Google Tips to Make Your Google Alerts as Useful as Possible

Google Alerts is a wonderful feature that tracks when your target keyword or phrase is mentioned. However, if you do not think carefully about which keywords or phrases to track, or the frequency with which to track them, you will end up with a bombardment of emails that stress you out. Below are some pro tips on how to make Google Alerts useful and stress-free.

Pro Tips for Effective Google Alerts:

1. Target specific, precise keywords so your inbox isn’t flooded with emails. When deciding what to create an alert about, consider whether it’s a very popular topic, because you don’t want to be overwhelmed with alerts. For example, “Biden” may not be a good choice for a Google Alert. An example of a good keyword: my friend is opening a restaurant with a very specific, uncommon name: "Bijou Staunton." I know that if I set up a Google Alert for this restaurant, I won't be bombarded with emails.

2. Enter a minus sign (-) before the keywords you want to exclude from the search.

3. Include common misspellings, nicknames, synonyms, abbreviations, or phrases associated with your business name in your query. Example: When I worked for Gerry Connolly’s Congressional office, I had a Google Alert set up for “Gerry Connolly”, but also “Gerry Connelly” and “Gerald Connolly”, etc. - This helped our communications team keep abreast of any news.

4. Set up separate inboxes or email filters to receive the alert emails, so they do not interfere with the flow of your daily work emails.

5. Use Advanced Search Operators in Google Alerts to refine alerts further: Use quotation marks to search for an exact phrase, or use the site operator (site:example.com) to limit results to a specific website.

6. Customize your alert settings as needed, including how often you’d like to receive alerts, the sources (e.g. news, blogs, video), and the region.

7. Set the frequency of your Google Alerts so you are not overwhelmed by emails. Google Alerts allows you to choose the time of day you want to receive the email, and whether you want the alerts in a "digest" format - all in a single email. This will make the alerts less overwhelming for you and your team.

8. Refine your Google Alerts over time to make them more efficient and useful for your purposes. Experiment with different spellings, keywords, operators, sources, or websites to improve the quality of your results. Weed out the Google Alerts that are no longer relevant to you.

Google Alerts are a very useful tool for monitoring news about your company, your industry, or industry trends. However, any Google Alert is only as good as the specific keywords and operators you use. If you do not think deliberately about what you want to include as keywords, you will end up with poor-quality search results.