Social Media Reporting dbt Package (Docs)

What does this dbt package do?

This dbt package aggregates and models data from multiple Fivetran social media connectors. The package standardizes the schemas from the various social media connectors and creates a single reporting model for all activity. It enables you to analyze your post performance by clicks, impressions, shares, likes, and comments.

Currently, this package supports the following social media connector types:

NOTE: You do not need to have all of these connector types to use this package, though you should have at least two.

Generates a comprehensive data dictionary of your source and modeled Social Media Reporting data via the dbt docs site

This package contains a number of tables, which all build up to the final social_media_reporting table. The social_media_reporting table combines the data from all of the connectors.

Table	Description
social_media_reporting__rollup_report	Each record represents a post from a social media account across selected connectors, including post metadata and metrics.

How do I use the dbt package?

Step 1: Pre-Requisites

Connector: Have at least one of the below supported Fivetran ad platform connectors syncing data into your warehouse. This package currently supports:

While you need only one of the above connectors to utilize this package, we recommend having at least two to gain the rollup benefit of this package.

Database support: This package has been tested on BigQuery, Snowflake, Redshift, Postgres and Databricks. Ensure you are using one of these supported databases.

Databricks Dispatch Configuration

If you are using a Databricks destination with this package you will need to add the below (or a variation of the below) dispatch configuration within your dbt_project.yml. This is required in order for the package to accurately search for macros within the dbt-labs/spark_utils then the dbt-labs/dbt_utils packages respectively.

dispatch:
  - macro_namespace: dbt_utils
    search_order: ['spark_utils', 'dbt_utils']

Step 2: Installing the Package

Include the following github package version in your packages.yml

Check dbt Hub for the latest installation instructions, or read the dbt docs for more information on installing packages.

packages:
  - package: fivetran/social_media_reporting
    version: [">=0.5.0", "<0.6.0"] # we recommend using ranges to capture non-breaking changes automatically

Do NOT include the upstream social media packages in this file. The transformation package itself has a dependency on it and will install the upstream packages as well.

Do NOT include the individual social media packages in this file. This package has dependencies on the packages and will install them as well.

Step 3: Configure Database and Schema Variables

By default, this package looks for your social media reporting data in your target database. If this is not where your app platform data is stored, add the relevant <connector>_database variables to your dbt_project.yml file (see below).

vars:
    ##Facebook Pages schema and database variables
    facebook_pages_schema: facebook_pages_schema
    facebook_pages_database: facebook_pages_database

    ##Instagram Business schema and database variables
    instagram_business_schema: instagram_business_schema
    instagram_business_database: instagram_business_database

    ##LinkedIn Pages schema and database variables
    linkedin_pages_schema: linkedin_pages_schema
    linkedin_pages_database: linkedin_pages_database

    ##Twitter Organic schema and database variables
    twitter_organic_schema: twitter_organic_schema
    twitter_organic_database: twitter_organic_database

Change the source table references

If an individual source table has a different name than the package expects, add the table name as it appears in your destination to the respective variable:

IMPORTANT: See the Facebook Pages dbt_project.yml, Instagram Business dbt_project.yml, LinkedIn Company Pages dbt_project.yml, and Twitter Organic dbt_project.yml variable declarations to see the expected names.

vars:
    <default_source_table_name>_identifier: your_table_name

Step 4: Enabling/Disabling Models

The package assumes that all connector models are enabled, so it will look to pull data from all of the connectors listed above. If you don't want to use certain connectors, disable those connectors' models in this package by setting the relevant variables to false:

vars:
    social_media_rollup__twitter_enabled: False
    social_media_rollup__facebook_enabled: False
    social_media_rollup__linkedin_enabled: False
    social_media_rollup__instagram_enabled: False

Next, you must disable the models in the unwanted connector's related package, which has its own configuration. Disable the relevant models under the models section of your dbt_project.yml file by setting the enabled value to false.

