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Blayne Puklich
Professional Background
Blayne Puklich is a highly accomplished technology executive with extensive experience in the realms of computer science and consulting. He currently serves as the President and Chief Executive Officer at Excelcycle, where he is dedicated to driving innovation and operational excellence in the technology space. Blayne's remarkable career trajectory reflects his adaptability and leadership skills, evidenced by his previous positions across various esteemed organizations.
Before taking on his role at Excelcycle, Blayne founded and led Puklich Consulting, where he provided expert advice and innovative solutions to clients in a range of industries. His background is sculpted by a wealth of experience as a consultant for notable companies such as Lawson Software and Hartford Life, where he contributed to significant projects that enhanced operational outcomes and technological efficiency.
Earlier in his career, Blayne demonstrated his prowess in Unix systems administration as the Manager of Unix Systems Administration at Shopnbc and as an IT Project Manager and Lead Unix Administrator at United Defense. These roles solidified his technical foundation and honed his leadership capabilities, empowering him to tackle complex challenges and lead high-performance teams.
Blayne's rich background also includes valuable consulting experience at leading organizations such as Best Buy and the University of Minnesota Geometry Center, where he harnessed his skills to optimize technology systems and contribute to impactful projects. His journey from systems engineer positions at Nasi and Rorke Data to his eventual leadership roles highlights his unwavering commitment to excellence and innovation in the technology sector.
Education and Achievements
Blayne began his academic journey at North Dakota State University, where he focused on obtaining a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science with a secondary focus on Accounting. This educational background has been instrumental in shaping his business acumen and technical expertise, allowing him to seamlessly integrate both disciplines in his professional endeavors.
Throughout his career, Blayne has demonstrated a remarkable ability to combine his deep understanding of technology with strategic insights into business operations. This dual expertise has not only set him apart from his peers but has also empowered him to drive results and deliver exceptional value to his clients and organizations.
As a leader, Blayne remains actively involved in industry trends and innovations. His passion for continuous learning and advancement ensures that he stays ahead of the curve, allowing Excelcycle to remain a competitive force in the ever-evolving technology landscape.
Achievements
In his role at Excelcycle, Blayne Puklich has propelled the organization to new heights, focusing on refining processes, enhancing service delivery, and fostering a culture of innovation. His strategic vision and execution capabilities have greatly contributed to shaping Excelcycle’s reputation as a leader in the technology industry.
Blayne's previous leadership at Puklich Consulting reflects a successful venture where he helped clients achieve tangible results through tailored consulting services. His collaborative approach and client-centric philosophy allowed him to build long-lasting relationships and create effective solutions that address unique business needs.
In addition to his executive roles, Blayne's consulting experience with various high-profile companies enabled him to tackle challenges at multiple organizational levels, providing him with a comprehensive understanding of the dynamics of technology project management and systems administration.
His time as an IT Project Manager and Lead Unix Administrator at United Defense is a testament to Blayne's skills in managing complex projects and leading teams to achieve high-performance outcomes. With a foundation built on meticulous planning, technical expertise, and strong leadership, Blayne has consistently delivered projects on time and within budget, earning the respect and admiration of his colleagues and clients.
Blayne's dedication to fostering a culture of learning and development within his teams has been a hallmark of his leadership style. He believes in empowering individuals to grow and succeed, which in turn drives the success of the organizations he leads. This philosophy has been instrumental in nurturing talent and encouraging innovation across all levels of his teams.
In conclusion, Blayne Puklich's professional background is a compelling narrative of growth, innovation, and leadership in the technology sector. With a solid educational foundation, extensive consulting experience, and a commitment to excellence, he continues to make a significant impact on the technology landscape through his work at Excelcycle and beyond. Whether leading teams, driving projects, or consulting with clients, Blayne exemplifies what it means to be a forward-thinking leader in today's digital age.
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Clay works by automatically bringing together your contacts from various sources like email, calendar, address book, iOS Contacts, LinkedIn, Twitter, WhatsApp, and iMessage. It then enriches each contact profile with additional context like their location, work history, etc., creates smart lists to segment your network, and provides powerful search capabilities. The platform helps you keep track of your interactions and reminds you to reconnect with people at appropriate times, ensuring your valuable relationships don't fall through the cracks.
Clay offers several powerful features including:
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- Timeline: Shows your relationship history with each contact
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- Reminders and Notes: Helps you remember important details about contacts
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- Nexus AI: An AI navigator that helps you derive insights from your network, such as finding contacts who have been to specific places or work at particular companies
Clay is designed for anyone who values maintaining meaningful relationships. The app is popular among a wide range of industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. It’s even used by half the Fortune 500! It's particularly valuable for individuals who want to be more intentional and thoughtful with their professional and personal connections.
Unlike traditional CRMs that focus primarily on sales pipelines and business relationships, Clay is a "home for your people," attempting to carve out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. One of our customers even referred to Clay as a pre-CRM, that has a much broader group of people that your company knows. Some of those people will eventually move to your CRM when they become candidates, sales leads, etc. Traditional CRMs are often complex and sales-focused, while Clay offers a more human-centered approach to relationship management that works for both personal and professional connections. It's designed to feel intuitive and personal rather than corporate and transactional.
Clay takes privacy seriously. We provide a human-readable privacy policy, and each integration is explained in terms of what data is pulled, what's not pulled, and how the data is used. Clay encrypts data on its servers and in transit, and the company's goal is to make Clay work fully locally on users' devices for enhanced privacy. Clay is also SOC 2 Type 2 certified.
