Smart Connector - Delivery Types Overview

What are Smart Connector delivery types?

When connecting your data using a Smart Connector, one of the first steps is to choose where TapClicks should look to find your data. The delivery type tells TapClicks the location of your data. 

There are four broad methods of getting data into TapClicks using a Smart Connector, which are as follows:

1. Basic
2. Hosted File
3. Database
4. Direct To Source

Each of these methods has several delivery type options associated with them, which are detailed in the table below.

Basic Delivery Types

Basic delivery types are the ones that typically don’t have external storage. The data is either 1) uploaded directly into the platform and managed in the manual upload page, 2) sent from one TapClicks Instance to another or, 3) in the Case of Google Sheets, only connected to a single file.

The most common method for adding data to TapClicks is using basic file upload. This occurs when you add files directly to TapClicks. For example, if you have a .csv file located on your computer and want to have that data show up in your TapClicks marketing database or in reports, you can simply find the file on your computer and add it directly. 

Another basic delivery type is email. When using the email feature, you can send files directly to TapClicks by attaching the file to an email and using a special email address generated by TapClicks (see image below).

Hosted Delivery Types

Another common delivery type is used when you have your files located in a cloud-based folder. In this case, you want TapClicks to check that folder every day for new data. When new files are added, the data in them is brought into TapClicks (provided it is formatted in the same way as you mapped the sample data during Smart Connector setup).

Some common examples of hosted folder locations are Amazon S3, Google Drive and Dropbox. You will need to provide credentials and instructions on where TapClicks should look. The first step for this delivery type is always to authenticate your connection (see image below).

Database Delivery Types

Many teams store their marketing, operations, and sales data in a database. These are used by business Intelligence teams to create analysis and insights. The Smart Connector allows you to access these databases directly and pull that data into TapClicks for use in your reports.

TapClicks needs both credentials to access the database, as well as a description of where to look for the data you'd like to pull in from the database. To accomplish this, you will need both login instructions and a query/location information.

The query/location instructions vary based on the database you are accessing (see image below). NOTE: You may need to the credentials from another team or resource in your organization.

Direct-to-Source Delivery Types

Direct-to-Source delivery types are connector that allow TapClicks to go directly to the first party data provider an extract data. Similar to hosted delivery types, your first step is to authenticate the connection.

Will the system look for new data automatically?

With the exception of the basic delivery types, once you establish a connection to the location where your data is kept and turn your Smart Connector on, the system will automatically check that location for new data on a daily basis.

To see the general step-by-step procedure for setting up a Smart Connector, see the Smart Connector Setup Guide. To see the specific steps to set up a Smart Connector connected to a database, see How to Setup a Database Smart Connector.