At some point in developing sites for clients you will may want a satellite site feeding off the main database but with prototype features on it. Considering that certain levels of web app service come with free staging sites you may as well use these rather than either the free service which may be less well provisioned or a separate paid site that you will have to pay additional money for. The number of slots available will depend on the service you are on.
Beginners guide to setting up a staging slot
Once you have the site up and running you operate it in the same way as a normal service and so you can get the publishing details from the Get Publish Profile.