I want to build an automated workflow that pulls content from news websites and creates short summaries. The goal is to get these summaries delivered to my email automatically so I can stay updated without reading full articles.
I need something that can extract text from web pages, condense it into just a couple of sentences, and then send those summaries directly to my email inbox. This would help me quickly scan through multiple news sources each day.
Has anyone found good web scraping solutions that integrate well with automation platforms? I’m particularly interested in tools that can handle the content extraction and summarization parts of this workflow.
Web Scraper by webscraper.io is my favorite for news automation. The Chrome extension lets you build scrapers visually, then export everything to their cloud platform for scheduled runs. Best part? The CSV/JSON export works great with Zapier’s formatter tools.
I scrape tech news sites twice daily. It handles pagination and infinite scroll automatically - something most news sites use now. Once the content hits Zapier, I run it through their AI summarization before emailing it out.
Way easier to learn than ParseHub or Octoparse. Just click what you want to extract and it builds the scraper for you. I add random delays and rotate user agents to avoid bot detection. Been rock solid for six months.
scraper api + chatgpt is honestly the way to go here. way simpler than everything else mentioned. the proxy rotation is automatic so u won’t get blocked, plus the zapier integration works great. costs more upfront but you’ll save hours on maintenance.
Octoparse works great for this. I set it to run scrapes automatically and connect to Zapier through their API. Just heads up - news sites love changing their layouts and breaking everything, so build error handling into your Zaps. I grab content with Octoparse, run it through OpenAI’s API for summaries, then send the email. Test your scraping templates often since websites update constantly. Also set up backup news sources in case sites start blocking you. Takes some tweaking but it’s rock solid once you get it dialed in.
Skip the complex setups. I built something similar last year and went through all those headaches with ParseHub, Octoparse, and constant maintenance nightmares.
Latenode handles this entire workflow in one place. No juggling multiple tools or broken integrations. You scrape news sites, process content through AI for summaries, and send emails all on the same platform.
Best part? The visual workflow builder. You drag and drop to create automation. When news sites change layouts (they will), you update one workflow instead of reconfiguring three different services.
Mine runs every morning at 6 AM. Pulls from five news sources, generates clean summaries, and delivers them before I wake up. Zero maintenance for 8 months.
Error handling’s built in. If one news source goes down, the workflow continues with others instead of breaking completely like Zapier chains.
i totally agree! phantombuster is super handy for scraping stuff, but for the summaries, you’ll definitely need to use opanai’s api. raw text is nice, but it doesn’t really do the work of summarizing like you want.
ParseHub works great for this. It handles dynamic content way better than most scrapers and integrates with Zapier through webhooks. The visual editor takes some getting used to, but it’s not too bad. For summarizing, I connect it to Claude or GPT through Make.com instead of Zapier’s AI actions - Make handles APIs much better. The whole setup runs smooth: ParseHub scrapes articles, Make sends them to AI for summaries, then shoots everything to email. Just watch out for rate limiting. News sites can be aggressive about blocking bots, so you might need rotating proxies or longer delays between scrapes.