Warehouses and Lakes
Marketing Analytics

How to load data from AppsFlyer to AWS Datalake

Learn how to use Airbyte to synchronize your AppsFlyer data into AWS Datalake within minutes.

TL;DR

This can be done by building a data pipeline manually, usually a Python script (you can leverage a tool as Apache Airflow for this). This process can take more than a full week of development. Or it can be done in minutes on Airbyte in three easy steps:

  1. set up AppsFlyer as a source connector (using Auth, or usually an API key)
  2. set up AWS Datalake as a destination connector
  3. define which data you want to transfer and how frequently

You can choose to self-host the pipeline using Airbyte Open Source or have it managed for you with Airbyte Cloud.

This tutorial’s purpose is to show you how.

What is AppsFlyer

AppsFlyer is a mobile attribution and marketing analytics platform that helps businesses measure and optimize their mobile app marketing campaigns. It provides real-time data and insights on user acquisition, engagement, retention, and revenue, allowing businesses to make data-driven decisions to improve their app performance and ROI. AppsFlyer's platform integrates with over 5,000 partners, including ad networks, social media platforms, and analytics tools, to provide a comprehensive view of the entire mobile app marketing ecosystem. With its advanced fraud protection and privacy compliance features, AppsFlyer ensures that businesses can trust their data and protect their users' privacy.

What is AWS Datalake

An AWS Data Lake is a centralized repository that allows you to store all your structured and unstructured data at any scale. It is designed to handle massive amounts of data from various sources, such as databases, applications, IoT devices, and more. With AWS Data Lake, you can easily ingest, store, catalog, process, and analyze data using a wide range of AWS services like Amazon S3, Amazon Athena, AWS Glue, and Amazon EMR. This allows you to build data lakes for machine learning, big data analytics, and data warehousing workloads. AWS Data Lake provides a secure, scalable, and cost-effective solution for managing your organization's data.

Integrate AppsFlyer with AWS Datalake in minutes

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Prerequisites

  1. A AppsFlyer account to transfer your customer data automatically from.
  2. A AWS Datalake account.
  3. An active Airbyte Cloud account, or you can also choose to use Airbyte Open Source locally. You can follow the instructions to set up Airbyte on your system using docker-compose.

Airbyte is an open-source data integration platform that consolidates and streamlines the process of extracting and loading data from multiple data sources to data warehouses. It offers pre-built connectors, including AppsFlyer and AWS Datalake, for seamless data migration.

When using Airbyte to move data from AppsFlyer to AWS Datalake, it extracts data from AppsFlyer using the source connector, converts it into a format AWS Datalake can ingest using the provided schema, and then loads it into AWS Datalake via the destination connector. This allows businesses to leverage their AppsFlyer data for advanced analytics and insights within AWS Datalake, simplifying the ETL process and saving significant time and resources.

Step 1: Set up AppsFlyer as a source connector

1. First, navigate to the Airbyte dashboard and click on the "Sources" tab on the left-hand side of the screen.
2. Click on the "Add Source" button and select "AppsFlyer" from the list of available connectors.
3. Enter your AppsFlyer API token and select the desired data range for the connector to pull data from.
4. Choose the specific AppsFlyer app you want to connect to and select the desired data fields to be included in the data sync.
5. Test the connection to ensure that the connector is properly configured and able to pull data from the selected app.
6. Once the connection is successful, save the configuration and activate the connector to begin syncing data from AppsFlyer to Airbyte.
7. Monitor the data sync to ensure that it is running smoothly and troubleshoot any issues that may arise.
8. Use the synced data to gain insights into your app's performance and make data-driven decisions to improve user engagement and retention.

Step 2: Set up AWS Datalake as a destination connector

1. Log in to your AWS account and navigate to the AWS Management Console.
2. Click on the S3 service and create a new bucket where you will store your data.
3. Create an IAM user with the necessary permissions to access the S3 bucket. Make sure to save the access key and secret key.
4. Open Airbyte and navigate to the Destinations tab.
5. Select the AWS Datalake destination connector and click on "Create new connection".
6. Enter a name for your connection and paste the access key and secret key you saved earlier.
7. Enter the name of the S3 bucket you created in step 2 and select the region where it is located.
8. Choose the format in which you want your data to be stored in the S3 bucket (e.g. CSV, JSON, Parquet).
9. Configure any additional settings, such as compression or encryption, if necessary.
10. Test the connection to make sure it is working properly.
11. Save the connection and start syncing your data to the AWS Datalake.

Step 3: Set up a connection to sync your AppsFlyer data to AWS Datalake

Once you've successfully connected AppsFlyer as a data source and AWS Datalake as a destination in Airbyte, you can set up a data pipeline between them with the following steps:

  1. Create a new connection: On the Airbyte dashboard, navigate to the 'Connections' tab and click the '+ New Connection' button.
  2. Choose your source: Select AppsFlyer from the dropdown list of your configured sources.
  3. Select your destination: Choose AWS Datalake from the dropdown list of your configured destinations.
  4. Configure your sync: Define the frequency of your data syncs based on your business needs. Airbyte allows both manual and automatic scheduling for your data refreshes.
  5. Select the data to sync: Choose the specific AppsFlyer objects you want to import data from towards AWS Datalake. You can sync all data or select specific tables and fields.
  6. Select the sync mode for your streams: Choose between full refreshes or incremental syncs (with deduplication if you want), and this for all streams or at the stream level. Incremental is only available for streams that have a primary cursor.
  7. Test your connection: Click the 'Test Connection' button to make sure that your setup works. If the connection test is successful, save your configuration.
  8. Start the sync: If the test passes, click 'Set Up Connection'. Airbyte will start moving data from AppsFlyer to AWS Datalake according to your settings.

