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Every 10 minutes

Collect ideas from Slack in Notion

Ideas posted in a Slack channel become short, tidy pages in your Notion ideas database, with a link back in the thread.

Runs
Every 10 minutes
Apps
Notion, Slack
AI
Yes, uses the built-in AI allowance
Access
Slack channels:history, chat:write; Notion insert

Send this to your assistant

Create a ClickRuntime automation: every 10 minutes, take new messages in #ideas, turn each one into a short brief, add it to my Ideas database in Notion, and reply in the thread with the link.

Paste it into your assistant. It tells you what it will send or change before it runs live.

First time? Adding ClickRuntime to your assistant takes about two minutes.

Why use it

Why teams use this automation

Ideas in Slack are fragile. Someone drops a half-formed suggestion into a channel on a Tuesday afternoon, gets two thumbs-up, and by Friday it is forty messages up. Product teams, agencies and founders complain that good ideas are lost, or that a backlog exists only as a vague memory of things that were mentioned once. Moving them into Notion by hand takes more effort than the idea seems to deserve, so it does not happen.

Every ten minutes ClickRuntime reads new messages in your ideas channel, asks its built-in AI to write a clear title, a brief of two or three sentences and some tags, and creates a structured page in a Notion ideas database. It then replies in the thread with the link so the author knows it was captured.

It suits teams that want an open idea box where posting takes five seconds.

What you get out of it

  • No idea is lost in the scroll

    Anything posted in the channel ends up in the database within minutes. The backlog contains what was actually suggested, not only what someone remembered to copy. The backlog holds what was suggested, not only what someone remembered to copy over on a busy day.

  • Rough messages become usable pages

    The AI turns a quick one-line thought into a title, brief and tags. Reviewers can scan the database and understand each idea without reading the original thread. Reviewers can scan titles and briefs and understand an idea without reading the original thread.

  • Contributors get feedback

    The reply with a link tells the author the idea was recorded. People keep suggesting things when they can see that suggestions go somewhere. People keep suggesting things when they can see that suggestions end up somewhere real.

  • Prioritisation has material to work with

    Ideas in a database can be sorted, voted on and linked to roadmap items. A planning session starts with a ranked list instead of a hunt through chat. A planning session begins with a sorted, taggable list and not a hunt through weeks of chat.

  • The habit costs nothing to maintain

    Nobody has to act as secretary for the channel. The automation does the filing continuously, so the database stays current without a weekly cleanup. Nobody acts as secretary for the channel, so the database stays current without a weekly tidy-up.

How it works

What happens, step by step

  1. Every 10 minutes, ClickRuntime reads new messages posted in your #ideas Slack channel since the last check.

  2. AI turns each idea into a short title, a brief description and a few tags.

  3. A page is created in your Notion ideas database with those details.

  4. ClickRuntime replies in the Slack thread with a link to the new Notion page.

Before it runs live

  • Connect Notion and share the database you want it to use
  • Connect Slack, then invite the app to the channel (type /invite @ClickRuntime there)

What you get

RunsEvery 10 minutes
Collect ideas from Slack in Notiontoday, 9:00Succeeded
Slack · #ideas (thread)💡 Saved to Ideas: https://www.notion.so/Referral-credits-for-team-plans-…

Build your own

Need it to work differently?

This template is a starting point. Copy the prompt and change it, or describe a different automation from scratch, with your own conditions, more apps or an AI step. Your assistant writes it, tests it and runs it on ClickRuntime.
  • Your own rules

    Conditions, thresholds, filters and exceptions, written the way you'd explain them to a colleague.

  • Any number of apps

    One automation can read from one app and update several others. Over 248 apps are ready, and anything with an API works too.

  • AI where it helps

    Summaries, classification, extraction and drafts use ClickRuntime's built-in AI, with no extra key.

  • On a schedule or on each event

    Runs as often as every 5 minutes, or the moment an app sends an event, and keeps track of what it already handled.

Changes you can ask for

  • Act only on the items that match your own rules, and skip the rest
  • Change what the AI looks for, or how it writes the result
  • Add another app, for example also send it to Google Sheets
  • Combine it with other Notion and Slack steps into one automation

Under the hood

The code that runs this automation

This is the Python script that runs each time the automation starts. Your AI assistant writes it for you when you send the prompt, and you allow each step in your assistant. To change how the automation works, describe the change to your assistant and it updates the script for you. For every function it can use, see the script reference.
idea_capture_from_slack_into_notion.pyexample
from slack_sdk import WebClient
from clickruntime import on_trigger, credentials, http, state, ai, report_fetched

CHANNEL_ID = "C0123IDEAS"
DATABASE_ID = "your-ideas-database-id"

@on_trigger
def run(event):
    slack = WebClient(token=credentials.connection("slack", "work"))
    msgs = [m for m in slack.conversations_history(channel=CHANNEL_ID, oldest=state.get("oldest") or "0", limit=50)["messages"]
            if not m.get("bot_id") and m.get("subtype") is None]
    report_fetched(len(msgs))
    if not msgs:
        return {"new": 0}
    for m in reversed(msgs):
        idea = ai.generate(m["text"][:2000], max_output_tokens=250,
                           json_schema={"type": "object", "properties": {"title": {"type": "string"}, "brief": {"type": "string"},
                                        "tags": {"type": "array", "items": {"type": "string"}}}}).json
        page = http.post("https://api.notion.com/v1/pages",
                         headers={"Authorization": f"Bearer {credentials.secret('NOTION_TOKEN')}", "Notion-Version": "2022-06-28"},
                         json={"parent": {"database_id": DATABASE_ID}, "properties": {
                             "Name": {"title": [{"text": {"content": idea["title"][:200]}}]},
                             "Brief": {"rich_text": [{"text": {"content": idea["brief"][:2000]}}]},
                             "Tags": {"multi_select": [{"name": t[:50]} for t in idea["tags"][:3]]}}}).json()
        slack.chat_postMessage(channel=CHANNEL_ID, thread_ts=m["ts"], text=f"💡 Saved to Ideas: {page['url']}")
    state.set("oldest", msgs[0]["ts"])
    return {"saved": len(msgs)}

FAQ

Common questions

Does every message in the channel become an idea?
By default, yes, every new top-level message. To skip chatter, it can look for a keyword such as idea or a reaction, and ignore replies. Describe the rule that suits your channel. Replies inside threads are not turned into separate ideas.
Which Notion properties are filled in?
Title, Brief, Tags and a link to the Slack message, plus the author and date if those properties exist. Your AI assistant can suggest the database layout if you do not have one. Properties are filled by matching names, so keep them simple.
Can people see who posted the idea?
Yes. The author's Slack name is stored with the page, so credit is kept. You can also leave it out if the channel is anonymous or you prefer to rank ideas without the name attached.
What permissions does it need?
Slack channels:history, chat:write; Notion insert. Nothing else in your accounts is used.
Does it need AI?
Yes. It uses ClickRuntime's built-in AI, so you don't need an OpenAI or Anthropic key. Every plan includes a monthly AI allowance.
How many runs does it use?
One run each time it checks. Checks that find nothing new and stop right away aren't counted.
Can I change how it works?
Yes. Describe the change to your AI assistant, for example a different schedule, channel or filter. It updates the automation, tests it and tells you what changed.

Set up “Collect ideas from Slack in Notion” from your assistant

Copy the prompt above, or connect your assistant first. Free plan, no credit card.