have a warning or information that users can’t miss, a Panel will help it to stand out.

• Use lists or bullet points: Breaking steps into more manageable chunks makes it less likely for information steps to missed.

Here’s an example page:

That’s it. Your simple, one-page procedure is now ready to be shared with others!

Option 2: Create a complex, or branching procedure

If your procedure is more complex or branching steps, formatting your procedure on one Confluence page could be confusing for users to follow. For this, you’ll need an app from the Atlassian Marketplace! This tutorial uses Guided Pathways for Confluence.

Step 1: Install Guided Pathways

Step 2: Create a Confluence page for each step in the procedure

1. Go to your chosen Confluence space. You can use an existing one or create a new space just for your procedure pages.

2. Click the blue + Create button and then click Page.

3. Create the first page of your procedure, then click Publish.

4. Create a page for every step of your procedure.

Here’s an example page we created for a customer complaints procedure:

Step 3: Use Guided Pathways to pull it all together

Watch the gif below, or follow along with our interactive demo here.

1. Go Apps > Guided Pathways. This will take you to the guides homepage.

2. Click Create a Guide.

3. Add your procedure title, category, and description. Then click Create.

4. Click + in the left sidebar to create your first page.

   • Enter a step name in Step Title.

   • Add a name in Button Text (this will show as a button on the previous page).

   • Link to your first Confluence page by clicking Link a Confluence Page.

5. Repeat this for all the pages in your procedure, adding extra child steps to create a new branching choice.

6. When you’re finished, click Publish in the top-right corner to make your guide available to other users.

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⚡️ Pro tip: At any time, you can check the structure of your procedure by toggling Preview Branching. This displays your steps as a branching tree. You can even see how your structure changes as you reorder your steps!

Step 4: Share your new procedure

You can either share your procedure from the Guided Pathways home by clicking the Share icon (below - just click the Published guides tab first). 

Alternatively, you can open up your procedure and copying the URL to share.

Here’s a quick look at our finished procedure in action:

What are your tips for making procedures easy to follow in Confluence? Share in the comments below! 👇