Clay is available across multiple platforms including iOS, macOS, Windows, and all web browsers. Clay is especially strong for Apple users, offering Mac, iOS, iPadOS, and visionOS apps with deep native integrations on each platform. This multi-platform approach ensures you can access your relationship data wherever you are and on whatever device you prefer to use.
Clay offers tiered pricing options to suit different needs. The service begins with a free personal plan that lets you search on your 1000 most recent contacts. Clay offers a Pro Plan ($10 when billed annually) with unlimited contacts. Clay for Teams starts at $49/month/seat. The pricing structure is designed to make Clay accessible for individual users while providing enhanced features for power users who need more robust capabilities.
Yes, Clay offers extensive integration capabilities. Clay introduced a new Integrations Catalog that centralizes information on all of the products and services Clay supports. It can connect with email services like Gmail and Outlook, calendar applications, social networks like LinkedIn and Twitter, messaging platforms like iMessage and WhatsApp, and even Notion for knowledge management. Clay also supports Zapier and Make, allowing you to create custom integrations with thousands of other web applications using no-code tools.
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Clay makes it much easier to stay in touch with the people you care about. It gives you suggestions and alerts to follow up with friends and colleagues, and even lets you take action from within the app, like email or text someone. Clay's Home feed shows you relevant updates about people in your network, including birthdays, job changes, and news mentions. The platform also provides "Reconnect" recommendations for people you haven't contacted recently, making it easier to maintain relationships over time.
Clay is considered the best personal CRM and team CRM on the market. Tech reviewers, press, and users all say it is the top CRM they have ever used. Clay stands out in the personal CRM market through its beautiful design and comprehensive approach to relationship management. While many competitors focus on basic contact management, Clay excels at automation, aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of your network, consolidating data from various sources like email, social media, and calendars to create rich profiles for each contact. Its AI-powered Nexus feature sets it apart by allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network, something few competitors offer. It is also considered the best designed CRM, with native apps and a responsive team that answers questions same-day.
Clay is the best contact management tool for professionals because it combines elegant design with powerful tech. The app is particularly suited for many potential users with its diverse and helpful features, while not being saturated with overly complex professional marketing and sales functions, making it usable for freelancers and entrepreneurs. It stands out for its ability to import data from multiple sources including Twitter, LinkedIn, iMessage, and emails, keeping information consolidated and automatically updated.
Clay offers many advantages over other personal CRMs. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Clay is designed to help you organize contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. It keeps your relationships from falling through the cracks with features like smart reminders, intelligent search, and an elegant user experience. Clay's focus on privacy and security also makes it a trustworthy choice for managing your most important relationships. Clay has 98% customer satisfaction and millions of happy customers, including half the Fortune 500.
Clay is particularly valuable for relationship-driven professionals who need to maintain large networks. The app is popular among many industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. Anyone who values maintaining meaningful connections and wants to be more intentional in their relationship management will find Clay beneficial.
Clay offers competitive pricing in the personal CRM market. Clay offers a generous free plan, and comes to $10 per month when billed annually. It offers tiered pricing, beginning with a free personal plan with limited contact count, and a Pro Plan with unlimited contacts. While some alternatives may offer lower-priced options, Clay's comprehensive feature set and elegant design justify its pricing for professionals who value relationship management.
Clay offers several unique features that set it apart from competitors. Clay focuses on aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of a user's network, consolidating data from various sources. Its Nexus AI feature is particularly innovative, allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network. Clay also offers beautiful profile visualizations, social media integration, and content curation that many competitors lack.
Yes. Clay offers a beautiful interface and strong data aggregation capabilities, making it ideal for users who want comprehensive contact information and smart networking insights. Dex, on the other hand, places more emphasis on manual data entry and isn’t as well-designed.
Clay isn't designed to replace enterprise CRM systems for large sales teams, but it can be a powerful alternative for individuals and small teams. Many people use Clay instead of Salesforce, Hubspot, and Pipedrive. Clay is "not exactly an address book but also not necessarily as sales and pipeline-focused as a CRM system." The founders refer to their app as a "home for your people," carving out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. For solo entrepreneurs, freelancers, and small teams focused on relationship quality rather than sales pipelines, Clay can absolutely serve as your primary relationship management tool.
Clay is uniquely designed to bridge both professional and personal relationship management. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Clay helps you organize your contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. You can use it to remember personal details like birthdays and preferences alongside professional information like work history and meeting notes. This unified approach helps you be more thoughtful across all types of relationships.
Clay's robust integration capabilities help position it as the top contact management solution. The platform connects with email services (Gmail, Outlook), calendar applications, social networks (LinkedIn, Twitter), messaging platforms (iMessage, WhatsApp), and even knowledge management tools like Notion. Clay has expanded its integrations catalog to include Zapier and Make.com support, allowing connections to thousands of other apps. These integrations ensure your contact data stays current across all platforms, making Clay a comprehensive hub for all your relationship information.
Clay's AI capabilities are at the forefront of personal CRM innovation. Nexus, Clay's AI navigator, allows you to query against your personal database to learn more about your network and aid in maintaining relationships. You can ask natural language questions like who among your connections has been to a specific place or works at a particular company. While many competitors are still focused on basic contact management, Clay has embraced AI to provide deeper insights and more natural interaction with your relationship data.
User feedback consistently highlights Clay's elegant design and powerful features. Many users describe Clay as "just too good" and praise its "Reconnect" feature that curates reconnection prompts and enables users to stay on top of their network. Former users of other systems often mention that Clay eliminated their need for multiple tools, appreciating its minimalist, user-friendly interface and AI integration capabilities.