How our tools work

Apify in plain words. Apify is the cloud platform where our tools run. You make a free account there, fill in a form and press Start. The tool runs on Apify's computers and saves a table for you. Apify bills you, not us, and the free plan is enough to try.

This page shows you how to run an Apify Actor, step by step. Our tools are Actors, so this is how you use every Cliqto Media Actor. You need a web browser and a free Apify account. You do not need to write code.

Not sure which tool you need? Start from a use case. Each use case page names the Actors and shows the steps.

All examples on this page use one tool: Greenhouse Jobs Monitor & Scraper. It reads the public job ads of companies that use Greenhouse. This page is an Apify tutorial for beginners. We explain each new word. If a word is still not clear, look it up in our glossary.

What is an Apify Actor

Before you learn how to run an Apify Actor, it helps to know what it is.

Apify is a cloud platform for web data. "Cloud" means the program runs on Apify's computers, not on yours.

An Actor is a small program on Apify. It does one job. For example, it reads job ads from a careers page. Or it turns a web page into clean text.

Every Actor works the same way:

Cliqto Media is an independent digital media company. Apify Actors are one of our product lines. We have built 150+ Actors in 14 categories, and 103 are live on Apify. They range from Jobs & hiring to AI-ready content & documents. We are not part of Apify. Apify hosts the tools and handles payment. You can see all our Actors in the catalog or on our Apify profile.

Step 1: Create a free Apify account

1. Open the Apify sign-up page.
2. Sign up with email, Google or GitHub.
3. Confirm your email if Apify asks.

The free plan is enough to test our tools. It gives you a small amount of free usage every month. See Pricing for details.

You land in Apify Console. Console is the website where you run Actors and see your data.

Step 2: Fill the input

Open the tool you want. You can start from our catalog and follow the link to Apify. Or search the Apify Store for "cliqtomedia".

Click Try for free or Start. You see the input form. The form is made from the Actor's input schema. An input schema is a list of fields, their types and their default values.

Most of our tools have a short form:

• What to read. URLs, search words, IDs or company names.
• How much. A maximum number of results. Start small, for example 20.
• Options. Country, language, date range or output format.

Each field has a short help text. Most fields have good default values. Often you can change one field and click Start.

The form also has a JSON view. JSON is a text format for data. Here is an example input for Greenhouse Jobs Monitor & Scraper:

{
  "mode": "snapshot",
  "boards": [
    "https://boards.greenhouse.io/examplecompany"
  ],
  "maxJobsTotal": 50
}

The field names are different in each tool. The form shows the right names for you.

Step 3: Start the run

Click Start at the bottom of the form. Apify creates a new run.

You see the run page. It shows:

• Status: Running, Succeeded, Failed, Aborted or Timed out.
• Log: what the tool is doing right now.
• Output: the first results, while the run is still working.

Most runs of our tools end in seconds or a few minutes. Big runs take longer. You can close the browser tab. The run goes on in the cloud.

Step 4: Open the dataset

A dataset is the table where a run saves its results. Each result is one row, also called an item.

To open it:

1. Open the run.
2. Click the Output tab for a quick table view.
3. Or click the Storage tab and open the dataset.

You can see the data as a table or as JSON. Here is one row from the Greenhouse tool, as JSON (shortened):

{
  "boardToken": "examplecompany",
  "jobId": "4012345",
  "title": "Data Analyst",
  "departments": ["Finance"],
  "absoluteUrl": "https://boards.greenhouse.io/examplecompany/jobs/4012345",
  "firstPublishedAt": "2026-10-14T09:12:00Z",
  "changeStatus": null
}

Many of our tools also save a short run summary. It tells you how many rows were saved, and what was skipped and why.

Step 5: Export CSV, JSON or Excel

You can export an Apify dataset to CSV and other formats in two clicks.

1. Open the dataset.
2. Click Export.
3. Pick a format and download the file.

Run on a schedule

Many people want fresh data every day or every week. For example: new jobs every morning, or price changes every Monday. You can schedule an Apify Actor for this.

First, save your input as a task.

What is an Apify task

An Apify task is a saved input for one Actor. Think of it as a saved form. You can have many tasks for one tool. For example, one task per competitor.

To make a task, open the Actor in Console. Fill the input, then click Save as a new task. Give it a clear name.

Add a schedule

1. In Console, open Schedules.
2. Click Create new.
3. Pick how often: hourly, daily, weekly or a custom time.
4. Pick your timezone.
5. Add your task (or the Actor) to the schedule.
6. Turn the schedule on. New schedules start turned off.

Schedules use cron rules. Cron is a short code for time, like 0 8 * * 1 for "every Monday at 08:00". Apify also lets you use simple words like @daily. One schedule can start up to 10 Actors and 10 tasks.

Use the API

An API is a way for programs to talk to each other. With the Apify API, your code can run an Actor and read the results. No clicks needed.

You need your API token. Find it in Console under Settings → API & Integrations. Keep the token secret. Anyone with it can use your account.

Run an Actor with one request

This request starts a tool, waits for it to finish, and returns the rows:

POST https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/cliqtomedia~greenhouse-jobs-monitor-scraper/run-sync-get-dataset-items
Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_TOKEN
Content-Type: application/json

{ "mode": "snapshot", "boards": ["https://boards.greenhouse.io/examplecompany"], "maxJobsTotal": 50 }

This "sync" way waits up to 300 seconds. If the run takes longer, the request stops but the run goes on. For longer runs, start the run first (POST /v2/acts/cliqtomedia~greenhouse-jobs-monitor-scraper/runs), then read the dataset when it ends, or use a webhook. The input field names are on each tool's API tab in Apify.

Use Python or JavaScript

Apify has official client libraries. A client library is ready-made code that makes the API easy.

# pip install apify-client
from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient("YOUR_API_TOKEN")
run = client.actor("cliqtomedia/greenhouse-jobs-monitor-scraper").call(
    run_input={"mode": "snapshot", "boards": ["https://boards.greenhouse.io/examplecompany"], "maxJobsTotal": 50}
)
for item in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items():
    print(item)

For JavaScript and Node.js, install apify-client with npm. It works the same way. Each tool's API tab on Apify shows ready code for Python, JavaScript and cURL.

Get webhooks when a run ends

A webhook is a message that Apify sends to a URL when something happens. With Apify webhooks, your app learns that a run is done. Then it can load the data at once.

Common webhook events:

To add one, open your Actor or task in Console. Go to the Integrations tab and add a webhook with your URL. A webhook on a task fires only for runs of that task.

The message includes the run ID. Your app uses the run ID to find the dataset and download the rows.

You can also skip code. Make, Zapier and n8n can wait for a finished run and then send data to Google Sheets, Slack or email. See Integrations.

A full example: daily new jobs in a sheet

Here is a real-world flow that uses all the steps above.

How to run an Apify Actor: quick checklist

Here is the whole flow again, as a short list. Use it every time you try a new tool.

Now you know how to run an Apify Actor. The steps are the same for every tool in our catalog.

Tips for better runs

Questions

Last updated: 20 October 2026