Data Sources in Connectors | Yext Hitchhikers Platform

What You’ll Learn

In this section, you will learn:

• An overview of the types of data sources in Connectors
• Examples of common sources
• Use cases for each source type

Overview

As you learned in the previous unit, connectors take data from a source, transform it into the correct format, and load it into the Knowledge Graph to create or update entities.

There are many data sources available in the Connectors framework. In this unit, you’ll learn about the different types of sources available, as well as the most common sources for getting entity data into the Knowledge Graph.

Source Types in Connectors

There are three main categories of data sources in Connectors:

• Connector apps
• Native sources
• Generic sources

More detail on each source type is below.

Connector apps

Connector apps in the Yext App Directory are pre-built connectors that you can install directly in your Yext account. You can choose to customize them further after they’re installed, or use them out-of-the-box.

Examples of commonly used connector apps are:

• Google Business Profile connectors for locations, restaurants, and other location types
• Olo connectors for restaurant menus and menu items
• Zendesk connector for help articles
• Kyruus connectors for healthcare locations and providers

Native sources

Native sources connect directly to third-party platforms to pull in data, but unlike connector apps, you still need to build the actual connector yourself.

Each native source will allow you to extract specific types of data, but they still allow for some customization.

Examples of common native sources are:

• Google Business Profile
• Ecommerce platforms like Google Merchant Center, Shopify, and Adobe Commerce
• Help article and ticketing platforms like Zendesk, Jira, Salesforce, and HubSpot

Generic sources

Generic sources allow you to build a connector to retrieve data from a source without connecting to a specific third-party platform or app They take more technical work to configure, but can allow for more customization.

Some examples of generic sources are:

• A file upload
• An API
• A direct file transfer
• The Yext Crawler, which scrapes HTML data from your webpages

In the challenge at the end of this module, you’ll use the Crawler to build a connector that pulls in help article data as entities in the Knowledge Graph. See the Create a Crawler Connector guide for detailed steps.

Keep Learning

• For all available generic and native sources in Connectors, see the Connectors reference section under Generic Sources and Native Sources.

• For all available Connector apps, search “connectors” in the Yext App Directory.