What Is Google Alerts & How To Use It Right

Do you want to know about Google Alerts, how to use it properly and what are its benefits? Your search ends here. Here, in one place, is everything you need.

With the digital presence that we have to manage in today’s world, you need to be able to manage your own reputation and build a good social media profile. Google Alerts are helpful for this. We have put together all the information you need in order to learn what Google Alerts are and how to use them. For instance, you could set

What is Google Alerts?

Google Alerts is a free tool from Google that sends you email alerts about stuff you’re interested in. Basically, it keeps an eye on the internet for your keywords and sends you updates daily, weekly, or monthly.

This can be super helpful for businesses. You can get notified when your company or products are mentioned online, or when people are talking about your services. It’s also good for tracking what’s being said about your company’s leaders, since that can impact your brand’s image.

It also helps you keep tabs on what your customers and competitors are doing, and find important people in your industry. Keeping up with industry news is a good way to help your business grow. Just be aware that Google Alerts can give you too much info if your searches are too broad. Try using specific words or phrases to narrow down your results, and exclude irrelevant ones.

In short, Google Alerts is useful for businesses in a number of ways. It delivers info about your company, products, rivals, leadership, and industry trends.

How does Google Alerts work?

To set up a Google Alert, just go to the Google Alerts page and type what you want to keep track of in the search box. If you want to change how often you get alerts, where they come from, the language, or the region, click Show options and tweak things there. You can also pick how many results you want and which email gets the alert. Hit create alert, and you’ll get emails when new search results show up. There are two filters: only the best results, which gives you the most popular stuff, and all results, which is broader.

6 Ways to Use Google Alerts

It’s time to check the six most common use cases for google alerts that will boost your brand monitoring game.

1. Tracking brand mentions

Keeping tabs on what folks say about your brand matters. You get to know what’s being said about you online. Monitoring the media lets you get feedback and honest opinions. You can then jump on ways to manage your image. Keeping your online rep clean is really important now since people trust online reviews and comments right away.

It’s really important for your biz to get how people use your stuff. These online talks can help you watch what your rivals do. You can also find people with clout and leads on social media. Looking at the feelings behind comments lets you figure out what customers think. You can then fix any problems or confusion. It also allows you to avoid problems down the road.

2. Following media coverage

Media coverage is basically getting your story out there on TV, in newspapers, and on the radio. It matters because it gets your message to more people, boosts your business’s reputation, and makes what you’re doing noticeable. It’s also a great way to keep tabs on things, attract attention to your brand, and get people to feel something about it. Basically, media coverage helps build trust and shows people you know your stuff, which makes customers stick with you. This is super helpful if you ever get bad press.

3. Keeping up with research

Staying on top of research helps you keep up with what’s happening – news, trends, and potential customers– so you can spot chances for your company to grow. Research matters because it grows your knowledge, gives you the newest info in your field, builds your reputation, helps you focus if you’re unsure where to begin, and makes you better at spotting good versus bad info. You can also find fresh subjects and thoughts, get more curious, reach more people, and improve your problem-solving skills. Whatever kind of business you’re in, remember to do your research if you want to beat the competition.

4. Managing brand reputation

Basically, your brand’s reputation is what customers think about your biz. A good rep is great ’cause people trust you more and spread the word. Managing your online rep means knowing what people think and using that to your advantage. That means dealing with feedback, replying to comments publicly, letting people share their experiences, and chatting with your audience.

Getting customers to trust you should be the aim, since they can spread the word about your brand and what you sell. Word-of-mouth is powerful, so be aware of how it works and use it to make your online rep better.

5. Tracking competitors

Yep, keeping tabs on what your rivals are up to is key. It gives you the lowdown on where you shine and where you’re weak compared to them. Knowing their game plan tells you how to really stand out and dodge slip-ups that could hurt your brand. Spotting their screw-ups gives you a chance to dodge similar fails. Plus, watching your competitors pushes you to up your game, spot opportunities, stay current, and get ready for anything.

6. Keeping an eye on SEO

SEO helps people find your business easier on the internet. When more folks visit your site, more people can find out about you. SEO helps with getting the right people to visit your website and creating trust with them. The more they trust you, the better your website will show up in searches and the better their experience will be. This makes your business better and your online marketing gets better. If you keep working on SEO, your site will move up in search results without you doing anything special.

8 Types of Google Alerts You Can Create

Okay, let’s look at the different kinds of Google Alerts you can set up. Basically, these types are just different sources Google checks. So, if you pick blogs, you’ll get an alert anytime your keyword pops up in a blog post.

Here’s a simple breakdown of Google Alerts you can set up:

1. **Automatic Alerts:** These cast a wide net and cover lots of different subjects automatically.

