Learning outcomes
You will better understand what KPI Alerts are used for
You will learn about the benefits of KPI alerts
You will learn how to set up KPI Alerts effectively
What are the benefits of KPI Alerts?
KPI Alerts are super useful to keep a pulse on important aspects of the online conversations you are tracking. KPI Alerts are used to notify users when Sentiment, Visibility or Volume goes up or down in a search based on a rule that you set up. You can access KPI Alerts from the Reports menu, on the left hand navigation bar of your search.
How to create a new KPI Alert?
There are multiple KPI alert options to choose from, but the most common alerts are Volume (increase/decrease) alerts or Sentiment (increase/decrease) alerts. Creating a KPI alert is straightforward - from the Reports menu, select KPI Alerts, then click on the Create New Alert button, then follow the steps on the form.
How to create a Sentiment KPI Alert?
Sentiment Decrease or Increase KPI alerts are useful to track when the sentiment of the conversation changes. Setting up a Sentiment Alert is straightforward - from the KPI Alert form:
Specify a unique name for your alert.
Add a saved filter (if you have one), or create a new one. Otherwise you can also leave this blank.
Choose Sentiment as your variable.
Specify when you want your KPI alert to be triggered, for example "alert me when sentiment decreases by more than 20%".
Specify how often you want to receive the KPI email alert for your sentiment. You have the option to specify Hourly, Daily, Weekly, or Monthly.
Specify the period for comparing the shift in sentiment. You have the option to specify previous hour (or day, or week, or month), or hourly average (or daily, or weekly, or monthly average).
Specify the email recipients for the alert.
Finally click “Create” and you will see the new sentiment alert you have created in the Alerts page.
💡 Top Tip: For better results, we suggest to go for at least 20%. You can of course make it as customisable as you wish and select the value between 1 and 100.
In the example above we configured the KPI alert to be sent every hour, when sentiment decreases by more than 20%, in comparison to the previous hour. So should sentiment go down by 20% compared to the previous hour, then you will be alerted by email.
How to create Volume KPI Alerts?
Volume KPI Alerts are useful if you want to be alerted when the volume of content in your search goes up or down, as compared to the previous period, or to an average. You can also set up the alert to be triggered when the volume of conversation about a specific topic or group of keywords, goes up or down.
To set up a Volume KPI alert, follow the same steps as when creating a Sentiment KPI Alert. So, from the KPI Alert form:
Specify a unique name for your alert.
Enable a saved filter (if you have one), or create a new one. Otherwise you can also leave this blank.
Choose Volume as your variable.
Specify when you want your KPI alert to be triggered, for example "alert me when volume increases by more than 70 posts". Note that with volume alerts, you can set a percentage based threshold, or a volume based threshold.
Specify how often you want to receive the KPI email alert. You have the option to specify Hourly, Daily, Weekly, or Monthly.
Specify the period for comparing the shift in volume. You have the option to specify previous hour (or day, or week, or month), or hourly average (or daily, or weekly, or monthly average).
Specify the email recipients for the volume alert.
Finally click “Create” and you will see the new volume alert you have created in the Alerts page.
In the example above we configured the KPI alert to be based on keyword mentions of "sustainable fashion" and we want it to be sent every hour. So, should the number of posts and articles in this search containing "sustainable fashion", increase by 70 posts, compared to the previous hour, then you will be alerted by email.
How to apply a Filter to a KPI Email Alert
One important aspect to keep in mind when creating KPI Alerts is that if there are any particular keywords that you want to individually track. You can do so by using the Filter option in the KPI Alert form, as shown below.
For instance, if we want to track how people are reacting to the specific topic or keyword within a conversation we could add these keywords to the Alert filter. To create a Filter you need Name your Filter and add your keywords and click Save Filters. You can use existing saved filters, or specify a new filter to be notified only when the conditions of that filter are met.
📝 Note: You are able to edit or remove your filters anytime.
Upload Email Recipients
When you are happy with setting up your Alert filter, it's time to add all required recipients. You can add anyone within your organisation to the recipient list, regardless of whether they are a Pulsar user or not.
Pro Tip: If you have a long list of recipients that needs to be added, simply copy and paste comma separated list of email addresses into the "Send Alert to" field and press enter.
Email Design
Presentation is everything, including your KPI Alert design. You can customise your email look to stay on brand, using your company logo or/and header image. If that's not enough, you can choose a custom primary, secondary and link colours that will stay in line with your brand aesthetic.
Before the first email is sent out, you can have a quick look at a preview to make sure the design is to your liking, and make further edits to it as needed.
Example of a KPI Alert Email
Below is an example of a KPI alert email:
