
An Open Letter to Google: Google Alerts Now Useless - scholia
http://thefinancialbrand.com/28346/google-alerts-broken/
======
jpilcher
Anyone accusing The Financial Brand of "lazy journalism" hasn't spent much
time on the site. The Financial Brand uses Google Alerts to find new financial
institutions starting out on Facebook. If you are assuming that The Financial
Brand simply copy-pastes press releases from Google Alerts, you are way off
base. Google Alerts are used to find things like
[http://thefinancialbrand.com/28070/50-of-the-most-
spectacula...](http://thefinancialbrand.com/28070/50-of-the-most-spectacular-
website-designs-in-banking/) Google Alerts are used to identify banks and
credit unions that are undergoing name changes and rebrands. All these are
used as first-hand sources for original articles.

The site is not an "aggregation" service. Regular readers of The Financial
Brand know this.

And FYI - I'd pay for the service if that what Google needs.

Sincerely,

Jeffry Pilcher, Publisher The Financial Brand

~~~
nicholassmith
Not sure why people are downvoting you for coming and explaining the facts to
us.

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josh2600
I have to say anecdotally that I have noticed my voluminous alerts reporting
much less data. When we got TechCrunched I got a hit, but a piece in Gigaom
took 4 days to hit my Google Alert. That's a fairly large web property with a
good PageRank, so I'm not sure why it would take so long.

Anyways, does anyone have an alternative service they can suggest?

~~~
jhund
I'd like to recommend <https://intigi.com> as an alternative to Google Alerts.
I'm one of the co-founders. We started building Intigi 2 years ago because we
were frustrated with the limited query abilities of Google Alerts. Intigi is
currently positioned for Marketers, however it's incredibly useful for anybody
who wants to track online information:

Intigi gives you the power of Lucene indexed search on the newest articles on
the web. You can subscribe to Intigi curated sources, or add your own RSS
feeds or Twitter home timeline, and then filter results using powerful Lucene
queries (fields, boosting, phrases, slop, wildcards, stop words) and other
filters (social signals, word count, publishing date, presence of image or
video). Intigi delivers results once per day or once per week via email, or
you can view results in realtime through the web interface.

Disclaimers: I'm one of the co-founders and it's a for-pay product.

~~~
josh2600
Can I make a suggestion?

I think your product looks really cool, but doing a 30 day trial on a product
like this doesn't make sense to me. I may not even be able to validate the
products usefulness in 30 days.

What I would suggest is that, as a marketing professional, I have a TON of
topics I'd like to monitor. Why not let me monitor 1 topic forever and then
force me to pay if I want more?

I guess I'm more interested in why this isn't a freemium product. What was the
thought process?

~~~
mjfern
I'm another Intigi cofounder. Great point on the freemium approach.

The reason we haven't pulled the trigger on this to date is twofold. First,
we're a bootstrapped startup and we've been cautious about our burn rate
(e.g., scaling infrastructure before we've achieved product/market fit and a
sustainable revenue model). Second, for some time our product wasn't fully
self-service. We were concerned about the support issues that would come with
a significant growth in our user base, especially free users, potentially
outside our target market.

We've now progressed beyond these two issues, and will launch a freemium model
soon, with 1 or 2 interests and cached results that are updated once or twice
per day.

I'd appreciate any other feedback, and happy to answer questions by email at
mjfern@intigi.com.

~~~
josh2600
I'll send you an email. I happen to also work at a bootstrapped startup but
we're at ~25 peeps so I can share a tip or two :).

I'll share some details of how we weathered the support issues :).

~~~
mjfern
Sounds great. Looking forward to hearing from you!

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davidjgraph
Anyone else getting bored of people whining about Google products they never
paid for when there are alternatives, both free and pay-for?

~~~
niggler
" Google products they never paid for"

I wholeheartedly agree with the sentiment (bitching about free services feels
like entitlement), but Google presents an interesting challenge here because
the free services die without even trying or offering a paid version. I wonder
what would happen if, instead of just axing services, google started charging.

~~~
NegativeK
The news still goes crazy over it. When Google started charging for heavy use
of the Maps API, people claimed Google was performing Microsoft-esque anti-
competitive tactics.

~~~
mmanfrin
The difference there is that Google Maps was used on a majority of all
products that featured maps (outside in-house things from Microsoft, or
special partnerships). Google Alerts, Reader, Finance, et al are products they
have been closing/breaking/disregarding for _lack_ of interest, which is a
completely opposite problem from the Maps example.

