Outbound Webhooks

What it does in ContentPulse: Sends real-time HTTP notifications to a URL you control whenever certain events happen in ContentPulse — a piece is generated, QA passes, content is published, etc. Plug them into Zapier, Make, n8n, Slack, your CRM, or your own internal apps. Status: Available Tier: Available on Pro and higher.

Before you start (prerequisites)

• Account requirement: A URL that can accept HTTPS POST requests with a JSON body. This can be:
  • A Zapier or Make.com "Webhook" trigger URL
  • A Slack incoming webhook (https://api.slack.com/messaging/webhooks)
  • Your own backend endpoint
  • A no-code receiver like https://webhook.site for testing
• Cost: Free on ContentPulse's side. Third-party costs depend on what you connect (Zapier free plan: 100 tasks/month; Slack: free).

Step-by-step setup

1. On the receiver side — get a webhook URL

This step depends on what you're connecting. A few common cases:

Zapier:

1. Create a new Zap, choose the Webhooks by Zapier trigger, event Catch Hook.
2. Zapier shows a URL like https://hooks.zapier.com/hooks/catch/123456/abcdefg/. Copy it.

Make.com:

1. New Scenario → add a Webhooks → Custom webhook module.
2. Click Add to create a new webhook; copy the URL Make.com generates.

Slack:

1. Go to https://api.slack.com/apps → Create New App → From scratch.
2. Enable Incoming Webhooks, then Add New Webhook to Workspace, choose the channel.
3. Copy the Webhook URL (https://hooks.slack.com/services/...).
4. Note: Slack's incoming webhooks expect a specific JSON shape ({"text": "..."}). ContentPulse sends a richer payload by default, so for Slack you'll usually want to route through Zapier or a small Cloudflare Worker that reformats the payload.

Your own backend:

1. Build an endpoint that accepts POST with Content-Type: application/json and returns HTTP 2xx within 30 seconds.
2. Verify the signature header (see "Verifying signatures" below) — this is how you confirm the request really came from ContentPulse.

2. In ContentPulse — register the webhook

1. Go to https://contentpulse.helloaurora.ai/settings/webhooks.
2. Click New Webhook.
3. Paste the URL.
4. Select the events you want to receive. Available events:
   • repurpose.started — generation started for a source
   • repurpose.complete — all pieces generated for a source
   • repurpose.failed — generation failed
   • piece.generated — a single piece was generated
   • piece.qa_passed — a piece passed QA
   • piece.qa_failed — a piece failed QA
   • piece.published — a piece was published to a destination
   • piece.status_changed — a piece moved between states
   • batch.complete — a bulk job finished [Screenshot to be added](screenshot:ContentPulse webhooks page with event checkboxes)
5. Click Create Webhook. ContentPulse shows you a signing secret like whsec_... exactly once — save it.

3. Verifying signatures (recommended for production)

Every ContentPulse webhook request includes these headers:

X-Webhook-Signature: <hex HMAC-SHA256 of body>
X-Webhook-Timestamp: <Unix seconds>
X-Webhook-Event: <event name, e.g. piece.published>

To verify in any language, compute HMAC-SHA256(body, your signing secret) and compare with X-Webhook-Signature (constant-time comparison). Example in Node.js:

import crypto from 'crypto';

function verify(body, signature, secret) {
  const expected = crypto.createHmac('sha256', secret).update(body).digest('hex');
  return crypto.timingSafeEqual(Buffer.from(expected), Buffer.from(signature));
}

4. Verify it's working

• ContentPulse fires a test event immediately on creation. Check your receiver — you should see one POST.
• The webhook row on Settings → Webhooks shows "Last triggered" with a timestamp.
• If delivery fails, ContentPulse retries with exponential backoff (3 retries over ~10 minutes). After 5 consecutive failures, the webhook is auto-disabled and you'll see a yellow banner on the page.

What you can do with it once connected

• Notify your team in Slack when a piece is ready for review.
• Auto-create a Linear/Notion task when a new batch completes.
• Push published-content URLs to a Google Sheet via Zapier.
• Trigger downstream automation (email a client, update a Trello card, etc.).

Common pitfalls

• Pitfall: Receiver times out → ContentPulse retries → duplicate webhook fires. Fix: Make your receiver idempotent. Every webhook includes a unique X-Webhook-Delivery-Id header; dedupe on that.

• Pitfall: Webhook gets auto-disabled. Fix: Open Settings → Webhooks, find the row with the red "Disabled" badge, fix the receiver, then click "Re-enable". You may need to re-trigger a test event to confirm.

• Pitfall: Signature verification fails. Fix: Make sure you're hashing the raw bytes of the request body, not a re-serialized version. Frameworks like Express's body-parser mutate the body; use express.raw() for webhook endpoints specifically.

• Pitfall: Slack incoming webhook returns 200 but no message appears. Fix: Slack expects a specific {"text": "..."} payload. ContentPulse's payload doesn't match. Use Zapier or a relay endpoint to reformat.

Restrictions

• 30-second response timeout — your endpoint must return 2xx within 30 seconds or we treat it as a failure.
• HTTPS only — http:// URLs are rejected.
• Max 10 webhooks per workspace.
• No payload customization yet — every event has a fixed JSON shape. If you need a custom shape, filter and reshape in Zapier or Make.

Need help?

Email [support@helloaurora.ai](mailto:support@helloaurora.ai) — we'll walk you through it.