Getting too many notifications can lead to alert fatigue and cause you to miss important updates. Here are strategies to reduce notification volume while keeping the updates you care about.

1. Adjust Check Frequency

The most direct way to reduce notifications is to check sources less frequently.

How to fix:

  • Review your check frequency settings for each source
  • Change high-frequency sources (hourly) to lower frequencies (daily, weekly)
  • Match frequency to how often the source actually updates
  • Consider business-hours-only checking for non-critical sources

Examples:

  • Competitor blog checking hourly → Change to daily at 9am
  • News sources checking every 30 minutes → Change to hourly or twice daily
  • Quarterly reports checking daily → Change to weekly or monthly

2. Refine Your Source Prompts

If you're getting notifications for changes you don't care about, your prompt may be too broad.

How to fix:

  • Edit the source and make your "What's important to you?" prompt more specific
  • Tell Changeflow to ignore certain sections or topics
  • Use the "I am particularly interested in..." pattern to focus notifications

Examples:

  • Instead of: Track all new content

  • Try: Track new blog posts about AI and machine learning only - ignore marketing content

  • Instead of: All changes

  • Try: Track changes to pricing only - ignore the FAQ and testimonials sections

See our guide on how to prompt sources for more details.

3. Use Email Filters to Organize Notifications

Even if you're getting many notifications, you can organize them so they don't overwhelm your inbox.

How to fix:

  • Set up email filters using the [Change] subject line tag
  • Use source tags (#tag) to filter by category
  • Move lower-priority notifications to folders for batch processing
  • Keep only critical alerts in your main inbox

Examples:

  • High priority: subject:[Change] AND #urgent → Stay in inbox
  • Medium priority: subject:[Change] AND (#competitors OR #news) → Move to "Changeflow - Review Daily" folder
  • Low priority: subject:[Change] → Move to "Changeflow - Weekly Review" folder

See our guide on managing email notifications for detailed instructions.

4. Pause or Delete Low-Value Sources

Some sources may not be providing enough value to justify the notification volume.

How to fix:

  • Review which sources are generating the most notifications
  • Pause sources temporarily to see if you miss them
  • Delete sources that consistently produce low-value notifications
  • Consider consolidating multiple similar sources into one broader search

Questions to ask:

  • Have I acted on any notifications from this source in the last month?
  • Would I notice if this source stopped sending notifications?
  • Is the information I'm getting worth the inbox clutter?

5. Batch Multiple Sources into Digest Times

Instead of getting notifications throughout the day, schedule multiple sources to check at the same time.

How to fix:

  • Group related sources to check at the same time (e.g., all at 9am daily)
  • This creates "digest moments" instead of a constant stream of alerts
  • Schedule low-priority sources for weekly digests

Example schedule:

  • 9am daily: Competitor sources, industry news, blog posts
  • 5pm daily: Regulatory updates, court filings
  • Monday 9am: Weekly reports, quarterly updates, job listings

6. Use Progressive Filtering

Not all changes require the same level of detail. Use progressive filtering to reduce noise.

How to fix:

  • For high-volume sources, ask for summaries of multiple changes instead of individual notifications
  • Use filtering keywords to reduce false positives
  • Track only major changes, not minor updates

Examples:

  • Instead of tracking every single news mention: Track major news stories about our brand - ignore passing mentions in round-up articles
  • For busy forums: Track new posts with over 50 upvotes only

7. Consolidate Notification Channels

If you're monitoring many sources, consider consolidating how you receive notifications.

How to fix:

  • Review if you need individual email notifications for every source
  • Consider using Changeflow's feed view to batch-review changes and remove notification email addresses completely

Quick Wins

If you're overwhelmed right now, try these immediate actions:

  1. Pause all non-critical sources for 24 hours - see which ones you actually miss
  2. Change all hourly sources to daily - you can always speed them back up if needed
  3. Set up one email filter to move all [Change] notifications to a folder - process them in batches
  4. Review your top 5 noisiest sources - refine their prompts or delete them

Still Getting Too Many Notifications?

If you've tried these strategies and still feel overwhelmed:

  • Contact support - we can review your sources and suggest optimizations
  • Consider if you're monitoring too many sources (50+ sources with hourly checks = a lot of email)
  • Think about whether you need real-time notifications or if daily/weekly digests would work better
  • Review if multiple team members are monitoring the same sources (consolidate to avoid duplication)

Prevention Tips

To avoid notification overload in the future:

  • Start conservative: When adding new sources, start with lower frequency (daily or weekly) and increase if needed
  • Test first: Monitor new sources for a week before sharing with your team
  • Regular audits: Review your sources monthly and delete or pause ones you're not using
  • Tag strategically: Use tags to organize sources so you can batch-review by category
  • Set expectations: Remember that more frequent doesn't always mean better - the goal is actionable intelligence, not constant updates