Only include the models you want to disable. Default values are generally true but that is not always the case.

models:
    # disable both instagram business models if not using instagram business
    instagram_business:
        enabled: false
    instagram_business_source:
        enabled: false
  
    # disable both linkedin company pages models if not using linkedin company pages
    linkedin_pages:
        enabled: false
    linkedin_pages_source:
        enabled: false
  
    # disable both twitter organic models if not using twitter organic
    twitter_organic:
        enabled: false
    twitter_organic_source:
        enabled: false
    
    # disable all three facebook pages models if not using facebook pages
    facebook_pages:
        enabled: false
    facebook_pages_source:
        enabled: false

(Optional) Step 5: Additional configurations

Unioning Multiple Social Media Connectors

If you have multiple social media connectors in Fivetran, you can use this package on all of them simultaneously. The package will union all of the data together and then pass the unioned table(s) into the reporting model. You will be able to see which source the data came from in the source_relation column of each model. To use this functionality, you will need to set either the union_schemas or union_databases variables:

IMPORTANT: You cannot use both the union_schemas and union_databases variables.

vars:
    ##Schemas variables
    facebook_pages_union_schemas: ['facebook_pages_one','facebook_pages_two']
    linkedin_pages_union_schemas: ['linkedin_company_pages_one', 'linkedin_company_pages_two']
    instagram_business_union_schemas: ['instagram_business_one', 'instagram_business_two', 'instagram_business_three']
    twitter_organic_union_schemas: ['twitter_social_one', 'twitter_social_two', 'twitter_social_three', 'twitter_social_four']

    ##Databases variables
    facebook_pages_union_databases: ['facebook_pages_one','facebook_pages_two']
    linkedin_pages_union_databases: ['linkedin_company_pages_one', 'linkedin_company_pages_two']
    instagram_business_union_databases: ['instagram_business_one', 'instagram_business_two', 'instagram_business_three']
    twitter_organic_union_databases: ['twitter_social_one', 'twitter_social_two', 'twitter_social_three', 'twitter_social_four']

For more configuration information, see the individual connector dbt packages (listed above).

Does this package have dependencies?

This dbt package is dependent on the following dbt packages. These dependencies are installed by default within this package. For more information on the following packages, refer to the dbt hub site.

IMPORTANT: If you have any of these dependent packages in your own packages.yml file, we highly recommend that you remove them from your root packages.yml to avoid package version conflicts.

packages:
    - package: fivetran/facebook_pages
      version: [">=0.3.0", "<0.4.0"]

    - package: fivetran/facebook_pages_source
      version: [">=0.3.0", "<0.4.0"]

    - package: fivetran/instagram_business
      version: [">=0.2.0", "<0.3.0"]

    - package: fivetran/instagram_business_source
      version: [">=0.2.0", "<0.3.0"]

    - package: fivetran/twitter_organic
      version: [">=0.3.0", "<0.4.0"]

    - package: fivetran/twitter_organic_source
      version: [">=0.3.0", "<0.4.0"]

    - package: fivetran/linkedin_pages
      version: [">=0.3.0", "<0.4.0"]

    - package: fivetran/linkedin_pages_source
      version: [">=0.3.0", "<0.4.0"]

    - package: fivetran/fivetran_utils
      version: [">=0.4.0", "<0.5.0"]

    - package: dbt-labs/dbt_utils
      version: [">=1.0.0", "<2.0.0"]

    - package: dbt-labs/spark_utils
      version: [">=0.3.0", "<0.4.0"]

How is this package maintained and can I contribute?

Package Maintenance

The Fivetran team maintaining this package only maintains the latest version of the package. We highly recommend you stay consistent with the latest version of the package and refer to the CHANGELOG and release notes for more information on changes across versions.

Contributions

These dbt packages are developed by a small team of analytics engineers at Fivetran. However, the packages are made better by community contributions.

We highly encourage and welcome contributions to this package. Check out this post on the best workflow for contributing to a package.

Are there any resources available?

If you encounter any questions or want to reach out for help, see the GitHub Issue section to find the right avenue of support for you.
If you would like to provide feedback to the dbt package team at Fivetran, or would like to request a future dbt package to be developed, then feel free to fill out our Feedback Form.