Companies are always hungry for data. As time passes, their need for it will only grow. They turn to web scraping or data scraping to get the information they need. Data scraping is essentially reading the data on a website and filtering the requested data. It is a much more time-efficient and feasible way of data collection than downloading the data or having it read by humans. Technology-inclined freelancers often turn to data scraping to earn money as a side hustle. Tools like ParseHub, Octoparse, and ScrapeBox have made the necessity for coding knowledge more of an edge rather than a vitality it used to be. Data scraping does not require any deep technical skills, making it a desirable side hustle for many young freelancers. This article can help you understand why data collection is essential, how scraping makes it faster, the future of data scraping, and how proxy providers like Smartproxy provide The Best Residential Proxy Network with 40M+ IPs | Smartproxy that can make scraping easier.
Cruciality of data collection
Companies are always in need of data. Without the necessary data, they would be virtually blind. Data collection gives the vital information that helps companies with marketing strategies, making business decisions, understanding users, looking for opportunities, etc. Prices from commercial websites, property information from real estate websites, reviews and comments on products, and desired data for research are just some uses of data gathering.
Why fresh data is much sought after
Information like product prices, product demand, stock information, etc. is volatile. Data from 5 minutes can differ from the data from 10 minutes ago, hence making it unreliable as time passes. Companies make critical business decisions based on the latest information/fresh data given to them. Without the required data, decisions would be a guessing game. Sometimes, millions of dollars ride on each decision. With data changing almost every minute, companies always want the newest information available. Fresh data helps make accurate and appropriate decisions by providing the latest information.
Future of data scraping
With the process of data scraping so simple, more and more freelancers are moving towards it. The market for data scraping is already high and will only increase. Without the need for any technical skills and programming knowledge, like it used to, the job will keep gaining popularity.
While it isn’t necessary, knowing programming can give an edge, as building custom scapers requires programming. Custom scrapers can sometimes be better than scraping tools since they can be easily crafted to suit the user’s requirements. Many programmers are getting into data scraping because of this.
Data scraping software companies are likely to take off as more users use their software. This could mean better scraping software with more features and efficiency, further decreasing the need to know to code.
As a result of the escalated web scraping, websites have started introducing ways to prevent it through various methods. Identifying an IP address and blocking it is one such method that is often used. To counter this, many scrapers use proxies. Proxies prevent websites from finding a user’s IP address and other identifying information by feeding fake information to the website. Smartproxy is one such proxy provider.
The demand for data scrapers
The world is producing more data in a day than it ever has. The data produced is exponentially increasing. All this information is valuable in some way to a company looking for it. As the data produced increases, so does the difficulty of collecting and filtering it. The requirement for data collection will only increase. The market for data scraping is also expected to bloom in the coming years.
Many companies and businesses employ job searching websites like Upwork and Fiverr to hire data scrappers. These kinds of websites are filled with freelancers looking for a side job. There are close to a thousand data scraping jobs available on freelancing sites. As the need for up-to-date data rises, the value for data scraping also rises.
Conclusion
Data scraping is an automated process where over 200 web pages can be scraped in under a minute. Some scrapers can be even faster. Reading 20 or 30 pages per second is not possible for humans to do. This automation is one of the reasons data scraping is becoming an ideal side hustle. It needs relatively low effort but is good to earn money on the side. It can pay anywhere from 10$ to 100$ for each website. Even people looking for a custom data scraper can hire someone with coding knowledge to build them one. With no prerequisites for major technical skills like coding and easy automation, it has become an ideal and popular side hustle.
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