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Steven Souther
I find qualified leads, convert them to customers, and make them raving fans using automated Customer Journeys built specifically for your products and services.
Professional Background
Steven Souther is a seasoned business professional with an exemplary career spanning over 20 years, dedicated to empowering entrepreneurs and business leaders to achieve accelerated growth through tailored Automated Customer Journeys. He understands that the passion and commitment of businesspeople are essential for success. Having worked in both entrepreneurial and corporate environments, Steven has developed an acute awareness of the challenges new businesses face, particularly the staggering statistic that indicates 50% of new enterprises fail within the first five years, primarily due to insufficient sales revenue.
To combat this, Steven focuses on enhancing the experiences that leads, prospects, and customers have throughout their interactions with a business. His innovative framework, which he refers to as the "Customer Journey," ensures a seamless experience that not only streamlines business operations but also significantly boosts sales revenue. By achieving a well-crafted customer journey, businesses can thrive, turning customers into enthusiastic advocates for their brand.
As the Chief Executive Officer at Ahensya Digital Marketing, Steven leads a dynamic team, leveraging his extensive knowledge in software engineering, sales, and marketing to develop strategies that drive client success. His prior roles have seen him occupying positions that further honed his abilities to manage, strategize, and deliver results within varying business landscapes. Steven’s commitment to bringing order to chaos within businesses has made him a reputable figure in the realm of digital marketing and customer experience management.
Education and Achievements
Steven Souther's educational background is impressive, featuring rigorous training from prestigious institutions that have equipped him with the skills necessary for his career in technology and marketing. He earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Engineering from California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, where he laid the foundation for his technical knowledge.
Building upon this foundation, Steven furthered his education at the IBM Software Engineer School, graduating with a Software Engineering Certification, which has given him the capability to expertly blend technical principles with marketing strategies. His immersive education at the IBM Sales & Marketing School in Atlanta has enhanced his proficiency in sales methodologies and customer engagement techniques, essential in the digital marketing landscape.
Throughout his career, Steven has amassed a wealth of experience in leading organizational initiatives and driving impactful strategies. His tenure as a Program Manager at Xerox and as a Senior Project Manager at Computer Associates (CA) has reinforced his capabilities in project management and operational excellence. Furthermore, his role as a Senior Consultant at IBM enabled him to showcase his strategic insight, benefitting clients by providing tailored solutions to meet their diverse business challenges.
Achievements
- Chief Executive Officer at Ahensya Digital Marketing: Under Steven’s leadership, Ahensya has blossomed into a reputable digital marketing firm, helping businesses implement Automated Customer Journeys that lead to increased engagement and revenue. Steven’s foresight and innovative strategies have earned the company a loyal client base focused on growth and efficiency.
- Former President at Lagility: In this role, Steven drove the strategic vision of the company, identifying new opportunities for business development and identifying innovative approaches for engaging customers in meaningful ways.
- Recognized as an Expert in Customer Experience: Through his work, Steven has become a sought-after expert in crafting customer journeys that effectively convert leads into long-term customers. His approach emphasizes the power of automation, allowing businesses to focus on what they do best while ensuring their customers receive a top-notch experience.
- Consulting Success Stories: Steven's tenure as a Senior Consultant at IBM involved assisting various organizations in enhancing their marketing and sales strategies, leading to measurable improvements in customer satisfaction and retention. His consulting projects are marked by actionable insights that yield tangible results.
- Innovation in Project Management: As a Senior Project Manager at CA and Program Manager at Xerox, Steven developed a reputation for driving projects to success with efficiency and innovation, ensuring that targets are met on time, and budgets are adhered to.
Steven Souther stands out as a passionate advocate for business success through optimized customer engagement. With his extensive background in technology and marketing, along with his unwavering commitment to elevating business processes, he continues to make significant contributions to the field. Entrepreneurs and business leaders seeking to enhance their sales revenue and customer satisfaction will find an exceptional partner in Steven, whose deep insights and hands-on experience provide the perfect roadmap to achieve measurable business growth.
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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.
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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 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.
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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.