Most frequently asked web scraping questions

Chris Miranda -

As Web Scraping becomes more well known, more and more questions come up about what you can and cant do with web scraping. Here are the most frequently asked questions about web scraping.

What is web scraping

Web scraping refers to the extraction of data from a website. This information is collected and then exported into a format that is more useful for the user. Be it a spreadsheet or an API. Web Scraping can be done both manually and automatically. Read more on what is web scraping

Any publicly available data that can be accessed by everyone on the internet can be legally extracted.

The data has to follow these 3 criteria for it to be legally extracted:

  • The user has made the data public
  • No account required for access
  • Not blocked by robots.txt file

However, there are some cases of collecting and scraping private data which exist in a completely different realm of legality. Continue to read on: Is web scraping legal?

Can you scrape the web for lead generation?

There are many websites you can scrape that you can use for lead generation! Online directories like Yellow pages, Yelp, RateMD are all websites you can scrape to help you generate a list of potential leads that may be interested in your product or service.

We have several guides on how to scrape different online directories for lead generation:

What is the best tool for web scraping?

While there are many different web scraping tools available, this answer depends on what you need. With that being said, we think you’ll enjoy using ParseHub. It has a suite of features that we think you’ll enjoy and is free to download:

  • Cloud-based web scraping
  • Powerful
  • Easy to use
  • Multiple output formats like JSON, CSV/ Excel
  • Pagination

Download ParseHub for Free

What is web scraping used for?

There are many uses for web scraping! As many businesses use web scraping for different purposes, here are some ways you can use web scraping for:

  • Lead Generation
  • Industry insights
  • Collect data
  • Investment opportunities
  • Competitor Research

Continue to read: What is web scraping used for?

Is web scraping difficult?

Web scraping might seem intimidating for some people. Especially if you’ve never done any coding in your life. However, they are way simpler ways to automate your data gathering process without having to write a single line of code. There are many web scrapers that allow you to web scraper without coding.

Can I extract data from the entire web?

No web scraper can scrape the entire web. As all websites are formatted differently, it would be difficult to extract the right information.

Is web scraping data mining?

Web scraping refers to the process of extracting data from web sources and structuring it into a more convenient format. It does not involve any data processing or analysis.

Data mining refers to the process of analyzing large datasets to uncover trends and valuable insights. It does not involve any data gathering or extraction.

Data mining does not involve data extraction. Web scraping could be used to create the datasets to be used in Data Mining.

What is the difference between web crawling and web scraping?

A Web Crawler will generally go through every single page on a website, rather than a subset of pages. On the other hand, Web Scraping focuses on a specific set of data on a website. These could be product details, stock prices, sports data or any other data sets.

Can you scrape data behind a login page?

Yes, it’s possible to scrape data behind a login page, but you do need to check with the terms and conditions of the website as it may be hiding the information for a reason. If you want to learn how to scrape behind a login page you can learn here.

How to avoid being blocked when scraping a website?

There are several ways you can avoid getting blocked when scraping a website like:

  • IP rotation
  • proxies
  • Switch user agents
  • Solving captcha services or feature
  • Slow down the scrape

Some websites will block your IP address if they know you're scraping their website. One way you can prevent  from getting blocked is by using an IP rotation feature. ParseHub has an IP rotation that will prevent you and your office from getting blocked. IP rotations is part of the premium plan.

Continue to read: Web scraper blocked: how to fix it with IP rotation