GCP is designed to deliver fast, reliable, and cost-efficient cloud solutions to businesses ranging from startups to large enterprises. The flexibility and scalability of the GCP cloud make it easy to provision resources. But, this convenience can also make it harder to track and control your spending. As your business grows, it gets even tougher to track your spending across different teams, and projects.
Why Integrate GCP Cost Alerts with Slack?
As your organization grows, more teams and individuals gain access to cloud resources. Developers, data scientists, and project managers all spin up resources for different purposes. While the pay-as-you-go pricing model brings in flexibility, it is more challenging to track your cloud cost in this setup. Without proper oversight, this can lead to over-provisioning and untracked spending.
Sending your GCP cost alerts and cost anomaly notifications to Slack is one way to bring some transparency into your cloud spending. It helps developers and project managers to be mindful of the resources they use. These alerts promote financial responsibility among teams and help them to manage resources better.
How to Track Cloud Spending with Economize?
Economize is a cloud cost management tool that can help you simplify the process of managing your GCP costs. By integrating your GCP account with Economize, you gain access to real-time spending insights and advanced cost-optimization tools. When linked with Slack, Economize sends GCP cost alerts directly to your Slack channels. This setup helps your team manage resources better, avoid surprises, and stay within budget.
Follow the given steps to connect your GCP account with Economize:
Step 1: Add GCP configuration information
After signing up with Economize, select Connect GCP as your cloud provider to begin onboarding your project.
- Enter the Project ID for the GCP project you want to onboard first. We suggest starting with your main GCP project.
- Now, use an existing BigQuery dataset or create a new dataset to import your cloud billing data.
- In the GCP console, go to BigQuery, open the Dataset info screen, and copy the Dataset ID value to paste into the onboarding field.provided field during the onboarding process.
Step 2: Enable cloud billing export to the BigQuery dataset
GCP provides an option to export your billing data to the BigQuery dataset. This consists of details regarding your usage, and pricing data.
- Click the hamburger menu at the top left of the GCP console, and select Billing.
- In the left Billing navigation menu, select Billing Export.
- For both Standard usage cost and Detailed usage cost, click EDIT SETTINGS to enable them.
- Configure the following settings:
- From the Projects list, select the project you set up to contain your billing data.
- For Dataset, select the dataset that you set up to contain your exported Cloud Billing data.
- Click on SAVE.
- Once both exports are enabled they will indicate the same as follows:
Step 3: Validate service account credentials
- Economize integrates with your GCP account using a service account. You can either use the Economize-managed service account or bring your own service account.
- Ensure the service account has the necessary permissions as outlined in the next steps.
- If you use the Economize-managed service account, copy the generated service account during onboarding and grant it the permissions specified in steps 4 and 5.
Step 4: Grant the viewer permission to the service account
Go to the IAM console, and complete the steps below to grant the service account permission to access project resources.
- At the top of the IAM console, select the project whose ID you entered in the first step.
- Configure the permission as follows:
- In the center of the page, under Permissions for project “My Project XYZ”, click + GRANT ACCESS.In the New principals field, under Add principals, paste the value of the service account based on your selected access method in Step 3.In the Role field, under Assign roles, search for and select Viewer.
- Click on SAVE.
Step 5: Assign the BigQuery Data Editor role to the service account
Go to BigQuery, and complete the following steps to permit the service account to access the BigQuery dataset.
- At the top of the BigQuery console, ensure the project containing the BigQuery dataset whose ID you entered in the first step is selected, then navigate to the Explorer panel, and select your project to expand it.
- Configure the permission as follows:
- Select the three vertical dots next to the dataset name, then click Share.On the Share permissions panel that appears on the right, click + ADD PRINCIPAL.In the New principals field, under Add principals, paste the value of the service account based on your selected access method in Step 3.In the Role field, under Assign roles, search for and select BigQuery Data Editor.
- Click on SAVE.
Step 6: Connect Economize with your Slack Workspace
Note that you need admin access to your Slack workspace, to complete this step.
- In the Economize console, go to Settings and open the Integrations page.
- Find Slack and click Configure.
- Here, you’ll see any connected Slack channels or you can add new ones by selecting + Add workspace.
- You’ll be directed to your Slack workspace and prompted to grant permission. A message will appear saying, “Economize requires a channel to post to as an app.” Select the channel where you’d like to receive notifications and click Allow.
After connecting the channel, you’ll be redirected back to the Economize dashboard.
How Economize Can Lower Your Cloud Costs?
Cloud cost management is a challenge many organizations face. With unexpected expenses and inefficiencies driving budgets higher, Economize brings clarity and insights into your cloud spending. Economize can help you in:
- Real-Time Optimization and Monitoring Economize continuously analyzes your cloud infrastructure, identifying cost-saving opportunities through automated scanning and real-time monitoring. Our platform detects spending anomalies instantly, helping prevent unexpected cost escalations.
- Smart Recommendations Engine Our platform functions as your dedicated cost optimization advisor, providing actionable recommendations for cloud spending. Each suggestion includes detailed savings projections, enabling informed decision-making for budget optimization.
- Advanced Analytics and Visualization Transform complex cloud spending data into clear insights through interactive dashboards and detailed cost breakdowns. Our intuitive visualization tools help you identify trends and optimize resources effectively.
- Intelligent Problem Detection Quickly identify and resolve cost issues through advanced root-cause analysis and anomaly detection. Our platform helps you understand and address the source of unexpected expenses immediately.
- Effortless Integration Get started in under five minutes with our agentless setup. Our platform integrates seamlessly with your existing cloud infrastructure and workflow tools, providing continuous monitoring without manual intervention.
Conclusion
By following these steps, you can efficiently onboard your GCP projects onto Economize and integrate your Slack workspace for real-time cost alerts. This setup ensures better resource management, promotes financial accountability across teams, and helps your organization stay within budget. This integration helps you take control of your cloud spending with ease and transparency.
Troubled by Rising Cloud Expenses?
High cloud bills can be overwhelming, but they don’t have to be. Economize provides an easy way to cut your cloud costs by up to 30%. Schedule a free demo with us today and start saving money in as little as 10 minutes. Take your first step towards smarter spending.
