How do I set up job alerts that are not useless?
Narrow the query and change the source. Most alerts are useless because they run a broad keyword search over an aggregator, so you get reposts, duplicates and roles two levels off. Set alerts per company on their applicant tracking system, keep queries specific, and delete any alert that produced nothing in a month.
Why most alerts fail
The failure is not the concept. It is that an alert built on a keyword query over a scraped index cannot be more precise than its source.
- They match on a title string, so they miss the same job under a different name and catch unrelated jobs sharing a word.
- They run over aggregators, which repost and refresh listings, so old roles arrive looking new.
- They have no seniority filter that works, so a lead role and a graduate role arrive together.
- They send daily whether or not anything happened, which trains you to stop opening them.
- Nobody ever turns them off, so the ones that never worked keep sending.
How to set ones that work
- Alert per company, not per keyword. Greenhouse, Lever and Ashby boards can be watched directly, and several companies offer their own subscribe link.
- Make each query narrow enough that a match is worth opening. Two or three specific alerts beat one broad one.
- Add the exclusions. Filtering out senior, contract or intern removes most of the noise in one step.
- Set the location and remote criteria explicitly rather than leaving them open.
- Use one destination. Route everything to a single folder or address so alerts are a place you go, not interruptions.
Frequency, and pruning
Daily is right for almost everyone. Instant alerts only help if you are able to apply within the hour, and if you are not, they are just more interruptions for the same result.
Then review the alerts themselves every month. If one has not produced a single role you opened, it is wrong and no amount of waiting will fix it. Rewrite it or delete it.
How we do it
We monitor the applicant tracking systems of a curated list of companies continuously and match new postings against your CV on meaning rather than a keyword string. We record when each posting first appeared, so what reaches you is new rather than refreshed.
Updated 2026-09-06