Marketers and research companies now leverage bots to monitor their competitors’ products and pricing closely. With data extraction and collection from multiple web pages each day, they are able to stay ahead of the game. This process is known as data scraping.

The current technology boom has created many exciting possibilities for businesses to gather information. With the increasing sophistication of data collection techniques, the scraper API is an innovative and cutting-edge tool to speed up data extraction and processing.

In this article, you will learn about this amazing tool and if it’s worth using.

What are scraper APIs?

Knowing what an API is will help us better understand a scraper API. An Application Programming Interface (API) is a software interface that links communication between 2 or more computer programs.

The Scraper API is a useful tool that extracts data from websites, databases, or software programs. It aims to simplify research and data scraping by providing structured data. Its API interface is designed to connect with programs and tools that support it, allowing for a more precise and targeted search and eliminating the need to trawl through large volumes of data.

Scraping API works in the following steps:

• After receiving the request, it takes control and chooses the appropriate proxy.
• It assigns and controls the rotation of proxies.
• Afterward, it sends HTTP requests and decodes the HTML data received from web servers.
• Finally, after retrieving the data, it either sends it to a cloud storage container or directly through the API.

In simpler terms, when you request data from a specific source, it establishes a connection with that source and collects the data. It then provides you with the collected data for your processing and storage.

Benefits of scraper APIs

Many price comparison websites, e-commerce sites, and service providers use scraper APIs for various reasons, which include:

• Specific data collection: Many large businesses use Scrapers API due to its precision and targeted research. For instance, Meteorological stations use it to collect weather forecast data, while companies collect real estate data from a real estate website. The objective is to obtain well-organized information that can be promptly applied.
• Market researchers utilize Scraper APIs to penetrate wide stream platforms such as YouTube, Twitter, etc., and also use it to receive feedback data regarding customer demands and competitive dynamics.
• Scraper APIs are used to keep track of prices, compare them with those of competitors, and assess whether a brand is overpricing or underpricing its products. It extracts pricing information from websites and servers. Using the extracted data, It keeps track of current prices and upcoming changes, allowing for automatic updates.

Types of Scraper APIs

With these easy-to-use technologies, users can effortlessly experience the benefits of web scraping without proxy maintenance.

There are various kinds of scraping APIs available depending on the type of data needed and the industry your company is in. Most scraper APIs are customized by businesses to automatically gather large amounts of data from e-commerce websites and search engines frequently.

On the other hand, some Scraper APIs are customized to specific websites or social media platforms.

The various types of Scraper API are:

• General Purpose Scraper API: These are Scraper APIs that can be applied generally, allowing their applications to access and use various types of data from different websites. When you make a request, the system automatically sends it, HTML files are parsed, JavaScript is rendered, and the resulting data is saved in JSON format. This tool has various applications, including academic research, website change tracking, and marketing purposes. An Example is the JureBevc General Purpose Scraper, a web scraper for arbitrary data.
• Dedicated Scraper API: These APIs are tailored to specific data sources and types, ensuring optimal performance. Its API suits specific websites, pages, solutions, and services. An example is the Wayfair Scraper API.

Wayfair Scraper API: With this, you can access real-time public data for items and search results on any Wayfair page. This API ensures that your scraping tasks are streamlined and improved for a more efficient process by scraping large amounts of public data.

Wayfair Scraper API works by:

• Fetching the product data: This is done through either the use of a URL or with query
• Sending Network request
• Data parsing of the web page’s content in HTML format; this includes title, price, ratings, etc.
• Exporting the product data in JSON format directly through the API or saved in your cloud storage

Its benefits include:

• Gathering and collection of product data
• Collection of pricing data
• Monitoring competition
• Gathering information about current stock availability

Conclusion

Obtaining real-time data for your organization is easy with scraper APIs, regardless of size. By using its focused search, irrelevant information and discrepancies are eliminated. It is highly effective for your needs.