Remember, Airbyte keeps your data in sync at the frequency you determine, ensuring your AWS Datalake data warehouse is always up-to-date with your AppsFlyer data.

Use Cases to transfer your AppsFlyer data to AWS Datalake

Integrating data from AppsFlyer to AWS Datalake provides several benefits. Here are a few use cases:

  1. Advanced Analytics: AWS Datalake’s powerful data processing capabilities enable you to perform complex queries and data analysis on your AppsFlyer data, extracting insights that wouldn't be possible within AppsFlyer alone.
  2. Data Consolidation: If you're using multiple other sources along with AppsFlyer, syncing to AWS Datalake allows you to centralize your data for a holistic view of your operations, and to set up a change data capture process so you never have any discrepancies in your data again.
  3. Historical Data Analysis: AppsFlyer has limits on historical data. Syncing data to AWS Datalake allows for long-term data retention and analysis of historical trends over time.
  4. Data Security and Compliance: AWS Datalake provides robust data security features. Syncing AppsFlyer data to AWS Datalake ensures your data is secured and allows for advanced data governance and compliance management.
  5. Scalability: AWS Datalake can handle large volumes of data without affecting performance, providing an ideal solution for growing businesses with expanding AppsFlyer data.
  6. Data Science and Machine Learning: By having AppsFlyer data in AWS Datalake, you can apply machine learning models to your data for predictive analytics, customer segmentation, and more.
  7. Reporting and Visualization: While AppsFlyer provides reporting tools, data visualization tools like Tableau, PowerBI, Looker (Google Data Studio) can connect to AWS Datalake, providing more advanced business intelligence options. If you have a AppsFlyer table that needs to be converted to a AWS Datalake table, Airbyte can do that automatically.

Wrapping Up

To summarize, this tutorial has shown you how to:

  1. Configure a AppsFlyer account as an Airbyte data source connector.
  2. Configure AWS Datalake as a data destination connector.
  3. Create an Airbyte data pipeline that will automatically be moving data directly from AppsFlyer to AWS Datalake after you set a schedule

With Airbyte, creating data pipelines take minutes, and the data integration possibilities are endless. Airbyte supports the largest catalog of API tools, databases, and files, among other sources. Airbyte's connectors are open-source, so you can add any custom objects to the connector, or even build a new connector from scratch without any local dev environment or any data engineer within 10 minutes with the no-code connector builder.

We look forward to seeing you make use of it! We invite you to join the conversation on our community Slack Channel, or sign up for our newsletter. You should also check out other Airbyte tutorials, and Airbyte’s content hub!

What should you do next?

Hope you enjoyed the reading. Here are the 3 ways we can help you in your data journey:

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Take the first step towards extensible data movement infrastructure that will give a ton of time back to your data team. 
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Talk to a data infrastructure expert
Get a free consultation with an Airbyte expert to significantly improve your data movement infrastructure. 
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Connectors Used

What should you do next?

Hope you enjoyed the reading. Here are the 3 ways we can help you in your data journey:

flag icon
Easily address your data movement needs with Airbyte Cloud
Take the first step towards extensible data movement infrastructure that will give a ton of time back to your data team. 
Get started with Airbyte for free
high five icon
Talk to a data infrastructure expert
Get a free consultation with an Airbyte expert to significantly improve your data movement infrastructure. 
Talk to sales
stars sparkling
Improve your data infrastructure knowledge
Subscribe to our monthly newsletter and get the community’s new enlightening content along with Airbyte’s progress in their mission to solve data integration once and for all.
Subscribe to newsletter

Connectors Used

Frequently Asked Questions

What data can you extract from AppsFlyer?

AppsFlyer's API provides access to a wide range of data related to mobile app marketing and user engagement. The following are the categories of data that can be accessed through the API:
1. Attribution data: This includes information about the source of app installs, such as the ad network, campaign, and creative.
2. In-app events data: This includes data about user actions within the app, such as purchases, registrations, and other custom events.
3. Retargeting data: This includes data about users who have engaged with the app in the past and can be targeted with specific campaigns.
4. Audience data: This includes data about the characteristics of app users, such as demographics, interests, and behaviors.
5. Ad revenue data: This includes data about the revenue generated by ads within the app, such as impressions, clicks, and conversions.
6. Fraud prevention data: This includes data about potential fraudulent activity, such as fake installs or clicks.
7. Raw data: This includes all of the above data in its raw form, allowing for custom analysis and reporting.

What data can you transfer to AWS Datalake?

You can transfer a wide variety of data to AWS Datalake. This usually includes structured, semi-structured, and unstructured data like transaction records, log files, JSON data, CSV files, and more, allowing robust, scalable data integration and analysis.

What are top ETL tools to transfer data from AppsFlyer to AWS Datalake?

The most prominent ETL tools to transfer data from AppsFlyer to AWS Datalake include:

  • Airbyte
  • Fivetran
  • Stitch
  • Matillion
  • Talend Data Integration

These tools help in extracting data from AppsFlyer and various sources (APIs, databases, and more), transforming it efficiently, and loading it into AWS Datalake and other databases, data warehouses and data lakes, enhancing data management capabilities.