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Stephen Hernandez
Creative
Professional Background
Stephen Hernandez is an integrated Creative Director and Art Director based in Los Angeles, where he has carved a remarkable career over the last decade. His extensive experience spans across diverse industries, making significant contributions to brands that are not only culture driving but also impactful in every community they touch. Publicly renowned for his creative ingenuity, Stephen has collaborated with high-profile clients including Nike, Apple, Google, and numerous others, tackling projects that resonate deeply with audiences.
One of the signature traits that sets Stephen apart in the competitive landscape of creative direction is his distinctive ability to meld artistry with strategy. He has a robust history of contributing to landmark campaigns, such as those that broke records for Nike, while also engaging in meaningful initiatives like working towards ending homelessness in Los Angeles. This dual focus showcases Stephen's commitment to both commercial success and social responsibility, allowing him to drive projects that are impactful on multiple levels.
Stephen's approach to creativity is hands-on, emphasizing collaboration and team synergy. His leadership style is characterized by a gregarious, people-first philosophy, ensuring that everyone in the project pipeline feels valued and empowered to contribute. This blends a sense of curious whimsy with practical intuition, enhancing the collaborative spirit within teams and fostering a culture of innovation. He is not just focused on individual accolades but instead prioritizes the elevation of the collective, making him an effective team collaborator and a meaningful contributor to any company's culture.
Education and Achievements
Stephen pursued his academic interests in the arts by obtaining a Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) from Biola University. This educational grounding has equipped him with the foundational skills and creative insights necessary to thrive in various highly competitive environments. Throughout his career, Stephen has demonstrated a capacity for blending aesthetic appeal with functionality, leading to significant achievements both in brand campaigns and within the roles he has occupied.
Over the years, Stephen has held pivotal positions that include serving as the Creative Director at Confidential, where he applies his visionary talents to projects that prioritize brand storytelling and effective audience engagement. Prior to this, he made impactful impressions at Swell, Inc. as the Creative Director for Google. In this role, he led teams to create compelling narratives that not only showcased Google's innovative products but also energized the consumer's connection to the brand.
Previously, Stephen also worked at Conscious Minds as the Creative Director for Nike. His tenure there involved crafting iconic campaigns that not only captured consumer attention but also engaged with them on deeper emotional levels. This experience solidified his reputation as a leader in creative thought and strategy, pushing boundaries in a brand synonymous with excellence.
Prior to these prominent positions, Stephen has ascended through various creative roles, including Associate Creative Director at theAudience, Senior Art Director at Trailer Park, and Senior Art Director at CBS Interactive. Each position allowed him to hone his skills in crafting distinct visual narratives and engaging audiences in ways that are both innovative and effective.
Notable Collaborations and Brands
Throughout his career, Stephen has collaborated with an array of leading brands and has played crucial roles within teams of distinguished advertising agencies. This experience gave him the opportunity to partner with brands such as Beats by Dre, Royal Caribbean, Samsung, Taylor Made, and Ford, among others. His work spans multiple sectors, including technology, retail, entertainment, and finance.
Notably, his portfolio also includes collaborations with global giants such as the NBA, NFL, and various non-profits, showcasing his versatility and adaptability in meeting diverse project demands. Each interaction with these esteemed brands has contributed to Stephen's understanding of consumer behavior and brand dynamics, enhancing his capabilities as a creative leader.
Film Contributions
In addition to his profound impact within the advertising and branding sectors, Stephen has contributed his artistic expertise to the film industry. His work has touched notable entities like Fox Theatrical, Paramount, Universal, and CBS, where he was involved in various capacities that required not only a keen eye for detail but also a creative vision that aligns with the high standards of filmmaking. This diverse experience solidifies his role as a multi-faceted creative professional, capable of transitioning between different creative landscapes with ease.
In every aspect of his career, Stephen Hernandez exemplifies dedication, innovation, and an unyielding commitment to pushing creative boundaries. His seasoned professional journey reflects a unique blend of artistic insight, leadership acumen, and a significant commitment to social impact, making him a prominent figure in the world of creative direction and art innovation.
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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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- 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.
Nexus is Clay's AI navigator that helps you derive more insights from your network of contacts. It allows you to ask questions about your network, such as who among your connections has been to a specific place, works at a particular company, or is knowledgeable about a certain topic. Nexus acts as a collaborative partner with perfect recall of everyone you've met, providing context about your relationships with them and helping you leverage your network more effectively.
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.