Notification Setup - StatusStack Documentation

Overview

StatusStack’s notification system alerts you when service status changes through multiple channels: Slack, Discord, Microsoft Teams, Email, SMS, and custom webhooks.

Notification Channels

Slack

Post alerts to Slack channels with rich formatting and threading

Discord

Send notifications to Discord servers with embeds and mentions

Microsoft Teams

Deliver adaptive cards to Teams channels

Email

Send HTML emails to individuals or distribution lists

SMS

Text message alerts via Twilio for critical issues

Webhooks

Custom integrations with any service supporting webhooks

Creating Your First Notification Rule

Navigate to Notifications

Go to Settings → Notifications in the dashboard

Click Create Rule

Click “Create Notification Rule” button

Name Your Rule

Give it a descriptive name:

"Production Critical Alerts"
"Degraded Service Warnings"
"Client: Acme Corp Notifications"

Configure Triggers

Select when to send notifications:

Status Changes
Monitor Events
Incident Updates

Alert on status transitions:

☑️ Component becomes Critical
☑️ Component becomes Degraded
☑️ Component recovers (returns to Operational)
☐ Component enters Maintenance

Select What to Monitor

Choose which resources trigger this rule:

Monitor:
  - All Stacks (or specific Stacks)
  - All Components (or specific Components)
  - All Monitors (or specific Monitors)

Tip: Start broad, refine later to reduce noise

Choose Notification Channels

Select where to send alerts:

Slack → #production-alerts channel
Email → ops@company.com
PagerDuty → On-call team (for Critical only)

Set Alert Level Filter (Optional)

Only alert for certain severity levels:

Alert Levels:
  ☑️ Critical (outages)
  ☑️ Degraded (performance issues)
  ☐ Info (informational updates)

Save and Activate

Click “Create Rule” to activate notifications

Channel Setup Guides

Slack Integration

Create Slack Webhook

In Slack:

Go to your workspace settings
Navigate to Apps → Incoming Webhooks
Click “Add to Slack”
Select the channel (e.g., #alerts)
Copy the webhook URL

Add to StatusStack

In StatusStack notification rule:

Select Slack as channel
Paste webhook URL
Customize display name (optional)

Test Integration

Click “Send Test Notification” to verify

Example Slack Message:

🔴 Production API is DOWN

Stack: Production Infrastructure
Component: Production API
Status: Critical → Degraded → Critical
Duration: 5 minutes

View Details: https://statusstack.com/stacks/prod

Advanced Options:

Thread alerts - Group related alerts in threads
Mentions - @channel or @here for critical alerts
Custom username - Set display name for bot
Custom emoji - Use custom status emojis

Discord Integration

Create Discord Webhook

In Discord:

Open server settings
Go to Integrations → Webhooks
Click “New Webhook”
Name it “StatusStack”
Select channel
Copy webhook URL

Add to StatusStack

In notification rule:

Select Discord as channel
Paste webhook URL
Configure embed color preferences

Test

Send a test notification

Example Discord Embed:

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
🔴  CRITICAL ALERT
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Production API is experiencing an outage

Stack: Production Infrastructure
Status: Critical
Started: 5 minutes ago

[View Details →]

Features:

Rich embeds with color coding
Role mentions (@everyone, @here)
Inline fields for structured data
Clickable links to status pages

Microsoft Teams Integration

Create Incoming Webhook

In Microsoft Teams:

Open the channel where you want notifications
Click ⋯ → Connectors
Search for “Incoming Webhook”
Click Configure
Name it “StatusStack Alerts”
Upload StatusStack logo (optional)
Copy webhook URL

Configure in StatusStack

Select Microsoft Teams channel
Paste webhook URL
Choose card style

Test Integration

Send test notification

Example Teams Card:

╔═══════════════════════════════╗
║  🔴  PRODUCTION ALERT         ║
╠═══════════════════════════════╣
║                               ║
║  Production API - Critical    ║
║                               ║
║  Stack: Production            ║
║  Duration: 5 minutes          ║
║  Impact: High                 ║
║                               ║
║  [View Status] [Acknowledge]  ║
╚═══════════════════════════════╝

Features:

Adaptive Cards with actions
Color-coded by severity
Inline buttons
Formatted text with markdown

Email Notifications

Add Email Addresses

In notification rule:

Select Email channel
Enter recipient email addresses (comma-separated)
Set email subject template (optional)

Customize Template (Optional)

Customize email content:

Subject line format
Include/exclude components
Branding (logo, colors)

Test Email

Send test to verify delivery

Email Recipients:

Single: ops@company.com
Multiple: ops@company.com, dev@company.com, alerts@company.com
Distribution List: team-alerts@company.com

Example Email:

