As you read this, there are millions of exchanges taking place online. New content is continually being published on blogs, social streams, and news sites, and some of that information is related to topics you are interested in.
Wouldn’t it be great if there was a simple and easy (and free) way to find out what is happening in your niche or industry that would save you time doing research? Well, there is, and it’s called …
Google Alerts
(Google Alerts – free web monitoring service)
Google can send you a notification when your brand is mentioned online, so you can keep up to date on blogs, news, and social media updates.
Google Alerts is not only useful for managing your reputation online, but also for receiving information about people, brands, companies, and any subject you are following.
With Google Alerts, you subscribe to a keyword or topic and you’re done. Whenever Google’s robots index a new web site, news update, press release, blog post, a video, tweet, or any other content related to the topic you’ve subscribed to, you will automatically receive an email or RSS update.
How To Create A Google Alert
Basically, there are only three simple steps required to start using Google Alerts:
Step 1 – Log Into Your Google Account
If you haven’t got a Google account, create one. Google lets you access loads of free services with one username and password. If you use Gmail, post videos to YouTube, run an Adwords campaign or own a GooglePlus page, then you should already have a Google account set up.
(Log into your Google Account to set up your Google alerts)
You can still set up Google Alerts without accessing your Google Account, but this gives you fewer options (e.g. you can’t receive Google Alerts via RSS, only email).
After logging into into your Google Account, access the Google Alerts tool here:
Step 2 – Set Up An Alert
You can set up an alert for every topic, business name, person or website you want to receive updates about. You can keep track of brands, employees, investors, influencers, competitors, celebrities, etc. There are no limits to how many alerts you can set up.
(Create as many alerts as you like with Google Alerts)
Step 3 – Set Your Preferences & Save
You can specify the keyword(s) you want alerts sent for, how often alerts should be sent (as it happens, once a day, once a week), sources (e.g. automatic, news, blogs, web, videos, discussions, etc.), language, region, how many (all results, only the best results), and how to receive alerts (via email or RSS feed) …
(Google alert preferences)
If you want to narrow where Google sources the information for your alerts, select the source from the drop-down menu …
(Google Alerts – sources)
You can also specify the delivery time of your alerts in your settings, and whether these should be sent as a single email …
(Google alert settings)
All of these settings can be changed anytime you like.
You will begin receiving alerts as set in your preferences …
(Receive alerts via email or RSS)
Note that at the bottom of your email notification, you are given various options, including:
- See more results
- Edit the alert
- Unsubscribe (stop receiving the alert)
- View all your alerts
- Receive the alert as RSS feed
How To Set Up Google Alerts While Browsing Google News
You can easily set up Google Alerts while browsing the web. Here’s how:
Go to Google News and type in your search term …
(Enter a search term in Google News)
Scroll down to the bottom of the page and click on ‘Create Alert’ …
(Google News – Create Alert)
Type in your email address and click on ‘Create Alert’ …
(Google Alerts screen)
If you elect to receive alerts via email, you will be asked to verify your Google Alert request …
(Verify your Google Alert request)
After confirming your request, your Google Alert will be set up and you will begin to receive alert notifications via email.
(Your Google Alert has been successfully verified)
You can return to the Google Alerts home page and create as many alerts as you want.
Deleting Google Alerts
You can delete any alerts you no longer want to receive …
(Google alert settings)
You can also stop receiving alerts by clicking on the ‘Unsubscribe’ link at the bottom of your emails …
(Click the Unsubscribe link at the bottom of the email)
Confirm that you want to unsubscribe from your Google Alert …
(Click unsubscribe to stop receiving Google Alerts)
Your Google Alert will be cancelled …
(Google Alert cancelled)
You will no longer receive alert emails on the topic after unsubscribing.
If you want to receive alerts sent to your inbox via email, you can configure rules in your email program to automatically send all alerts to one or more email folders. This will help keep your alerts organized and easier to track and sort through.
If your alerts are sent out via RSS feed, you can use a feed reader to view the information on your smart phone or mobile device.
Once you have set up alerts, you can monitor information about keywords, names, competitors, etc., or start creating content in your topic of choice.
How To Repost News Items From Google Alerts On Your Blog
You can publish news items directly from Google Alerts on your WordPress your blog as blog posts or as a ‘widgetized’ item on your sidebar.
Let’s take a look at both methods:
Publish Google Alerts News Items As A Blog Post
To publish news items from Google Alerts as a blog post, do the following:
Set up your site to post by email …
(Post to WordPress by email)
If you need help with this step, see this tutorial:
Next, create an Alert to send to the email address you have set up …
(Create Alert and send to email)
Alerts will now be posted to your blog, or come in as ‘drafts’ that you can review and publish.
Publish Google Alerts News Items On Your Sidebar
To republish news items from Google Alerts as a as a ‘widgetized’ item on your sidebar, all you need to do is set up to receive your alerts as an RSS feed as described earlier …
(Receive alerts as an RSS feed)
Next, copy the RSS feed link to your clipboard …
(Copy RSS link address)
And add the RSS feed to an RSS widget as described in this tutorial:
Your alert will display as a ‘widgetized’ item on your sidebar and the feed will update regularly as Google sources new items …
(RSS Widget with Google Alert feed)
Hopefully, you have found this tutorial helpful. To learn more about using social media monitoring tools to monitor social signals, see this article: Top Media Tools That Can Help Grow Your Business Online
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