🧠 Project Name: How I Built a Startup Intelligence Table with Clay (Without Code)

🔧 What This Workflow Does:

This is a step-by-step guide for creating a live, enriched company database using Clay. I used it to pull company domains, founder names, LinkedIn URLs, and work emails — all in one place.

✅ Tools Used:

  • Clay
  • Notion (to receive drafts)

Step-by-Step Tutorial 🗂️

🔹 Step 1: Create a New Table in Clay

Go to clay.com and create a new table. In the first column, add a list of company names. (e.g. Shopify, Canva, Stripe, Notion…). You can paste these manually or import from CSV. Name the column Company Name.

⚡ Step 2: Enrich the Company Domain

Clay can automatically find a company’s domain based on the name.

  1. Select “Add Column” -> “Add Enrichment”.
  2. Search for “Find Domain from Company Name”. You have multiple options you can choose for. I went with the one from Clearbit.
Clay Enrichment menu screenshot showing Find Domain from Company Name options
Clay table screenshot showing Company Name column and Find Domain from Company Name results

👤 Step 3: Get Founder Names

  1. Select “Add Column” -> “Add Enrichment”.
  2. Search for “Founder Names” and select the one you wish. I went with “Find names of a company’s founder”.
  3. Clay will fetch public founder info like:
    • Tobias Lütke, Scott Lake (for Shopify)
    • Patrick Collison, John Collison (for Stripe)
Clay Enrichment menu screenshot showing Founder Names options
Clay table screenshot showing Founder Names results

🔗 Step 4: Find LinkedIn URLs

  1. Add a new column → “Find professional profile”. I went with the one from Datagma.
  2. Use the founder names and domain as inputs.
  3. Result: direct links to their LinkedIn profiles.
Clay table screenshot showing Find Professional Profile results

📧 Step 5: Find Work Emails (when available)

  1. Add a new column → “Find work email”. I went with the one from LeadMagic.
  2. Clay will match likely email formats using domain + name patterns.
    • e.g. patrick@stripe.com, eric.yuan@zoom.us
  3. In some cases, it might not return an email if not publicly accessible.
Clay table screenshot showing Find Work Email results

✅ Optional (but Powerful) Steps

📣 Get Recent News / Fundraising

Add: News & Fundraising column.

This pulls latest press mentions and funding round info — especially useful if you're doing B2B outreach or writing content.

Clay table screenshot showing News & Fundraising column results

🧠 GPT-Powered Outreach Intros

Add a column: AI → “Write a message”.

Use a prompt like: 

Write a short friendly outreach reason for {{First Name}} at {{Company Name}} based on recent product updates or funding.

Clay will generate custom messages based on live company info.

Clay screenshot showing AI Write a Message configuration and personalized outreach results

🔄 Export to Notion

  1. In the top-right, click “Export” -> Notion.
  2. Choose your Notion workspace and database.
  3. Your whole table (including AI outputs) now syncs to Notion for tracking or collaboration. You can view mine here: Notion Template Link
Notion screenshot showing the final Lead Gen Qualifier table

💡 Why I Built It

I wanted a lightweight but smart system to track high-potential companies in my niche — and know who to talk to and what to say.

With Clay, I get real-time company info + AI-generated outreach ideas in one place.

Great for:

  • Warm email intros
  • Strategic partnerships
  • Content research
  • Or just staying ahead of the market.

For reference, here is my template in Clay: Clay Template Link