Subject: [CRITICAL] Production API is DOWN

StatusStack Alert
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

🔴 Production API has changed status to CRITICAL

Stack: Production Infrastructure
Previous Status: Operational
Current Status: Critical
Duration: 5 minutes
Detected: January 19, 2025 at 10:30 AM UTC

Impact:
- API requests failing
- User-facing services affected
- Payment processing impacted

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

View full details:
https://statusstack.com/stacks/production

View incident updates:
https://statusstack.com/incidents/12345

SMS Alerts (Twilio)

Configure Twilio

In StatusStack settings:

Go to Settings → Integrations → Twilio
Enter Account SID
Enter Auth Token
Enter Twilio phone number
Save configuration

Add SMS to Rule

In notification rule:

Select SMS channel
Enter phone numbers (with country code)
Set character limit (160 recommended)

Test SMS

Send test message

Phone Number Format:

US: +1-555-123-4567
UK: +44-20-1234-5678
International: +[country-code]-[number]

Example SMS:

StatusStack Alert:
Production API is DOWN
Status: Critical
View: https://stst.co/p/abc123

SMS is charged per message by Twilio. Use SMS only for critical alerts to control costs.Recommended: Critical alerts only, not for degraded or info.

Webhook Integration

Create Webhook Endpoint

Set up an endpoint to receive webhooks:

POST https://your-service.com/webhooks/statusstack

Headers:
  Content-Type: application/json
  X-StatusStack-Signature: sha256_signature

Configure in StatusStack

Select Webhook channel
Enter your webhook URL
Add custom headers (optional)
Select HTTP method (POST default)

Verify Signature

Validate webhook authenticity:

const crypto = require('crypto');

function verifyWebhook(payload, signature, secret) {
  const hmac = crypto.createHmac('sha256', secret);
  const digest = hmac.update(payload).digest('hex');
  return digest === signature;
}

Webhook Payload:

{
  "event": "component.status_changed",
  "timestamp": "2025-01-19T10:30:00Z",
  "stack": {
    "id": "stack_abc123",
    "name": "Production Infrastructure",
    "slug": "production"
  },
  "component": {
    "id": "comp_xyz789",
    "name": "Production API",
    "previous_status": "operational",
    "current_status": "critical"
  },
  "incident": {
    "id": "inc_123",
    "created_at": "2025-01-19T10:30:00Z",
    "resolved_at": null
  }
}

Common Webhook Integrations:

PagerDuty
Datadog
New Relic
Custom monitoring dashboards
Incident management systems

Notification Rules Best Practices

Start Simple, Iterate

Don’t over-configure initiallyWeek 1: Single rule for critical alerts

Rule: "Critical Production Alerts"
Triggers: Component becomes Critical
Stacks: Production only
Channels: Slack #alerts

Week 2: Add degraded warnings

Rule: "Degraded Service Warnings"
Triggers: Component becomes Degraded
Stacks: Production only
Channels: Slack #warnings

Week 3: Separate channels by service type

Rule: "Payment Processing Alerts"
Components: Stripe, Payment API
Channels: Slack #payments-alerts, PagerDuty

Use Alert Levels Wisely

Match severity to response urgency

Level	Definition	Response	Channels
Critical	Service down, users impacted	Immediate	Slack, Email, SMS, PagerDuty
Degraded	Performance issues, some users affected	Within 30 minutes	Slack, Email
Info	Status changes, maintenance	Awareness only	Email, Dashboard

Example rule structure:

Critical Alerts:
  Channels: Slack, Email, PagerDuty, SMS
  Stack: Production only
  Triggers: Critical status

Degraded Warnings:
  Channels: Slack, Email
  Stacks: Production, Staging
  Triggers: Degraded status

Info Updates:
  Channels: Email (digest)
  Stacks: All
  Triggers: All status changes

Reduce Notification Fatigue

Avoid alert overloadBad: Alert on everything

❌ All status changes
❌ Every component in every Stack
❌ Info + Degraded + Critical
❌ 10+ channels per rule

Good: Targeted, actionable alerts

✅ Critical production components only
✅ Specific Stacks (Production)
✅ Critical and Degraded only
✅ 2-3 channels maximum

Techniques:

Rate limiting - Max 1 alert per 15 minutes per component
Deduplication - Group related alerts
Smart grouping - “3 components down” instead of 3 separate alerts
Escalation - Start with Slack, escalate to SMS if unacknowledged

Separate Production from Non-Production

Different urgency levels

Production Alerts:
  Stacks: Production Infrastructure
  Channels: Slack #prod-alerts, PagerDuty, SMS
  Triggers: Critical, Degraded
  Priority: High

