Rank alerts

Summary#

Rank Alerts watches a specific keyword and domain pair on Google and tells you when the position gets worse. You choose how far a keyword has to fall before it counts, Metric Vault re-checks each tracked keyword once every 24 hours, and a drop past your threshold — or falling out of the top 10 entirely — raises an alert. Tracking a keyword costs no credits.

Alerts belong to the website you had selected when you created them, and the list shows only that website's keywords. Switch website to see the others. See Working with multiple websites.

Purpose#

The keywords that actually pay for a site are a short list, and losing one is expensive in a way that is easy to miss. Rankings do not fall on a schedule, and by the time a monthly traffic report shows the dip, the competitor who took the position has had a month to consolidate.

Rank Alerts exists to make that specific loss loud. It ignores the thousands of keywords a site ranks for and watches only the ones you nominated, which is what lets it justify checking every single day.

Requirements#

• A signed-in account. Tracked keywords are saved to your account so alerts keep running when the dashboard is closed.
• A keyword and the domain you want it tracked for.

No plan upgrade is needed, and no credits are spent. The button reads Start Tracking · 1 report but tracking a keyword does not charge your allowance.

Permissions#

Navigation Path#

Track & Report → Rank Alerts

The screen's own heading is Keyword Rank Alerts.

Step-by-Step Guide#

Track a keyword#

1. In the Track a New Keyword card, type the search term into KEYWORD.
2. Type the site you want it tracked for into YOUR DOMAIN, placeholder e.g., yourbrand.com. A bare domain is right; https:// and a trailing slash are stripped for you.
3. Choose a value in ALERT ON DROP OF. The four options are 5+ positions, 3+ positions, 10+ positions and Out of top 10.
4. Press Start Tracking · 1 report.

The feedback line under the form reads Tracking… and then Now tracking. First SERP check running now. A baseline check runs immediately, which is why the row appears with a position a moment later. That first check never raises an alert; there is no earlier position to compare it with.

If you press the button without signing in you get Sign in first., and with a field empty you get Keyword + domain required.

Choosing a threshold#

The threshold is how many positions a keyword must fall, compared with its previous check, before an alert fires.

Leaving the top 10 raises an alert on its own, whatever threshold you picked. If a keyword was ranked 10 or better on the previous check and is now outside the top 10 or not ranking at all, that is an alert even on a 3+ positions threshold. So the Out of top 10 option is not needed to get that behavior.

Pick 3+ positions for a small set of critical terms where you want early warning, and 5+ positions for a broader list where small movement is noise.

Add several keywords at once#

Two routes.

From a CSV. Press Download CSV template to get metricvault-rank-alerts-template.csv, which contains a header row and three example rows:

keyword,domain,drop_threshold
running shoes,example.com,5
best laptops,example.com,5
marketing automation,example.com,3

Fill it in, press Bulk import CSV, and choose the file. Two columns are required, keyword and domain; a third column sets that row's threshold and defaults to 5 when missing. A first row containing the word keyword or domain is treated as a header and skipped. Progress reads Importing 40 row(s)… and finishes as Imported 38/40 (2 failed). Rows missing a keyword or a domain are counted as failures and skipped.

From another tool. Tools such as Rank Tracker and Keyword Explorer have an Add to Tracker button. It hands its keywords to this screen, where a queue appears above the feedback line reading 20 keywords queued from Rank Tracker, with the keywords as chips. Type the domain to track them for and press Track all 20. Progress reads Tracking 3 of 20… and finishes as Now tracking 20 keywords for yourbrand.com. Dismiss clears the queue.

Check a keyword now#

Press Check on the row. The button reads Checking…, a fresh Google check runs, and the table reloads with the new position. This counts as that keyword's check for the day.

Stop tracking#

Press the bin icon on the row. The confirmation reads Stop tracking this keyword? with a Stop tracking button. The keyword and its position history are removed.

How the checks run#

Each tracked keyword is re-checked 24 hours after its own last check, not at one fixed hour for every customer. Up to 30 due keywords are processed per pass of the scheduler, so a long list is worked through over successive passes.

The Next Auto Check tile counts down to 06:00 UTC and is a rough guide only. The number that governs any single keyword is its own Last Checked value in the table.

Every check records the position into that keyword's history and updates its best and worst positions. Checks are run against Google in the United States on desktop, looking at the first 30 organic results. Keywords added from this screen use those settings; the country and device controls in the top bar do not change them.

Reading the tracked-keyword table#

The band label on Current is TOP 3 for positions 1 to 3, PAGE 1 for 4 to 10, PAGE 2 for 11 to 20, BURIED beyond that, and NOT RANKED when the keyword was not found in the first 30 results.

The four tiles above the table read:

What an alert says#

An alert is raised when either condition is met on a check.

Rank drops from the last 14 days appear in the notifications feed behind the bell icon and on the alerts hub, titled "running shoes" dropped on example.com with the body Was #6. Now #14. They are controlled by the SEO Score Alerts switch in Account → Preferences.

Slack, webhook and email delivery for a rank drop come from channels stored on the individual alert. The Track a New Keyword card collects a keyword, a domain and a threshold, and no channel fields, so an alert created here reaches you through the in-app feed. Every notification you can receive is the full inventory.

Limitations#

• Checks look at the first 30 organic results. A keyword ranked beyond that is recorded as not ranking.
• Positions are United States, English, desktop. There is no per-keyword country or device choice on this screen.
• Paid results, local packs and other SERP features are not counted as positions.
• A keyword's first check is a baseline and never alerts.
• Improvements are recorded but never alerted. The Best column is where you see them.
• Deleting a keyword deletes its history.

Troubleshooting#

FAQs#

How many keywords can I track? There is no cap on how many you add. Up to 30 due keywords are checked per pass of the scheduler, so a large list is worked through over successive passes.

Does tracking cost credits? No. Neither adding a keyword nor the daily checks touch your allowance, despite the · 1 report on the button.

Is this the same as Rank Tracker? No, and they pair well. Rank Alerts watches a short list of keywords you chose and tells you when one falls. Rank tracker takes a domain and shows everything it ranks for right now, with a twelve-month trend. Use Rank Tracker to find the keywords worth watching, then Add to Tracker to move them here.

Can I be alerted when a keyword improves? No. Alerts fire on drops only. Improvements show up in the Best column and in Rank Tracker's wins list.

What happens when a keyword stops ranking entirely? The check records no position, the row shows NOT RANKED, and if the keyword was in the top 10 on the previous check that is a High alert. The best and worst figures are left alone rather than being spoiled by a missing reading.

Do teammates see my tracked keywords? Yes. Rank alerts belong to the workspace. See What teammates share.