I don't have the Tableau API, either. I normally just download the data as a CSV, save it somewhere I'll be able to access and update later, then connect to that download from Tableau.
If you clean your data with Tableau Prep first, you'll have a better time in Tableau later. Here is my favorite resource from Tableau about cleaning survey data with Prep, in case you haven't seen this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VF7nHRQ3His
Unfortunately, this method won't let the data automatically update... to update, you'll have to export the data again from Qualtrics and replace/append the file you saved earlier (the one you told Tableau to reference). That's the best option I know of without the API. I'd also be curious to hear if anyone else has a better workaround!

Thanks For Your Opinion I marked as Accepted Answer.
Thank You!!!

Even with the API, you can't fully automate, because you can't connect the API to Tableau Prep. We can connect to it through Server or Desktop, and load data there, which means a lot of manipulation in Desktop (which is a NIGHTMARE), or basically using the process lizb311 mentioned above doing a manual download to get the file cleaned in Prep, then loading the extract onto Server from there. We've had issues with the api since we got it, and unfortunately we got bounced around between Tableau and Qualtrics both saying the issue was on the other side. Ultimately we were able to get help from Tableau to get it working, but it took months of messing around with it. Not sure i'm convinced it's worth the money, particularly considering the investment and level of support we've been able to get with it. I'd recommend the manual downloads, and using Prep, which is by far one of the most useful tools we have adopted in our survey workflow.

jcwright That is so disappointing! In my mind (having never had the API), the API was a magical thing that would bring my data into Tableau in the right shape and perfectly cleaned, no need for anything else... Oh, well. Maybe "never meet your heroes" applies to software, too? Regardless, I appreciate you sharing your experience with the API. That's definitely good to know; my team often discusses adding that feature on to our license. Hopefully they'll add a way to connect directly to Prep in the future.

lizb311 Yes agree about never meeting your heroes... we're still working with the API, since it has some utility for us, and Tableau tells us that there's some updates on their calendar (I think this year) that will help us get better value from it. But it's definitely worth asking the hard questions to all involved before the purchase, since it's not a simple 'plug and play' the way we'd been led to believe it was originally.