Skip to main content

Create a New Alert

Learn how to set up new alerts to track mentions, competitive coverage, specific journalists' work, and more

Written by Oli the Octopus

Create a New Alert

Set up Muck Rack Alerts to find new press hits, broadcast clips and podcast mentions, mentions of any keyword or company in journalists' tweets, and relevant people to build relationships with. You can set up Alerts from scratch or directly from your search results.

Learn More in Muck Rack Academy
​

Explore common use cases for using Alerts to maximize your PR strategy and impact in our 5 Ways to Leverage Muck Rack Alerts guide.

Watch the video below or keep reading to learn how to create a new alert.

NOTE: Email alerts are restricted to 100 results per email. If you anticipate receiving more than 100 results, we suggest adjusting your Alert frequency within the alert settings to receive alerts more often. This will reduce the number of results included in each email.

How Alerts Connect to Other Objects in Muck Rack

Alerts are powered by Trackers, which define what content you’re monitoring. Once you’ve created an Alert, you can take action on individual results, like adding coverage directly to a Coverage Report for reporting. Adjustments to Trackers automatically update all linked Alerts, ensuring consistency across your monitoring setup.

  • Tracker → Alert: Your Tracker provides the keywords, filters, and monitoring logic your Alert uses. Shows the Content to Monitor section of Alert Settings with Trackers listed

  • Alert → Coverage Report: Use Add to Coverage Report from an Alert email to save coverage for reporting. Shows the "Add to Coverage Report" button at the bottom of an email Alert

  • Tracker → Alerts Overview: In the Trackers table, review the "Alerts" column to see how many Alerts are linked to each Tracker. Click the number to view the specific Alerts.

Note: Podcast Trackers can be added to Alerts, but podcast results cannot currently be added to Coverage Reports or Dashboards. Article and broadcast results in your Alerts can be added to Coverage Reports as usual.

Learn More About Trackers and Coverage Reports

If you haven’t created one yet, start with Create a New Coverage Report or Automate a Coverage Report.

Learn More About Podcast Monitoring

To create a Podcast Tracker and attach it to an Alert, see Podcast Monitoring.

Create an Alert from Search Results

We recommend creating an Alert from your Search Results page for the most efficient workflow.

Note: People and Media Outlet Trackers cannot be used to power Alerts.

  1. From your results page, select Create Alert in the action bar.
    ​

  2. When prompted, create a Tracker (this will power your Alert).
    ​

  3. Fill in your Alert details by giving your Alert a name and choosing visibility using the Shared with dropdown.
    ​

    Shows the Alert details section

  4. Choose your Delivery Settings:
    ​

    1. Alert Type: Email or Slack​

    2. Subscribers who will receive your Alerts (Brand Premier users can add anyone as a subscriber, even if they are not a Muck Rack user!)​

    3. Delivery days: Daily or Specific Days ​

    4. Frequency: Once per day, Twice per day, Three times per day, or As published​

    5. Sending time​

    6. Timezone
      ​

      Shows the Delivery Settings section

  5. Fill in your Content to Monitor section to determine which coverage will be captured in your Alert. You can add up to 10 Trackers to a single Alert.
    ​

    Once added, you can:
    ​

    • Select the arrows next to your Trackers to reorder the way they appear in your Alert
      ​

      GIF shows a user rearranging the order of their Trackers


      ​

    • Choose how they are sorted (by Recency, UVM, Relevancy, or Prominence)
      ​

      Shows the "Sort coverage by" radio buttons


      ​

    • Choose whether you would like to show any coverage data such as UVM, Sentiment, or Domain Authority.
      ​

  6. Select the Save button.
    ​

    Close up of the Save button at the bottom

Create an Alert From Scratch

  1. From the navigation bar, select Monitoring > Alerts.

    Shows the 'Monitoring' dropdown menu expanded with 'Alerts' circled in red

  2. Select the Create Alert button.
    ​

    Shows the 'Alerts' page with the 'Create Alert' button circled in red in the top right-hand corner

  3. Follow steps 3 through 6 from above.
    ​

Create an Alert for a Media List

Filter any Alert by your Media Lists to receive results only from the journalists on a Media List. For example, suppose you’ve built a Media List of people attending or covering an event in your city. In that case, you can receive an email anytime they mention a specific topic or keyword.

Watch the video below to learn more about creating an alert for a Media List

NOTE: Your team’s Custom Contacts content will not appear in Alerts.