2. **News Alerts:** Get emails when something changes online. This can be from web pages, news stories, blog posts, or science stuff.

3. **Blog Alerts:** Stay in the loop with the newest blog posts and articles. You’ll be pinged whenever a new one drops.

4. **Web Alerts:** Track websites and catch any changes based on what you tell it to look for. You’ll get quick updates on stuff happening all over the web.

5. **Video Alerts:** Get updates for video content in your area of interest or based on the words you give.

6. **Book Alerts:** Cool for writers or anyone who likes books. Stay current with other authors, book titles, events, and find ideas.

7. **Discussion Alerts:** Discussions happen all the time online and on social media. This helps you know what’s being said, what people care about, and what’s being said about your brand or business.

8. **Finance Alerts:** Stay informed about stocks, prices, finance news, and anything else in the business and finance world.

How to Set Up Google Alerts in 3 Simple Steps (with or without a Gmail Account)

Okay, so we’ve looked at what Google Alerts can do and the different kinds you can make. Now, let’s talk about getting them set up. It’s pretty easy – just three quick steps, and it doesn’t matter if you even have a Google account.

1. Create an alert

You’ll get email alerts when there are new Google search results, also from apps and forums. For example, you can learn stuff like products, news, or mentions of your brand.

How to create an alert with a Gmail Account

Visit the google alerts site
Enter in the search box the topic you want to receive notifications about
If you want to modify your settings, click show options
Then click create an alert

How to create an alert without a Gmail Account

Visit myaccount.google.com and log in.
Click on the Personal Info option
Select the Email option
Now Select the Alternate Email option and type your email

2. Edit or disable an alert

If you want to edit an alert:

Go to google alerts.
Click edit right next to the alert you want
If you don’t see anything, click show options
Make your changes
Choose update alert
To change the way you receive alerts, click on settings and then check your options and press save

If you want to turn off an alert:

Click news settings
Then click on notifications, which is under “alerts”. To get notifications, turn on get notifications
To stop all notifications, turn off get notifications

3. Delete an alert

Go to google alerts
Click delete on the alert you wish to delete
Optional: You can also delete an alert by pressing unsubscribe at the end of an alert email

Tips on Taking Your Google Alerts to the Next Level

It’s important to do your best when it comes to improving your alerts and generating the results you want. So, let us guide you through these 3 tips that will take your google alerts to the next level.

Cover search query variations and common misspellings of your search term

Even though Google’s getting good at spotting typos, it still misses stuff. So, when you’re setting up a search alert, toss in some common misspellings, that way you’ll get better results. Google says that spelling can be tricky because people type keywords wrong all the time, so new words are popping up all the time. So how do we mess with misspelled words? First do some keyword digging before messing with your website.

Give these steps a shot:

* Look through your website’s records to see how people are misspelling your brand or products.
* Look at lists of common misspellings.
* Try misspelling the word yourself.
* Use a typo generator.

Make use of Google’s search operators to narrow your results

Here’s how to use commands to get better search results. There are different kinds, and each one changes what you find. Check it out:

Quotes (word): If you put quotes around a word, you’ll only see results with that exact word. If you don’t use quotes, you will get a lot of irrelevant results.
Minus symbol (-): Use this to leave out words you don’t want to see. Like, if you’re looking for apple pie but don’t want results about Apple products, search for apple pie -computer.
Plus symbol (+): Forces a word to be included in your search.
Asterisk (*): This is like a blank space. It can be anything.
Site: Want results from one site? Type site:websitename.com before your search.
Related:See sites similar to another? Type related:websitename.com.
Info:This helps you get info about something. It finds pages with domain text on the page, like on-site pages, and the website’s stock.

Deliver your notifications to an RSS feed or use Google Inbox to avoid jamming

Connect your notifications to an RSS feed or the google inbox to avoid email notifications from google alerts. Instead, set up your notifications as an RSS feed means having them all in one place. How to do that?

Go to your alerts home page
Click on the pencil icon to edit your alert
From the dropdown next to “Deliver To,” select “RSS Feed” and then click the “Update Alert” button

Adding Google Alerts to an RSS feed allows you to view customized google alerts from a source you chose to stay informed about the latest news and content. This is the best way to use google alerts to avoid jamming your email inbox.

Now Over to You

Google Alerts are super useful for keeping tabs on your brand’s social media and online image. Now, you’re all set to get your account going, use Alerts the right way, and really get the most out of them.

Want to know more about how Google Alerts work and how they tie into AI? Check out our article on How to Use Google Alerts and AI to Monitor Social Media Presence. Just remember, having a strong social media presence is super important for any successful brand marketing plan.