diff --git a/services/backend/Dockerfile b/services/backend/Dockerfile
index 6e0927c8..32a13d8b 100644
--- a/services/backend/Dockerfile
+++ b/services/backend/Dockerfile
@@ -36,4 +36,4 @@ RUN yarn build
 
 EXPOSE 4000
 
-CMD ["/bin/bash", "-c", "bundle exec rails s -b 0.0.0.0 -p 4000"]
+CMD ["/bin/bash", "-c", "bundle exec ddtracerb exec rails s -b 0.0.0.0 -p 4000"]
diff --git a/services/backend/Gemfile b/services/backend/Gemfile
index 18f8eaa5..3bd49547 100644
--- a/services/backend/Gemfile
+++ b/services/backend/Gemfile
@@ -98,4 +98,7 @@ gem 'sassc', github: 'sass/sassc-ruby', group: :development
 
 # monitoring
 gem 'ddtrace', require: 'ddtrace/auto_instrument'
-gem 'dogstatsd-ruby', require: 'datadog/statsd'
\ No newline at end of file
+# needed for Datadog Continuous Profiler
+gem 'google-protobuf', '~> 3.0'
+# needed for runtime metrics
+gem 'dogstatsd-ruby', require: 'datadog/statsd'
diff --git a/services/backend/config/initializers/datadog-tracer.rb b/services/backend/config/initializers/datadog-tracer.rb
index f3758bd7..2de38f50 100644
--- a/services/backend/config/initializers/datadog-tracer.rb
+++ b/services/backend/config/initializers/datadog-tracer.rb
@@ -2,4 +2,5 @@
   c.env = ENV['DD_ENV'] || 'development'
   c.service = ENV['DD_SERVICE'] || 'store-backend'
   c.tracing.sampling.default_rate = 1.0
+  c.profiling.enabled = true
 end
\ No newline at end of file