~~~
outside1234
The difference there was really that the iPhone used Maps and that that needed
to be monetized.

~~~
rgbrenner
the iphone maps app was from google (until the contract expired, and apple
created their own)... how could charging themselves for api use be a
monetization strategy?

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niggler
While the essence of the message is fair, there are just way too many ads and
moving parts on the page to read it. I could have mistaked it for forbes.com
(to be fair, though, they don't have a big fullpage ad before the content)

I dont begrudge websites that use ads, but in this case it really detracted
from readability

~~~
scholia
Really? This is how it looks on my PC, in Google Chrome....
<http://imgur.com/NIQb4rU>

~~~
niggler
They changed that specific article's rendering. When I and others looked
earlier today, it was a real mess.

My original comment was near the top when "jpilcher" showed up (based on his
responses, it was roughly 1-2 hours after I saw the article) and I suspect he
read the comments and changed that specific page.

Other articles still show the old format:
[http://thefinancialbrand.com/28313/cool-vehicle-designs-
from...](http://thefinancialbrand.com/28313/cool-vehicle-designs-from-
financial-institutions/)

(Notice the size of the ad on the right side as well as the interstitial ads)

<http://i.imgur.com/RekSTWf.jpg>

~~~
scholia
Ah, sneaky! This is what it looks like here, at the moment
<http://imgur.com/tvcjehW>

The layout didn't attract my attention when I read the piece and posted it
here. It felt like a fairly ordinary commercial site...

------
earbitscom
I absolutely get fewer of these. I would blame it on getting less press about
our company, but they used to alert me when we posted new blog posts on our
own company blog, and I never receive those anymore. I can confirm that Google
Alerts we used to receive have stopped coming.

------
aqrashik
I started using mention (<https://en.mention.net/>) which I came across on HN
itself and I must say I'm really satisfied with it.

I use it mainly for alerts about apps and services I develop and it does a
good job of alerting me whenever someone mentions it on websites as well as in
tweets etc.

~~~
itry
Perfect example of a horror ui. It took me so long just to set up a simple
alert, that now I hate mention.

~~~
welcometothesky
I'm co-founder and lead designer at mention. I'll be glad to hear you tell us
more about your experience. Can you send us an email at support@mention.net?

We're currently working on the new version and first experience is one of our
priority.

~~~
itry
Its been a while. Let me try to remember... One thing was that at some point
in the signup process it kicked me to another domain. erwaehnung.de or
something. First it felt like i was tricked into something. Then I thought
"ok, some ugly SEO stuff" and was a bit annoyed.

The other thing was that after signing up, I was not logged in. Since I
already forgot my password (put in some crap) i had to use the reset-password
thingy.

I remember, that later I had some problems adding keywords. I dont know why
anymore, sorry.

I have to say, that your service is _good_. Only the ui was annoying.

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will_brown
Just wanted to share how I came to use Google Alerts, because out of any
software I have ever used it is the strangest introduction. In 2010 I started
V-BLOOD, LLC and began distributing a blood red, vampire themed energy drink
in small glass dram vials. V-Blood was doing well so I wanted to expand the
product line with glass vials full of sour candy called "sour fairy dust". The
supplier of the sour candy happened to be the creator of Jelly Belly. As it
turned out we both had backgrounds in law and I was lucky enough to gain a
mentor for V-Blood. In addition to the million other insights he gave me into
the candy/convection industry, he insisted I use Google Alerts for energy
drinks, candy, vampires, ect...

If Google lets Alerts go to the wayside it is a major opportunity in search
for start-ups. Maybe most would disagree but I see Alerts as a stand alone
product and not simply a feature for Google.

------
eli
Uh, those alerts appear to be set to find "Only the best results" rather than
"All Results". So, yeah, you're getting fewer of them.

Or am I missing something?

~~~
gwern
I have a variety of Alerts set to both Best and All. Both have seen
substantial falls in hits over the years. (And really, did you think no one
would've pointed this out yet if that were the real cause?)

~~~
eli
Well, every alert shown in the screenshots is set that way.

------
leephillips
I have a dozen or so Google alerts in my set of RSS feeds (that I've just
moved over[0] to Newsblur). I haven't noticed any major degradation, but I
haven't tried to test the system. Can anyone suggest an alternative?

[0]<http://lee-phillips.org/newsblurred/>

------
webwanderings
Yahoo has apparently updated its Alert, or they're updating. Their last alert
email looked different and updated in design.

You can also grab Bing's RSS feed which will update based on the time criteria
you define with the keywords.

I've been noticing a decline with Google Alerts for a while.

------
teeja
My experience with Blogger began after G acquired it, and it never changed
(over a few hundred posts) ... just languished, like someone got a new toy and
got tired of it.

"Embrace, extend, extinguish"? Maybe, or was there no potential profit in it?
Reminds me of when Apple let Hypercard stagnate, then assigned someone to
overhaul it, then quit that with it half-finished ... just before declaring HC
"over".

------
nicholaides
"Google has lost touch with its core business model: search"

Those type of statements always bother me. Google probably knows what their
core business model is.

