Data aggregation is the process of capturing data from multiple sources and then formatting it in a proper way for better data analysis. 

Data aggregation does the job on behalf of your organization. For any brand to succeed, you need insightful data that can help you conduct your business well.

Even the chart above indicates that data is what will determine the success of any business that applies it.

Let’s understand this with an example:

Say that you run multiple products online, now you are conducting multiple campaigns and other promotional activities to exhibit your product, but the real question here is how will you know which product is doing well?

Here is when the process of data aggregation comes to place. 

With data aggregation, you will start to collect data on your prospect's behaviour such as which product they purchase the most, which drives more views and more other queries and this will help you enhance those products better.

However, for data aggregation to take place, you require data from the right sources that can help add meaning and impact to your data analysis strategy.

But with the online world being restricted to access content online, how can you get past this issue?

Here is when web scraping can help you.

Web scraping is the process of extracting information from a source or website which contains valuable information and scraping all of that and saving it in your system in the format you would like to view it in such as CSV file and much more.

Previously, if a company needed to extract information from a website, they would opt for the method of copy-pasting. But the drawback here was when it comes to large data the copy-pasting would consume a lot of time to conduct the action and when you copy-paste big data the website slows down alerting the owner of suspicious activity.

But with web scraping, this isn’t the case. In just a few minutes you can easily extract information without slowing down the website which is why it has grown to be popular. To conduct web scraping activities is convenient, all you need to is:

1 . Select the website/source you want to scrape

2. Choose the data which you needs scraping
3. Run the web scraping code
4. Save it all in your system

There are multiple reason how the existence of web scraping activities can benefit your business such as:

1. SCRAPES RELEVANT DATA FROM THE CROWD

There are tens and thousands of data available online but not all that data is relevant to help your business grow. As a brand you know what is required for your brand’s enrichment and hence with web scraping, extracting only that portion of essential data that can help brands succeed faster in their lead capture activities. 

Let’s understand this with an example:

If you want to scrape data from your competitor's websites, web scraping makes that happen without the competitor's website slowing down or having any risk of any brand conducting this action to be detected. 

2. QUICKER IMPROVISATION OF BRAND’S SOLUTIONS

A brand can enhance its solution when it has the right data which exhibits the requirements needed to improvise the solution. Web scraping provides accurate data because all the data being driven is from sources that have been following it or from platforms where prospects have mentioned their opinion on their expectations about a particular product. 

All of this contributes a valuable data collection to brands which can help them to improvise their solution better. Since brands have an analysis of what their prospects are expecting, it becomes easier to adapt to the modifications and also plan out the next possible changes before the new trend hits. 

3. RETAINS BRAND SUCCESS

A brand success can only be retained when a band continues to serve the needs of all its prospects even with each changing trend. But how can that happen when the trends have no time of their arrival? 

With the data collected, brand’s can have an idea, it might not be the exact prediction but a simple analysis of how their solution will be looked upon a few years from now. Not only that aspect, but brands can also have an analysis of how their prospects will look at a product. 

Let’s understand this with an example:

Maybe the current product offered by a brand is great,it has all the features and the prices are great, with web scraping you can get data which will help you analyze what more prospects are looking for. 

4. OUTSELL COMPETITORS

The harsh truth is if you want to be successful, outselling your competitors can win you over some brownie points. With web scraping, you can easily scrape any information which will most likely help your brand to hover in front of your competitors. 

It could be their pricing strategies, their prospect reviews and any other information which will most likely help in catering to your very own prospect needs. The market is growing and changing all the time when it comes to conducting activities which can pull your brand closer to assisting their needs better, web scraping is an ideal tool for that action to take place.

You now have such an efficient technique in hand to capture your data, but conducting this more often does lead to a huge risk, a risk of being caught or categorized as a suspicious activity.

This issue can cause a stoppage in your work and slow down your business growth unless you avoid it with a secure solution.

Proxy servers can be your saviour here.

A proxy server is a solution that helps you a brand to access any kind of information from any source without the fear of their identity being hidden. 

Let’s understand this with an example:

Now your competitors have only limited their data access on their website to certain users. If you are not a part of those set users, chances are you would either have the request denied or be blocked. The way they find out is through the IP address you hold.

What a proxy server does is it hides your IP address and showcases another IP address so when your competitors receive it, they will think that you are a part of their users and give you access. When this action is being conducted, proxy servers ensure that nowhere at any point will your identity be revealed.

When it comes to web scraping for your business activities, proxy servers are beneficial. While you continue to scrape the multiple websites, proxy servers ensure that your identity is hidden and that the scraping activity conducts quicker.