# Silicon vs Hiring a Data Analytics Consultant

URL: https://meetsilicon.com/vs-data-analytics-consultant/

> A data analytics consultant is usually hired for a project and hands the work over at the end. Silicon builds and maintains your data foundation as your company grows.

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# Silicon vs hiring a data analytics consultant
A data analytics consultant is usually hired for a project. They build a set of reports or dashboards, document the work and hand it over to your team. Silicon partners with high-growth startups to build and maintain their data foundation, and our AI analytics platform runs on that foundation, so the work carries on after the first dashboards ship.
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## Choose Silicon if
- You don't have a data team to hand the work over to
- Your key metrics need to stay correct as pricing, plans and tools change
- You want one point of contact for building and maintaining your data
- You want anyone in the company to ask questions in Slack and see where each answer comes from
## Hiring a data analytics consultant may fit better if
- You already have a data team and need extra hands for one defined project
- You need specialist work beyond reporting, such as a forecasting or pricing model
- You want someone working inside your team, on your own tools and process
Side by side
## Side by side
| Silicon | Hiring a data analytics consultant
How the work is set up | A foundation build, then an ongoing partnership as the company grows | Usually a project with an agreed end date
After launch | We maintain your data foundation and key metrics, and handle new requests from any team | Handed over to your team, or a new contract for more work
Keeping key metrics correct | We update each definition with the person who owns it | Your team, once the project ends
When something in your data changes | The platform flags the dashboards and metrics affected, and we make the fix | Depends on whether the consultant is still under contract
Software | The Silicon platform is included, with dashboards and an AI analyst in Slack | Usually built in tools you license separately
Pricing | A fixed-scope build, then monthly or annual | Usually hourly, daily or per project
Who does the work | We do, with one point of contact. Specialist data engineers work under our contract | The consultant or their firm
Consultants work in many different ways. This compares Silicon with the most common setup, a project with a fixed end date.
FAQ
## Questions, answered
### Is Silicon a data analytics consultant? +
No. Silicon is a data partner. We build your data foundation and keep maintaining it as the company grows, and our AI analytics platform is part of the partnership. For one specific piece of work, such as preparing numbers for a fundraise, we also run projects of two to four weeks.
### Is it cheaper to hire a data engineer instead? +
One senior analytics engineer and their tools cost about $120-227k a year at a company of about $5M revenue (Valiotti), and hiring one takes 6-10 weeks before two to four months of ramp-up (KORE1). We quote the partnership after a short discovery, so you can compare it with both options.
### How does a data engineering consultant compare? +
A data engineering consultant usually builds the pipelines and data models for a project, and reporting is often a separate piece of work. The Silicon foundation build covers both, and the partnership keeps them maintained afterwards.
### Can we work with Silicon and a consultant? +
Yes. Some companies bring in a consultant for specialist work, such as a forecasting model. It can run on the same data foundation and metric definitions we maintain.
## Other comparisons
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## Tell us where your data lives today.
Book 30 minutes with the founder. Tell us where your data is today, and see Silicon running on sample data.
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30-minute demo with the founder