Clay Enrichment

Create a Clay Account and Set Up Your First Table

Navigate to clay.com and create an account. Clay offers a free tier with a limited number of credits, which is sufficient to test your first enrichment workflow. Once logged in, click 'New Table' to create your workspace. You can start a table from scratch (manually uploading a CSV of contacts), import from a connected CRM (HubSpot or Salesforce), or pull records from a Clay-native source like LinkedIn search, Apollo search, or a Google Sheets import. For beginners, uploading a CSV of target companies or contacts is the fastest way to get started. Ensure your CSV includes at minimum a 'Full Name' and 'Company Domain' or 'LinkedIn URL' column, as these are the most common input fields for enrichment actions. Clay tables function similarly to spreadsheets, with rows representing records (people or companies) and columns representing enrichment actions or data fields.

Connect Your First Enrichment Provider (e.g., Apollo or Lusha)

Once your table has records loaded, click the '+' button to add a new column and select 'Enrich.' Browse or search the provider library to find your chosen provider (e.g., Apollo.io for email finding). Select the specific action you want (e.g., 'Find Email' or 'Find Person'). Clay will prompt you to either use the Clay-managed account for that provider (consuming Clay credits) or connect your own API key for the provider to use your existing subscription. Map the required input fields — for Apollo email finding, you'll typically map 'First Name,' 'Last Name,' and 'Company Domain' from your existing table columns. Click 'Run Column' to execute enrichment across all rows. Clay will display the enriched values in the new column and indicate which rows were successfully enriched vs. returned no result. Credit consumption is displayed per row and in aggregate before you confirm the run.

// Example Clay table column config for Apollo email enrichment
// Input mapping:
// first_name → [Column: First Name]
// last_name → [Column: Last Name]
// company_domain → [Column: Company Domain]
// Output: email, email_confidence_score, linkedin_url

Configure Waterfall Enrichment for Maximum Coverage

To set up waterfall enrichment, add a second enrichment column for the same data point (e.g., email) but with a different provider (e.g., Lusha after Apollo). In the column settings, enable the conditional logic option: set the condition to 'Only run if [Apollo Email] is empty.' This ensures Lusha is only queried when Apollo failed to return an email, preventing duplicate credit spend. Repeat this pattern for a third provider (e.g., Hunter.io or Clearbit) with the condition 'Only run if [Lusha Email] is empty.' Finally, create a 'Final Email' formula column that returns the first non-empty value across your waterfall columns using a formula like: =IF([Apollo Email] != "", [Apollo Email], IF([Lusha Email] != "", [Lusha Email], [Hunter Email])). This waterfall pattern can increase email match rates from 40–60% (single provider) to 80–95%+ while spending credits only on records where previous providers failed.

// Waterfall formula column (pseudocode for Clay formula field)
=COALESCE(
  [Apollo Email],
  [Lusha Email],
  [Clearbit Email],
  [Hunter Email]
)
// Returns first non-empty value across all provider columns

Connect Your CRM (HubSpot or Salesforce) for Bidirectional Sync

Go to Clay's Integrations panel and connect your HubSpot or Salesforce account using OAuth authentication. To import from HubSpot, add a new table row source and select 'Import from HubSpot' — you can filter by contact list, lifecycle stage, or custom property to pull a targeted segment. To push enriched data back to HubSpot, add an 'Update HubSpot Contact' action column and map your enriched Clay fields to HubSpot properties. Critically, set each field mapping to 'Only write if HubSpot field is empty' to protect existing clean data. For Salesforce, the same pattern applies using the Salesforce connector with SOQL-based filtering for record imports. Always run a small test batch (10–20 records) before executing a full CRM enrichment run to validate field mappings and confirm no unintended overwrites occur.

// HubSpot field mapping config (conceptual)
{
  "clay_field": "Final Email",
  "hubspot_property": "email",
  "write_condition": "only_if_empty"
},
{
  "clay_field": "Mobile Phone (Lusha)",
  "hubspot_property": "mobilephone",
  "write_condition": "only_if_empty"
},
{
  "clay_field": "LinkedIn URL",
  "hubspot_property": "hs_linkedin_url",
  "write_condition": "always"
}

Set Up AI Enrichment with Claygent for Custom Research

Add a new column and select the 'Claygent' action (Clay's AI research agent). Write a natural language prompt describing what you want Claygent to research for each record. Examples include: 'Based on [Company Website URL], what is the primary product this company sells?' or 'Based on [LinkedIn URL], summarize this person's last 3 job titles in one sentence.' Claygent will browse the referenced URL or search the web and return a structured text response. You can also use Claygent to generate personalized outreach openers: 'Write a 1-sentence personalized opener for a cold email to [First Name] at [Company Name], referencing their recent [Funding Event] and positioning our product as relevant to their [ICP Pain Point].' Claygent outputs can be used directly as merge fields in outreach sequences, enabling truly personalized outbound at scale.

// Example Claygent prompt for personalized opener generation
"Write a 1-sentence cold email opener for {first_name} at {company_name}. 
They recently {funding_event}. We help {company_industry} companies 
with {our_value_prop}. Be conversational, not salesy. Max 25 words."

Activate Enriched Data in SalesLoft, Attio, or Gong

Once enrichment is complete, activate your data by pushing records to your outreach or CRM tool. For SalesLoft, add a 'Push to SalesLoft' action column and map Clay fields (email, first name, personalized opener, account name) to SalesLoft person and account fields. You can also assign records to a specific SalesLoft cadence directly from Clay. For Attio, use Clay's Attio integration to create or update records and trigger Attio automations based on enriched field values. For Gong integration, enrich your HubSpot or Salesforce CRM first (Step 4), and Gong will automatically pull the updated account and contact context into call intelligence dashboards. Platforms like Maestro can orchestrate this entire activation layer, routing enriched Clay records into the appropriate outreach sequence or CRM workflow based on ICP scoring and enrichment results.

// SalesLoft push action field mapping (conceptual)
{
  "person_email": "[Final Email]",
  "first_name": "[First Name]",
  "last_name": "[Last Name]",
  "account_name": "[Company Name]",
  "custom_field_opener": "[Claygent Personalized Opener]",
  "cadence_id": "cadence_12345",
  "owner_id": "[Assigned AE User ID]"
}