---
schema_version: "1"
id: cfa95998a2dfa89c9c69c4c9330eb8903d1c1ab4c19716c6ad7c1f0e69794450
title: Designate Community Experts
collection: admin
version: current
locale: en-us
portal_url: https://docs.salesforce.com/admin/current/en-us/service/264-0-0/ideas_community_experts.md
canonical_url: https://help.salesforce.com/s/articleView?id=service.ideas_community_experts.htm&release=264.0.0&type=5
source_site: help.salesforce.com
content_type: documentation
content_hash: 6406a6ec50ce3817999ac05fb7c8ae7dcadf17b36721f3a5e1538142baf95f32
description: Designate your star users as experts in their Ideas community.
products:
  - Service Cloud
release: "264"
---
# Designate Community Experts

Designate your star users as experts in their Ideas community.

### Required Editions

<table class="slds-table slds-table_bordered slds-max-medium-table_stacked slds-m-bottom_small edition"><colgroup><col></colgroup><tbody><tr class=""><td class="slds-cell-wrap" style="vertical-align:top;"><a href="https://help.salesforce.com/s/articleView?id=service.legacy_editions.htm&amp;language=en_US" target="_blank">View supported editions</a></td></tr></tbody></table>

An expert is a member of the Ideas community who speaks credibly and authoritatively on behalf of your organization. When experts post comments or ideas, a unique icon displays next to their name (![Expert badge](https://sf-zdocs-cdn-prod.zoominsoftware.com/tdta-service-support_legacy-264-0-0-production-enus/081af4ec-6c06-4d4b-9443-cb3516bbc46d/support_legacy/images/expert_badge.png)). The Salesforce administrator can designate as many experts as necessary.

If you want to have experts in your Ideas community, set up [Zones](https://help.salesforce.com/s/articleView?id=service.ideas_communities.htm&release=264.0.0&type=5 "Zones organize ideas and questions into logical groups, with each zone having its own focus and unique ideas and questions. Zones are shared by the Ideas, Answers, and Chatter Answers applications, allowing you to view and create zones from those locations.") and create a public group that includes the expert users. Then, during the setup process you can designate this public group as your experts.

Before you select a public group to be experts, note the following:

- An expert can be an employee of your organization who is responsible for providing official responses to the Ideas community. An expert can also be someone outside your organization who is active within the Ideas community and knowledgeable about the subject matter.
- The only difference between an expert and other Ideas community members is the unique icon that displays next to the expert's name. Experts don’t have any extra permissions beyond what’s specified in their user profile and permission sets.
- Experts must be part of a public group and that public group must be specified in the Experts Group dropdown list. If the experts within each Ideas community are different, consider creating a public group for each community.
- If an Ideas community is displayed in a Customer Portal or partner portal, you can use a cascading style sheet (CSS) to change the icon associated with the expert. When creating a portal, specify your CSS in the Header of your portal and use the `expertUserBadge` class to reference the new background image for the expert. Make the icon no larger than 16 by 16 pixels.

#### See Also

- [Create and Edit Zones](https://help.salesforce.com/s/articleView?id=service.ideas_new_comm.htm&release=264.0.0&type=5 "Zones are shared by the Ideas, Answers, and Chatter Answers applications, allowing you to view and create zones from those locations. Answers can have only one zone displayed at a time. Supported editions allow up to 50 zones per organization.")