The modern data stack is becoming increasingly integrated and interdependent. As companies grow and expand, data remains one of the most valuable resources for any business. Data lets your company see the ins and outs of operating, who its clients are, and how to improve processes that lead to better customer experiences. One of the biggest problems that companies face is having data due to existing but not being able to utilize that data in ways that drive the company forward.
Data should never be something that sits and is not used. Unfortunately, finding ways to integrate data into every part of a company is a tall order. For most companies, there are a lot of holds on this process. Whether that’s data still being siloed and not accessible or simply not having the talent throughout a company for the data to be useful. dbt Cloud is a step in the right direction for helping to give data engineers the tools they need to leverage their time for the company’s success.
Here is what dbt Cloud is and why your team needs it.
What is dbt Cloud?
dbt stands for Data-Based Tool and is designed to help engineers and data scientists by freeing them up to focus their energy on tasks that can move the company forward. This tool is part of the ETL process but mainly focuses on the ‘T’.
What is ETL, and How Does dbt Cloud Help?
When it comes to data, companies’ number one problem is that their data can be inaccessible. Every time a company interacts in any way, the result is the creation of data. Every website visit or hyperlink hit, every purchase or inquiry, and so on. This data can accumulate and be a rich resource for any business.
These data points are essential to understanding the customers and clients that move the company forward. Not only that, but this data is robust for helping departments understand how to use their time and resources better to improve their customer experience and efficiency ultimately. However, when this data isn’t accessible, it becomes a data silo. This is where traditionally, ETL and data warehouses have become the industry’s saving grace.
ETL stands for Extract, Translate, and Load. When data undergoes ETL from a silo to a warehouse, it becomes useful t other companies. One of the main reasons it’s useful is that it has been not only centralized by translated into useful formate.
The only problem is that many companies find that even though their data has now been moved to a warehouse, it faces the same problems when it was in a data silo. With limited personnel across a company that can access the data stored inside a warehouse, it still doesn’t serve the company well. This creates a scenario where departments are still cut off from essential data that could drive their goals forward and is a problem that needs to be fixed.
How dbt Cloud Helps
While data scientists and engineers are capable of creating pipelines that allow departments to access data, this can be a cumbersome job. Chances are, there isn’t enough manpower to make this realistically helpful for a company – but that’s where dbt Cloud comes in. This SaaS component helps to give data engineers the tools they need to leverage their time wisely for the company’s betterment.
No more tedious pipelines that take up massive amounts of time and effort from engineers just to maintain. dbt Cloud focuses on giving your team the tools it needs to quickly go inside a data warehouse and find data – the ‘T’ component – and make it accessible. These tools make orchestration and searching for data a thing of ease. This tool is meant to be an integral player in your data stack that helps free your engineers from tedious tasks that can weigh them down and stifle the flow of data to its intended destinations.
Conclusion
dbt Cloud brings a refreshing lack of distraction by helping streamline hard processes like orchestration and CI/CD pipelines. While some companies may have substantial teams where this isn’t a problem, helping to cut down on the tediousness of these tasks for small teams can be a lifesaver. This is a beautiful tool to consider integrating into your data stack, especially if you are working with a smaller team and need the freedom. Freeing your data engineers to work on problems that aren’t tediously consuming while helping to push data further into your company is the goal of dbt Cloud and what makes it such a powerful tool.
