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Search Dovetail when a Slack question appears

Ask in Slack and get the right Dovetail evidence without hunting through projects.

Trigger

Channel Message Received

Triggered when a message is posted in a Slack channel (public, private, or multi-party IM). Does NOT match direct messages.

Action

Magic Search

Tool to perform a magic search across workspace data. use when you need to retrieve relevant highlights, notes, insights, channels, themes, or tags by query.

Why this helps

Research answers are buried across notes, highlights, and insights while decisions move quickly.

  • Reduce context switching
  • Surface prior research faster
  • Keep answers grounded in existing evidence

Setup

Build it in a few focused steps.

  • 1Connect Slackbot and Dovetail in Notis once.
  • 2Create an automation and describe that channel questions should become Dovetail Magic Searches.
  • 3Pick Channel Message Received as the trigger.
  • 4Choose a report channel, then test with one real research question.

Questions about this workflow

Does this search direct messages?

No. It uses the channel message trigger, which covers Slack channels and excludes direct messages.

When this happens · Trigger

Do this · Action

Supported Triggers and Actions

Notis builds workflows that link Slackbot to Dovetail. A trigger fires from one place; an action lands in another.

Slackbot triggers

Dovetail actions

Recurring trigger

Notis starts this workflow on a schedule, such as daily, weekly, or during business hours.

TriggerScheduled

Create Channel

Tool to create a new channel in dovetail. use after confirming channel details.

ActionInstant

Webhook trigger

Notis starts this workflow when an external tool or custom backend sends an HTTP request.

TriggerInstant

Create Contact

Tool to create a new contact in dovetail. use when you need to register a contact before logging interactions.

ActionInstant

New Channel Created Trigger

Triggered when a new channel is created in Slack.

TriggerInstant

Create Data Point

Tool to create a data point within a channel. use after capturing new content to record and classify it in dovetail.

ActionInstant

Channel Message Received

Triggered when a message is posted in a Slack channel (public, private, or multi-party IM). Does NOT match direct messages.

TriggerInstant

Create Insight

Tool to create a new insight in dovetail. use after synthesizing findings when ready to store them. example: "create insight 'q1 user trends' with body '...' for project 'proj 123'."

ActionInstant

Direct Message Received

Triggered when a new direct message (DM) is sent to a user in Slack. Catches all DMs across all DM channels.

TriggerInstant

Create Topic

Tool to create a new topic in a channel. use after confirming channel id, title, and optional description.

ActionInstant

Message Reaction Added

Triggered when a reaction is added to a message in Slack. Supports optional filtering by channel and emoji name.

TriggerInstant

Delete Channel

Tool to delete an existing channel. use when you need to remove a channel and move it to the project's trash (restorable for 30 days). confirm the channel id before calling.

ActionInstant

Message Reaction Removed

Triggered when a reaction is removed from a message in Slack. Supports optional filtering by channel and emoji name.

TriggerInstant

Delete Topic

Tool to delete an existing topic. use when you have confirmed the topic id and want to move it to trash (restorable for 30 days). example: "delete topic with id 123e4567-e89b-12d3-a456-426614174000."

ActionInstant

Reaction Added Trigger

DEPRECATED: use `SLACK_MESSAGE_REACTION_ADDED` instead. Triggered when a reaction is added to a message in Slack.

TriggerInstant

Get Note

Tool to retrieve details of a specific note. use when you have confirmed the note id and need full note metadata from dovetail.

ActionInstant

Connect any two apps with Notis in the middle.

Slackbot and Dovetail, or any other combination from 1,000+ integrations.

When this happens · Trigger

Do this · Action

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