At any given moment in time, there are billions of data transactions taking place online. New content is constantly being published on social media networks, websites, and news sites, and some of that information is related to topics that matter to you.
Wouldn’t it be great if there was a free, easy and simple way to find out what is happening in your niche or industry so that you are not wasting a huge amount of time doing research? Well, there is, and it’s called …
Google Alerts
(Google Alerts – free web monitoring service)
Get a notification whenever there are new results for your searches, so you can keep up to date on blogs, social media updates, and news without having to visit loads of social media and news websites for the latest information.
Google Alerts is not only only a great tool for helping you manage your reputation online, but also for receiving news about people, brands, companies, and any other subject you need to know about.
With Google Alerts, you subscribe to a keyword or topic and you’re done. Whenever Google’s robots index a new web page, press release, news update, blog post, a tweet, video, or any other content related to that topic, it will automatically send you an email or RSS update.
Google Alerts – A Tutorial
Let’s go over the 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 many 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)
You can still set up Google Alerts without accessing your Google Account, but this will give you fewer configuration options (e.g. you can only receive email alerts, not alerts via RSS).
After logging into into your Google Account, access the Google Alerts tool by entering the following URL into your browser:
Step 2 – Set Up An Alert
Set up an alert for every topic, business, person or website address you want to receive updates about. You can keep track of brands, names of employees, celebrities, influencers, competitors, investors, etc. There are no limits to how many alerts you can set up.
(Google Alerts lets you create as many alerts as you like)
Step 3 – Configure Your Preferences
You can specify the keyword(s) you want to receive alerts for, how often alerts should be sent out (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 Alerts – preferences)
To narrow the source of your alerts, just select an option from the drop-down menu …
(Google alert sources)
You can also specify the delivery time of your alerts in your settings, and if you want to receive all alerts as a single email …
(Google Alerts – settings)
All of these settings can be changed anytime.
You will begin receiving alerts as per your preferences …
(Google alerts – email alert)
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
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)
Enter 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 stop receiving alerts by deleting them from your account …
(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 stop receiving alert emails on the topic after unsubscribing.
If you want Google to deliver alerts via email, you can configure rules in your email program to send alerts automatically 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 access the information on your smartphone or mobile device.
Once you have set up your alerts, you can track information about keywords, brands, the competition, etc., or create web content on the latest news and updates in your topic of choice.
How To Repost News Items From Google Alerts On Your Site
You can repost news items directly from Google Alerts on your WordPress your WordPress 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:
Configure 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 repost 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 useful. If you would like to know more about using social media management tools to improve your business online, see this article: WordPress And Social Media Monitoring
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"I have used the tutorials to teach all of my clients and it has probably never been so easy for everyone to learn WordPress ... Now I don't need to buy all these very expensive video courses that often don't deliver what they promise." - Stefan Wendt, Internet Marketing Success Group
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