Parse.ly User Management API Guide

Auth method: API key (shared secret): apikey + secret query parameters on every request

Setup steps

1. Log in to the Parse.ly dashboard as an admin.
2. Navigate to Settings > API Access to retrieve your site's API key and shared secret.
3. Pass apikey=&secret= as query parameters on all API requests.
4. For SSO (SAML 2.0), configure your IdP (Okta or Entra ID) using the metadata provided in Settings > SSO; SSO is available on the Content Advocacy tier or as an add-on.

User object field mapping is not yet verified for this app.

Endpoint coverage is not yet verified for this app.

• Rate limits: Parse.ly does not publicly document specific rate limits for its Analytics API. Limits are enforced but thresholds are not published.

• Rate-limit headers: Unknown

• Retry-After header: Unknown

• Rate-limit notes: No publicly documented rate-limit tiers or headers found in official documentation. Contact Parse.ly support for plan-specific limits.

• Pagination method: offset

• Default page size: 10

• Max page size: 100

• Pagination pointer: page / limit

• Webhooks available: No

• Webhook notes: Parse.ly does not document a webhook system for user-management or analytics events in its official documentation.

• Alternative event strategy: Parse.ly offers a real-time data pipeline (Firehose) for raw event streaming to data warehouses; this is a data product, not a user-management webhook.

• SCIM available: No
• SCIM version: Not documented
• Plan required: Enterprise
• Endpoint: Not documented

Limitations:

• No SCIM provisioning is offered at any tier.
• User provisioning must be performed manually through the Parse.ly dashboard.
• SSO (SAML 2.0) is available on the Content Advocacy tier or as a paid add-on, but does not include JIT provisioning via SCIM.

The only production-viable API scenario is pulling analytics data: authenticate with apikey and secret as query parameters, issue a GET to /v2/analytics/posts, and paginate with page / limit. Rate limits exist but thresholds are not publicly documented - contact Parse.ly support for plan-specific limits before building high-frequency polling logic.

SSO configuration (SAML 2.0 via Okta or Entra ID) is dashboard-only and cannot be automated via API. User invitations, role assignments, and removals are also dashboard-only - no REST endpoint exists for any of these operations. Webhooks are not available for user-management events; the Firehose data pipeline is a raw analytics event stream, not an access-management signal.

Invite a new user to Parse.ly

1. Log in to the Parse.ly dashboard as an admin.
2. Navigate to Settings > Users.
3. Click 'Invite User', enter the user's email address, and assign a role (Viewer, Editor, Admin).
4. The user receives an email invitation to set up their account.

Watch out for: There is no API endpoint to automate this; invitations are dashboard-only. Seat limits apply per plan tier.

Enable SSO for your organization

1. Ensure your plan includes SSO (Content Advocacy tier or add-on).
2. In the Parse.ly dashboard, go to Settings > SSO.
3. Download the Parse.ly SAML metadata and configure your IdP (Okta or Entra ID) with it.
4. Upload your IdP metadata to Parse.ly and enable SSO enforcement.
5. Test SSO login before enforcing it org-wide.

Watch out for: SSO does not enable automatic user provisioning (no SCIM). Users must still be manually invited in the dashboard before they can log in via SSO.

Pull analytics data via API

1. Retrieve your apikey and secret from Settings > API Access in the dashboard.
2. Make a GET request to https://api.parsely.com/v2/analytics/posts?apikey=&secret=&days=7&limit=10
3. Parse the returned JSON for post-level traffic metrics.
4. Use the page parameter to paginate through results.

Watch out for: This is the only programmatic API Parse.ly exposes publicly. It covers analytics data, not user or account management.

The core trap is assuming that SSO enablement solves the provisioning problem - it does not. SAML 2.0 login works once a user is manually invited in the dashboard, but there is no JIT provisioning and no SCIM endpoint at any tier.

Teams integrating Parse.ly into an identity graph via an orchestration layer (including an MCP server with 60+ deep IT/identity integrations) will find no user API to call: no list-users endpoint, no deactivate endpoint, no role-sync endpoint.

The apikey + secret auth scheme is a shared credential, not a per-user or per-service token, which limits auditability and makes credential rotation a manual, account-wide operation. Any automation built on top of Parse.ly for access governance will require a human-in-the-loop step at the dashboard for every provisioning and deprovisioning action.