  1. Go to Relationships > Media List.
    ​

    Shows the 'Relationships' dropdown menu expanded with the 'Media Lists' option circled in red

  2. From the Media List page, select the three dots under Actions for a given Media List, then select Create Alert.
    ​

    Shows the Media Lists page with a closeup of the 'Actions' menu with 'Create Alert' circled in red

  3. This will open a new Tracker filtered to your Media List. Select Continue to Alert to go to the Create a New Alert page.
    ​

  4. Follow Steps 3 through 6 from above.

Create an Alert for an Individual Journalist's New Content

If you have a list of top journalists you want to monitor, Muck Rack allows you to set up Alerts for individual journalists proactively. This lets you receive a notification in your inbox whenever they write a new article and any article is added to their Muck Rack profile.

  1. Select any person's profile page in Muck Rack

  2. Select Create Alert below their bio.
    ​

    Highlights the 'Create Alert' button at the top of a journalist profile page

    ​

  3. Fill out the Alert configuration settings, then select Save at the bottom.
    You've now set up an alert that will notify you any time this journalist publishes any content!

Create an Alert for an Individual Journalist Using Specific Keywords

You can set up an Alert that notifies you when a specific journalist publishes coverage that matches keywords you choose, such as your company name, a product, or a topic. This works for existing coverage and for proactive monitoring, where you want to know the first time a journalist writes about something.

  1. Open the journalist's profile page in Muck Rack. You can find it by running a People Search, selecting the journalist's name, and then selecting View Full Profile.

  2. Click Create Alert below their bio.

  3. In the pop-up, choose Preview and Edit Tracker.
    ​

  4. Enter the keywords you want to monitor in this journalist's work. You'll notice this Article search page is filtered to the specific journalist.
    ​

  5. Check that the search results look as expected.
    ​
    ​Note: If you're setting up a proactive Alert and the journalist hasn't yet published anything with these keywords, you won't see any results. That's expected. The Alert will notify you when matching coverage is published.
    ​

  6. Click Create Tracker.

  7. Continue creating your Alert from scratch. When you reach the content source, choose the new journalist Tracker you just created.

  8. Finish configuring your Alert settings and click Save.

Journalist-Specific Alert Tips

  • Name your Tracker clearly. Include the journalist's name and the topic (for example, "Jane Doe – Acme Corp") so it's easy to find when you build future Alerts.

  • Combine journalists in one email. Alerts can have multiple Trackers attached. You can create a Tracker for each journalist and attach them all to a single Alert to receive one consolidated email.

  • Monitoring a group? If you're tracking the same keywords across many reporters, a Media List Alert may be simpler.

Create a New Slack Alert

After completing the Slack integration setup process, you can create Alerts to send to Slack. Watch the video or follow the instructions below to learn how to set up Slack Alerts.

  1. From the Navigation bar, select Monitoring > Alerts.
    ​

  2. Select the name of an alert you’d like to be sent to a Slack Channel or select the + Create Alert button to create a new alert.
    ​


    ​NOTE: At this time, when selecting the Create Alert button, you will first need to select Email as the Alert type. You can then change this to Slack within the Alert settings. Our engineering team is working on an update to this button to include Slack as an alert type in the near future.
    ​

  3. From the Create a New Alert page, select Slack under Alert Type within Delivery Settings.
    ​


    ​

  4. Select which public channel you’d like the alerts sent to.
    ​


    ​NOTE: Although you can only select 1 Slack channel within an Alert, you can send as many Alerts as you like to the same Slack channel (select the same Slack channel for as many Alerts as desired).
    ​

  5. Add 1 to 2 Trackers to determine which coverage will be captured in your Alert.
    ​


    ​NOTE: For "As published" alerts such as Slack, you can have up to 2 Trackers powering a single Alert. If you need more Trackers, you can set up as many Alerts to feed a single Slack channel as you like (each with 1 to 2 Trackers), or you can change your Alert Type to Email and select up to 10 Trackers to power a single Alert and have it delivered to your inbox in a digest format.
    ​

  6. Once you've configured your Alert to your liking, select Save at the bottom.
    ​

NOTE: Muck Rack Slack Alerts will appear in your organization's Slack search results. If you'd prefer to avoid this, we recommend using the "Exclude apps and workflows" filter in Slack searches.

Manually Assign a Slack Channel ID

You can manually assign a channel to your alerts rather than selecting a channel listed in Muck Rack. To do so, use the following steps.

