n8n template: hourly brand news alert to Slack

By Keencrest · 2026-11-01

Data: The GDELT Project. GDELT permits commercial use and redistribution with a citation and a link, and every row the Actor returns carries that citation. The Actor is not affiliated with or endorsed by GDELT.

Download: n8n-gdelt-brand-alert-slack.json. Import with Workflows, Import from file. Guide with both options: Get a Slack alert when your brand is in the news.

The four nodes

Node	What it does
Every hour	Schedule Trigger, hourly
GDELT News Monitor (Apify, watch mode)	HTTP Request to the Actor's run-sync endpoint, with `watchMode` on, so only new articles come back. Auth is your own Header Auth credential
Build Slack message	Code node: one message for all new articles, 15 lines at most
Post to Slack (incoming webhook)	HTTP Request to your Slack webhook URL. No Slack OAuth app needed

Settings to change

keywords, excludeKeywords, languages in the Apify node's body; hoursBack applies to the first run only.
The credential on the Apify node (Authorization: Bearer plus your token). The file contains no token and no credential id.
The Slack webhook URL placeholder in the last node.

Cost and limits

$0.002 per article returned, billed by Apify to your account; an hour with no new article returns nothing, so the Slack node does not run. The request carries maxTotalChargeUsd=1. The sync endpoint gives up after 5 minutes, which watch-mode runs do not approach (short windows finish in seconds); a very broad first run (all languages, long hoursBack) can, so start with English and 6 hours.

What was tested

The JSON was checked for structure (unique node ids, every connection pointing at an existing node, required node fields, no token) and the Code node was run against a sample article to check the message text. It was not imported into a live n8n or run against Slack in this build; if an import complains, tell us which node and we will fix the file. The Actor's watch mode was tested on the platform.

Try it: GDELT News Monitor on Apify. $0.002 per article returned, no start fee; reading files and filtering is free. The Apify free plan includes monthly credit, so a test run costs nothing out of pocket.

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