What is Google Alerts
Probably, if you need to know what they say about your online reputation, you have already heard about Google Alerts. It is an application, developed by the Mountain View colossus, which allows you to monitor the web and identify the pages that contain specific keywords.
Every time someone mentions the word you entered to be alerted, or the query, the service sends an alert to your email address.
This way, you can stay up-to-date on your favorite topics and get notified when your brand is mentioned on the web ( brand monitoring ). So you can decide, for example, when and how to delete a YouTube video.
It is important to note that the tool retrieves information from websites, blogs, and searches within the Google network. It does not include social networks, forums, deep web and dark web.
The brain behind the application is the Indian engineer Naga Kataru, whose name appears on all three Alerts patents on Google.
On February 2003, Kataru, tired of searching for news about the impending US war with Iraq, decided to develop an application. Purpose: to send email notifications regarding specific keywords. The engineer showed his prototype to Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page, who immediately loved the idea and launched it in August 2003.
How does it work
Let’s see how Google Alerts works. You can set the following search parameters:
- Frequency of reception of notices;
- Typology of the site you want to use as a source;
- Search language;
- Region search;
- Number of results (only the best or all);
I remind you that you can use the application only if you have a Google account. Therefore, in case you do not have it, do what is necessary to create it beforehand. Once registered, connect to the main page of the official website and start configuring your search. Doing so is very simple: in the “Create an alert about” field at the top of the page, type the keyword you want to monitor. For example, your name, your brand, your favorite team, etc.
Then see the results in the alert preview. If you have not found any results of your interest among the suggestions, create an alert.
In the picture above, we have set an alert for “midterm elections,”: so we will receive by email the list of results in Google that contains the search “midterm elections”.
What is it for
The use of Google Alerts implies a series of advantages. For example, it saves you the trouble of searching for topics of interest, but primarily it is very useful for online businesses. The main advantage is monitoring what people are saying about you or your brand on Google.
Therefore, it is a handy tool for companies, professionals, politicians and media. If, for example, Google indexes a link that speaks ill of you or your brand, you can act immediately and find out how to remove content from Google.