  1. From the Navigation bar, select Monitoring > Alerts.
    ​

  2. Select the name of a Slack alert to edit it.
    ​


    ​

  3. Under Select a Delivery Method, choose Enter Channel ID Manually.
    ​

    ​

  4. Once selected, a text field will appear, and you can enter the channel ID.
    ​


    Once entered and saved, the dropdown should correctly populate with the channel name for the channel ID you had entered. You should begin to receive alerts when new coverage is found.
    ​

  5. Once you've configured your Alert to your liking, select Save at the bottom.
    ​

​NOTE: Muck Rack Slack Alerts will be displayed in Slack search results. To avoid this, we recommend using the "Exclude apps and workflows" filter in Slack searches.

Learn More in Help Center

Learn more by checking out our Muck Rack Integration with Slack article.

Add Subscribers Without a Muck Rack Seat

NOTE: This option is exclusive to Brand Premier users only.

Brand Premier users can invite others without a Muck Rack seat to subscribe to their Alerts using the following steps:

  1. Navigate to your Alert Settings by going to Monitoring > Alerts, selecting the three dots under Actions, and selecting Settings and Sharing.
    ​

  2. Under Delivery Settings > Subscribers, enter the email address of the person you would like to share your alert with into the Subscribers field and select Enter.
    ​


    ​

  3. Wait for that person to accept the invite via email.
    ​

    Shows a message below the Subscribers section that says, "We've sent an opt-in email to [email address]. They'll need to confirm before receiving this Alert."

Note: Before a non MR user begins to receive any Subscribed-to Alerts, they will first need to accept via the "Yes, send me the Alerts" button in the email they receive from Muck Rack.

Shows an example alert invite email with the "Yes, send me the Alerts" button shown

Regular Alert vs. Non-MR User Alert

Subscribers without a Muck Rack seat will see a different version of the Alert than paid Muck Rack users. These emails will be stripped of buttons like “Edit Tracker,” “View latest results,” or "Edit Alert Setttings." Results will also not include the option to "Add to Coverage Report" or "View Duplicates."

Recipients without a Muck Rack seat can only view the coverage you’ve selected. There will be an ‘unsubscribe’ option provided in the email if users want to opt-out at any time.

Shows a side-by-side image of an Alert as it appears for Non-MR users and an alert as it appears for those with a Muck Rack seat

Troubleshooting FAQ

Why Doesn’t My Tracker Appear in the Alert Dropdown?

  • Ensure the Tracker is based on an Article or Broadcast search. People Trackers cannot be used for Alerts. Recreate the Tracker as an Article search if necessary.

How Do I Connect a Tracker to an Alert?

  1. Go to Monitoring > Alerts.

  2. Select the Alert you want to power.

  3. Click the three horizontal dots under "Actions" and choose "Settings & Sharing."

  4. Scroll to "Content to Monitor" and click "Add Trackers."

  5. Select the Tracker you want to attach.

How Do I Update a Tracker Used by an Alert?

  1. Navigate to Monitoring > Alerts and select the Alert.

  2. Scroll to "Content to Monitor" to find the associated Tracker.

  3. Click the Tracker name to open its search results.

  4. Adjust filters or Boolean logic as needed and click "Update Tracker."

Issue

Solution

Why didn't I receive my email alert?

- Search your Spam/Junk folders: Ensure the email address is correct in your Alert settings and check if the Alert frequency is set appropriately.

Why doesn't my Tracker appear in the Alert dropdown?

- Ensure the Tracker is based on an Article or Broadcast search. People Trackers cannot be used for Alerts. Recreate the Tracker as an Article search if necessary.

How do I connect a Tracker to an Alert?

- Go to Monitoring > Alerts, select the Alert, click the three dots under "Actions," and choose "Settings & Sharing." Scroll to "Content to Monitor" and click "Add Trackers."

How do I update a Tracker used by an Alert?

- Navigate to Monitoring > Alerts, select the Alert, scroll to "Content to Monitor," click the Tracker name, adjust filters or Boolean logic as needed, and click "Update Tracker."

Do I need to add a new Tracker for existing Alerts?

- No. Existing Alerts were automatically converted to use Trackers. Edit the attached Tracker to update the Alert logic.

Why are Alerts now powered by Trackers?

- This change centralizes search logic, making Alerts more accurate and predictable. Adjustments to Trackers automatically update all linked Alerts.

💬 Was this article helpful?

Share your feedback and let us know how to improve our Help Center content.

Related Articles
Did this answer your question?