Adding a new keyword for Mentionlytics to track is quick and straightforward. Follow the steps below to set up a new Mention Tracker or expand an existing one with more keywords.
Kind note: To add a keyword, you must first add a tracker for the keyword to belong in. Trackers work as “folders” for the keywords to be included in.
How to Add Keywords to a New Mention Tracker
1. Locate the Mention Tracker Box
Begin by navigating to the Mention Tracker box in your dashboard. Click “Add Keyword / Tracker.”
2. Choose the Tracking Purpose
You will be prompted to select the purpose of your new tracker. You can choose to track:
Your Brand
Your Competitors
Your Industry
Or add a keyword to an existing Mention Tracker. If you want to do this, click here to skip the steps below.
3. Name Your Mention Tracker
Enter the name of your new Mention Tracker. You will also notice an option to avoid duplicate mentions caused by overlapping keywords and social profiles in the same tracker/folder.
This is enabled by default. If you prefer to disable it, simply uncheck the box. You may also assign a color to your tracker for better organization; this is purely optional.
4. Add Your Keyword and Refine the Query
The platform automatically adds your tracker name as the initial keyword. You can modify this keyword if needed. The main keyword needs to be more than 2 characters long.
You may also include additional required keywords. You can configure these keywords using:
AND operator, which would be your main keyword in combination with all the included keywords. For best results, we recommend using 1 to 2 maximum required words to avoid over-restricting your search.
OR operator, which would be your main keyword in combination with any of the included keywords (but not all of them).
You also have the ability to exclude specific keywords to avoid irrelevant or off-topic results. Use this field to refine your results by excluding unwanted topics. This section works as the NOT operator.
Important note: The limit of included keywords is 15.
These are the sections where you can add your additional keywords or your excluded keywords.
This is how you add additional keywords with the OR operator.
This is how to add an excluded keyword.
Tip: In Pro and higher-tier subscriptions, you have the option to add multiple main keywords with the OR operator, which should be used as variations of the main keyword. The limit of keywords here is 4.
Please note that the limit of included keywords (AND or OR) is again 15.
5. Use the Advanced Keyword Options
Within the advanced settings, you can further control your search structure and sources by:
Adding a specific hashtag. The system automatically uses the main keyword(s) as a hashtag on TikTok and Instagram. You can use a specific hashtag with this option only if you want to replace the main keyword’s hashtag.
Restricting results to one particular site as a source, which means that we will ONLY bring web results from this website.
Adding content from a specific subreddit, which means that we will ONLY bring results from this subreddit.
Enabling or disabling sentiment analysis for the results that occur from this keyword.
Targeted sentiment/emotion. When Sentiment/Emotion analysis is activated, the system performs Sentiment/Emotion analysis on the main keyword by default. You can use this advanced option to perform the Sentiment/Emotion analysis on a different keyword instead of the main one (e.g., Tracker, Not targeted, Custom).
Daily mentions limit. You can set a daily limit on how many mentions a keyword is allowed to bring into your account. This helps you manage keywords with very high traffic so they don’t consume your entire monthly quota.
How the Daily Mentions Limit works
You choose the maximum number of mentions the keyword should collect per day. Once the limit is reached, the keyword will stop collecting new mentions until the daily counter resets at the beginning of the next day.
When to use Daily Limit
This option is recommended only for:
Keywords that you expect to bring very high traffic.
Situations where you don’t need every single mention, especially for broad or generic keywords.
Preserving your quota for other, more important keywords in the same tracking setup.
Adjusting the Limit
The limit can be increased or decreased only by increments of 500 mentions.
This gives you flexibility to control high-volume keywords without losing visibility across your entire monitoring setup.
6. Apply Language and Country Filters
In the next section, you may select:
A specific language
A specific country for your results
We do not recommend using the Country filter because, in many cases, the Country data is not provided, especially in social media, so the majority of results will be unspecified, and the country will be unknown. TikTok and Reddit do not support country-specific filters.
The option to include results where the country is unknown is selected by default. You can uncheck this if you prefer stricter filtering.
7. Select Data Sources
Choose which platforms and data sources should be included in your tracking. Be mindful of sources requiring authorization:
Instagram
Threads
To collect mentions from these platforms, you must authorize at least one corresponding social profile in your Mentionlytics account.
Additional filtering options include:
Excluding comments or replies.
Excluding retweets (enabled by default) — this is relevant to Twitter/X only.
Enabling strict keyword matching — this is relevant to Twitter/X only. This is useful when your main keyword (or variations of it) is used widely, so with this setting, you can reduce the noise of similar but not relevant results.
Preventing the retrieval of tweets where your main keyword does not appear — this is relevant to Twitter/X only.
When you are done with your setup, you can do a test run to check the results!
8. Social Profiles to Monitor (Optional)
This step is optional. The system automatically attempts to identify synonymous social profiles based on the name of your Mention Tracker.
However, it is recommended to manually add the profiles you want, so you may skip this step here.
9. Alerts (Optional)
You can create keyword-specific alerts in this step.
However, for efficiency and clarity, it is recommended to manage all alerts collectively via the Notifications section in your main menu.
10. Finalize Your Tracker
Review your selections and confirm to create your new tracker. Your tracker will now include your selected keyword and begin collecting real-time mentions!
Quick note: When you first create a keyword, the system will go back a few days and bring some results, but the full monitoring will be performed from the creation date onwards.
How to Add a Keyword to an Existing Tracker
If you want to add a keyword to an already existing Mention Tracker:
Hover over the tracker.
Click the “+” icon.
Choose to add a Keyword, Social Profile, or Location.
Your tracker will update immediately with the newly added keyword.