What is our primary use case?
My main use case for Rivery is to target and source from various data sources.
A specific example of how I use Rivery is that the advantage lies in the ability to approach every data project easily because it has so many connectors. I have used them for taking data from Facebook, Google, YouTube, Instagram, and other platforms.
In addition to my main use case, I also take data from Monday and different databases. I knew that it would not be a problem when I needed to take data from different sources.
What is most valuable?
The best features Rivery offers include building blocks that make everything much easier and clearer. They have great support, are very fast, and respond quickly, ensuring they do not stop correspondence with you until you get a solution. If needed, I meet with the Israeli team for a quick focused Zoom session, and I knew I would be fine once I chose Rivery.
The building blocks work for me because there is great documentation for every time I want to connect to a source, and most of the time I can handle it myself without any problem. If I get stuck because of a different aspect of security or a setting I did not know about before, I just reach out via the support email, and they answer me and can look at my account to see what I did wrong. Everything is very transparent and therefore easy.
Rivery has positively impacted my organization by enabling us to create a stable pipeline, and we can expand the variety of the data sources as we go very easily, with no worries, and with a lot of confidence in the fact that it can be done. It also has great monitoring of the cost.
In terms of specific outcomes or metrics, before Rivery, connecting to so many APIs would have required us to allocate a developer, which costs a lot of money compared to a data person. It also required a lot of context switching for something that is really easy to productize, which is what Rivery did. Rivery saved time and money because everything was handled in one place by only one or two data people instead of using the resources of a development team, which is great, and all the knowledge is handled in one team.
What needs improvement?
How Rivery can be improved is a challenging question, but I think something with the graphics could be better because when there is a lot of code inside, it needs to be more user-friendly. I am not talking about the source-to-target, but when we implement a lot of code, you need a different visual of how you use it, such as what you see in DBT.
There is a problem where sometimes I run a river and something in the UI does not get refreshed because I think of browser cache limits, which is annoying. I always need to refresh, and then I am not sure, so I have to go inside the river and look in the log to see if it has finished or not, which takes my time. At the end of the day, when I am running the river, I need it to be done before I go to the next step. Something in the UI could work more smoothly to show it easily. I am not sure why it happens, and I am not sure if there is a solution for it, but if it could be more clear, that would be very nice, such as sending an email once the river is really done.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Rivery for a total of three years, maybe even a little bit more.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Rivery is very stable in my experience.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Rivery's scalability is great, and I did not have any issues.
How are customer service and support?
The customer support for Rivery is excellent.
I would rate the customer support a nine on a scale from one to ten.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
I did not really use a different solution before Rivery. I worked in another company before this role, and the job was done by a backend developer who coded the ETL solution.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing was unfortunately not so good in my recent data project. Before that, it was fine. When I had to connect to databases, the cost was very fair and reasonable, and we could use it in a way that we could scale with it.
However, once I had to integrate source-to-target with Monday, for example, I was very surprised by the cost, which was very high. I found myself asking my stakeholder to make it only five times a day because it was really expensive. He was expecting real-time data, so the gap was too big and hard to negotiate. At the end of the day, we decided to do it every hour, and we knew it would be very expensive, so that was a hard decision we had to make.
What other advice do I have?
My advice for others looking into using Rivery is to read the documentation once you start. If you have any questions or need a person to help you at first, you can always reach out to customer success or support. They will guide you and give you the proper how-tos and support.
It can be a bit stressful to start with this kind of system because you might be afraid of billing too much when you run the river. Once you get started, you know how to manage it. You know how to do tests of streaming new data without charging too much money. It is really easy to use, and once you do it one time, the second time is really easy.
There may be a barrier the first time for those who do not know the concept, but if you have been doing ETL as a SaaS, I believe the transition, whether to save money or because they have more features you like, will not be a problem, even for a junior data person, because it is very easy. I would rate this product an eight overall.