Curling the Alternative Data for Better Analytics.
Tags: webdev, database, api
Published: 2022-11-05 19:08:08

_Understanding alternative data and ways to source it._

Alternative data is something that you can get from the not-so-usual source. Alternative data have the potential to be exploited more as it has the potential to be explored, unlike the normally available data.


![Photo by Viktor Talashuk on Unsplash](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/r8imt1hdrrhxe5f21xi0.png)


In this article, we will discuss alternative data and the ease of getting the data. There are various offerings by organisations which are as simple as making an HTTP request.

All the hustle of web scraping, data collection etc is been smoothly navigated. All that matters is the hard work which will give you better insight into your business.

## The Basics

Various companies provide you with alternative data with various methods like scrapping, getting reports submitted by various researchers etc. Most organisations use alternative data to get a competitive advantage as you get an insight into the industry in a much better way.

![Photo by Lukas Blazek on Unsplash](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/24c3h3asip46qzlaumj2.png)



The alternative data can be of various genres and flavours the most important factor in choosing the correct alternative data is through understanding the correlation between your requirements and the available data.

Alternatively, you need to have expertise in the content so that you can fetch something insightful through the data.

## Why Alternative Data is Required?

In this day and age, we are totally surrounded by technology. The things which are freely available to end users are driven by users' data as the revenue source.

![Photo by Alexis Fauvet on Unsplash
](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/9wesc92ntmzi8n0m0r9d.png)



It would be totally naive for anyone to not understand the power of data. The data and its effect on any upcoming organisation can either make or break its future. Various financial institutes are using alternative data for their success.

As money is involved in the investment it is required to understand the insight into the already existing data. This data can help the fund manager to understand the possible performance of the platform.

I hope you must have got the idea of the use of alternative data towards the growth of individuals. Mainly the edge you can get over your competitor is something any organisation craves.

## Where to get Alternative Data?
There are various well-established organisations which do the heavy lifting for you. Now the only work left with us is to work with the data and not worry about the ways of procuring it.

![Proxy Curl](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/fjr7ks3rzd0607iazkcp.png)

Proxy Curl By Nubela is one such organisation which has various offerings in this respect.

Proxy curl has offered such as simple HTTP requests using which you can integrate their services with your product. They provide you with a huge database of LinkedIn data. The data is collected using different scrappers from the public profile. The data is all legal to use.

Following are some of the offerings given by proxy curl.

![Proxy Curl Alternative Data Offerings.](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/gk0qif9q4r2oj5cimnph.png)

There are proper API docs that you can find on this link. Alternatively, as soon as you register you get credit to try the service. Post your trial is over you can opt for the premium plan which isn’t that costly.

## Sample API request

A simple curl request for getting the profile data looks like the following. This is as simple as just integrating a simple ajax request in whichever language you are working.

REQUEST
curl \
    -X GET \
    -H "Authorization: Bearer ${YOUR_API_KEY}"\
'https://nubela.co/proxycurl/api/linkedin/profile/resolve/email?work_email=danial%40nubela.co'


A sample response would looks something like following

RESPONSE
{
    "url": "https://id.linkedin.com/in/danial-habibi"
}

You can get similar data, which you can utilise only after getting your personalised API keys course for security concerns.

Proxy curl has a database i.e. LinkDB which is an alternative database. Here you can with a simple query search for the data. LinkDb is a PostgreSQL database. As of date, it contains 117m public Linkedin profiles.

You have the entire country's data in your database. Just imagine what can be done with proper analysis of the available data.

References.
Read more about LinkDB: https://nubela.co/blog/linkdb-an-exhaustive-dataset-of-linkedin-members-and-companies/
Read more about alternative data. https://nubela.co/blog/the-ultimate-guide-to-alternative-data-what-is-it-really/

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### About The Author
Apoorv Tomar is a software developer and part of [Mindroast](https://mindroast.com/). You can connect with him on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/tomarapoorv), [Linkedin](https://www.linkedin.com/in/apoorvtomar/), [Telegram](https://t.me/ApoorvTomar) and [Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/apoorvsinghtomar/). Subscribe to the [newsletter](https://www.mindroast.com/newsletter) for the latest curated content. Don’t hesitate to say ‘Hi’ on any platform, just stating a reference of where did you find my profile.