How do I narrow an alert to certain people?
Updated 6 October 2026
The Short Answer
New Message and No Reply have a From field: Everyone, Groups or Individuals. Groups and Individuals open your own groups and contacts so you can pick particular people. Narrowing is how you stop one alert firing too often without switching it off altogether.
Step two of three. Start broad, then narrow the one that turns out to be noisy.
What are my choices?
In the panel, the From field sets who the alert watches:
- Everyone — where every alert starts
- Groups — expands to your own groups
- Individuals — expands to your own contacts, by name
Name anyone and Everyone drops off; untick the last name and it goes back to Everyone. Name more than three and the box shows a count, such as 4 People. Only New Message and No Reply pick people here; on New Lead, From lists doors instead.
When should I narrow one?
When it is firing more often than it is useful.
The usual case is New Message on a busy line. Rather than switching it off — which is how you miss the one that mattered — narrow it to the group of people you are actively working. On No Reply, narrowing to your hot buyers means you only hear about the silences you would act on.
Can I have two alerts for different people?
Yes — two alerts of the same type, narrowed differently. Press New Alert again — say, your live buyers on Telegram, and one other group on WhatsApp.
Alerts add up and never cancel. When someone matches both, you hear on every channel the two name, so a second alert left on Everyone also catches the people the first one names. The panel warns you under Alert Me On: Another alert watches this too.
Where do groups come from?
Groups are made in Prospecting, and they are the same groups an automation points at.
If Groups here has nothing behind it, that is why — make one in Prospecting first. An alert narrowed only to an empty group, or to contacts you have since deleted, reaches nobody: turning it on shows Choose at least one person for us to watch for you and keeps Turn On grey.
Why is New Leads not in the list?
An alert's From offers Everyone, Groups and Individuals only. New Leads belongs to automations: on an automation's Who it starts the sequence for each new lead as they come in.
To hear about new leads, make a New Lead alert instead: press New Alert, pick New Lead, and leave every door under its From ticked.