Staging Alerts:
  Stacks: Staging Environment
  Channels: Slack #staging-alerts
  Triggers: Critical only
  Priority: Medium

Development Alerts:
  Stacks: Development
  Channels: Email digest
  Triggers: Critical only
  Priority: Low

Test Notification Rules

Verify before you need themMonthly testing:

Send test notifications to all channels
Verify delivery times
Check formatting and content
Ensure contact info is current
Update on-call rotations

Use test button:

Every notification rule has a “Test” button
Sends a sample alert to all configured channels
Verifies connectivity without triggering actual alerts

Advanced Notification Features

Notification Schedules

Send alerts only during specific times:

Notification Schedule:
  Active Hours: 9 AM - 5 PM EST (business hours)
  Active Days: Monday - Friday
  Holidays: Pause on US Federal Holidays
  Override: Allow Critical alerts 24/7

Use cases:

Reduce after-hours noise for non-critical alerts
Respect team working hours
Pause during holidays

Alert Escalation

Escalate to more urgent channels if unacknowledged:

Escalation Policy:
  Step 1: Slack #alerts (immediate)
  Step 2: Email on-call team (after 5 minutes)
  Step 3: SMS on-call engineer (after 15 minutes)
  Step 4: Call backup engineer (after 30 minutes)

Enterprise feature: Requires acknowledgment tracking

Alert Grouping

Group related alerts to reduce spam:

Grouping Strategy:
  Group By: Stack
  Time Window: 5 minutes
  Result: "3 components in Production Stack are down"
  Instead of: 3 separate alert messages

Custom Alert Templates

Customize notification content (Enterprise):

{{status_emoji}} **{{component.name}}** is {{status}}

Stack: {{stack.name}}
Previous: {{previous_status}}
Current: {{current_status}}
Duration: {{duration}}

{{#if incident}}
Incident: {{incident.title}}
Updates: {{incident.updates_count}}
{{/if}}

View: {{stack.url}}

Notification Limits by Plan

Plan	Max Rules	Channels per Rule	SMS Alerts
Free	3	2	Not available
Pro	25	Unlimited	100/month
Enterprise	Unlimited	Unlimited	Custom

Troubleshooting

Not Receiving Notifications

Check:

✅ Notification rule is active (not paused)
✅ Triggers are configured correctly
✅ Stack/Component is included in rule
✅ Alert level matches (Critical vs Degraded)
✅ Notification channels are working

Solutions:

Send test notification
Check channel configuration
Verify webhook URLs are accessible
Check spam folder for emails
Verify phone numbers for SMS

Receiving Too Many Alerts

Solutions:

Increase failure thresholds on monitors
Add rate limiting to notification rules
Use alert grouping
Filter by alert level (Critical only)
Separate production from non-production

Delayed Notifications

Possible causes:

Email server delays
Slack/Discord rate limiting
Webhook endpoint slow
StatusStack processing queue backlog

Solutions:

Check channel-specific delivery times
Reduce number of channels
Optimize webhook endpoints
Contact support if persistent

Duplicate Notifications

Causes:

Multiple rules matching same event
Component in multiple Stacks with separate rules

Solutions:

Review rule conditions
Use more specific Stack/Component filters
Enable deduplication (Enterprise)

Next Steps

Slack Integration

Detailed Slack setup and customization

Discord Integration

Configure Discord webhooks and embeds

Webhook Integration

Custom webhook integration guide

Notification Concepts

Deep dive into notification architecture

​Overview

​Notification Channels

Slack

Discord

Microsoft Teams

Email

SMS

Webhooks

​Creating Your First Notification Rule

​Channel Setup Guides

​Slack Integration

​Discord Integration

​Microsoft Teams Integration

​Email Notifications

​SMS Alerts (Twilio)

​Webhook Integration

​Notification Rules Best Practices

​Advanced Notification Features

​Notification Schedules

​Alert Escalation

​Alert Grouping

​Custom Alert Templates

​Notification Limits by Plan

​Troubleshooting

​Not Receiving Notifications

​Receiving Too Many Alerts

​Delayed Notifications

​Duplicate Notifications

​Next Steps

Slack Integration

Discord Integration

Webhook Integration

Notification Concepts

Overview

Notification Channels

Creating Your First Notification Rule

Channel Setup Guides

Slack Integration

Discord Integration

Microsoft Teams Integration

Email Notifications

SMS Alerts (Twilio)

Webhook Integration

Notification Rules Best Practices

Advanced Notification Features

Notification Schedules

Alert Escalation

Alert Grouping

Custom Alert Templates

Notification Limits by Plan

Troubleshooting

Not Receiving Notifications

Receiving Too Many Alerts

Delayed Notifications

Duplicate Notifications

Next Steps