~~~
seangransee
Their core business model isn't search. It's advertising.

~~~
anigbrowl
...on search results. Let's not split hairs.

------
arafalov
So, is there a good comparable service? I know there is a bunch of social-
media trackers, but Google Alerts (used to) search everything.

------
ams6110
Seems to me that with something like curl or lynx, diff, a crontab, and a bit
of hacking you could pretty easily come up with a script that periodically ran
a search query and emailed you any new results since the last time it ran.

------
InfinityX0
SEOmoz's Fresh Web Explorer is a great substitute for Google Alerts, and it
was launched partially for this reason. It's not instantaneous, but it allows
you many of the same functions as Alerts, with a much bigger spread.

Tool: <http://freshwebexplorer.seomoz.org> Post with More Depth On Usage:
<http://www.seomoz.org/blog/announcing-fresh-web-explorer>

------
cmorgan8506
I built <http://www.feed-alert.com> for my own uses. Would consider building
on it, if it grabs any notice.

~~~
rocky1138
Haven't had a chance to fully test it out, but I love the interface. Never
change.

------
gcb0
I love how every single journalist have lost it.

remember when i used to work for a huge newspaper, the Ombudsmen opening op-ed
column talked about the journalists never leaving the newsroom anymore, just
sitting there regurgitating news from the TV or the internet. and maybe making
a couple phone calls.

------
newobj
Is an open letter just a blog post you start with "Dear such-and-such"?

Please stop saying open letter. Just delete the "Dear such-and-such" part and
remove "An Open Letter to such-and-such" from the title. Now look, it looks
just like a normal blog post minus the pretence.

~~~
ChuckMcM
The "classical" definition of an open letter is a correspondence from
person/entity A to person/entity B, which is published for general viewing
rather than mailed. The goal of such things is to demonstrate a point of view,
and action on that view, for others. As a form of rhetoric it is reasonably
persuasive if done well.

So to answer your rhetorical question :-) of _"Is an open letter just a blog
post you start with 'Dear such-and-such'?"_ , Of course it is, it is a
rhetorical argument made in the form of a correspondence. Making such
arguments in the form of an essay or allegory are also common.

~~~
michaelwww
What strange knowledge you bring from outside the blogosphere. Where is this
"classical" world you speak of? ;-)

~~~
ChuckMcM
lol, I certainly can't vouch for it, others [1] before me have used it to
great effect however.

[1] [http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/benjamin-
franklin...](http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/benjamin-franklin-
publishes-an-open-letter-to-lord-north)

------
mmuro
I was never a user of Google Alerts until recently and noticed I rarely get
emails. However, performing a search will reveal something completely
different. By the time a Google Alert gets to me, I've already seen the site.

Google Alerts is largely useless for me.

------
SkittlesNTwix
How soon until Google Alerts is retired, I wonder.

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cleverjake
I haven't noticed an issue myself, though I would be interested in hearing the
average quality of each item over time (ie if the fewer items you are getting
are the cream of the crop of the formerly larger amount).

------
jamesseattle
If you have an OS X or Linux machine just use a cron job to do daily google
searches. Certainly less than a page of Python.

------
ch33zer
I don't want to read a financial blog if the majority of their content just
comes from a google search anyways. I hate when news sites just quote verbatim
from a source (or worse, another article) with no extra analysis or anything
thrown in. I would far prefer to just read the original and make my own
conclusions.

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forgetcolor
I've found that google alerts rarely reports new hits on my terms anymore. I
know this because I also use their time tools in search to find new hits, and
what it finds almost never comes in as an alert anymore. When it does it's
often quite old.

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hknozcan
I did not realize this either due to extensive email traffic but it makes
sense. I took time and added a couple alerts the other day. If it is broken,
why have us spend time and rely on it.

------
bsims
I know the author of this post and notified him it had made the front page of
Hacker News.

Thought it was ironic to find out from a person vs. Google Alerts.

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masklinn
> Google has lost touch with its core business model: search.

It's not and it's never been their "core business model", sadly. It's their
hook.

------
rushabh
Again anecdotal but Google Alerts is definitely broken. I hope Twitter is
sensing a big opportunity here.

------
lazylizard
<http://tattlerapp.com/> does this work?

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atesti
I wonder if Google Alerts will even survive until the next spring cleaning

------
kamakazizuru
why not try presstler if you want to find out about ur brand?
<http://presstler.com>

