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Zara Chen
Director of Global Visual Merchandising and Store Design, Estee Lauder at The Estée Lauder Companies Inc.
Professional Background
Zara Chen is a highly accomplished Design Director with over 11 years of experience specializing in Visual Merchandising Design and Project Management. With an impressive background in both industrial design and branding, Zara has made significant contributions to leading global beauty brands. Her role as the Director of Global Visual Merchandising and Store Design at Estee Lauder Companies Inc. showcases her expertise in creating compelling visual narratives that resonate with consumers and effectively communicate brand culture. Throughout her career, she has honed her skills in cascading product concepts from inception to full realization, ensuring that every detail aligns with strategic business objectives.
Zara's diverse portfolio encompasses a range of skills including experiential design, industrial design, and branding design. Her capabilities extend from visual merchandising and in-store experiences to creating impactful popup stores and event designs. In her role, she emphasizes the importance of human-centric design, focusing on how consumers interact with products and environments. This approach leverages her extensive knowledge of merchandising displays and store fixture design, which allows her to create immersive shopping experiences that elevate brands in competitive markets.
Education and Achievements
Zara holds a Master’s Degree in Design Management (MPS), which is equivalent to an MBA, from the prestigious Pratt Institute. This advanced education equips her with a robust understanding of how business and design intersect, providing her with the insights necessary to foster innovation and sustainability within the design sector. Furthering her expertise, Zara completed a Continuing Education Course in Brand Identity at the School of Visual Arts, solidifying her capabilities in branding design.
She earned her Bachelor's Degree in Industrial and Product Design from Shih Chien University, where she developed a strong foundation in design principles, materials, and production techniques. Zara's educational background, combined with her hands-on work experience across various roles and industries, positions her as a leader in design thinking and project management.
Achievements
Throughout her career, Zara has held several key positions at Estee Lauder, where she began as a Senior Designer and quickly ascended to managerial roles, thanks to her innovative design solutions and leadership traits. Her ability to manage high-level projects while engaging multidisciplinary teams highlights her strategic thinking and organizational skills.
Before her tenure at Estee Lauder, Zara was an Industrial Designer at MAC Cosmetics, contributing to their distinctive product presentations. She also played a pivotal role as a Brand Designer at Hair Philosophy New York and as a Brand Designer & Strategist at PÂTISSERIE FRANCIS. Each position fortified her understanding of brand storytelling through design and further emphasized her ability to blend aesthetics with functionality.
In addition to her practical experience, Zara's freelance work as a Senior Product and Retail Designer reflects her dynamic ability to adapt to various design challenges. Her internships, including at Process Brand Evolution, provided her with early exposure to the intricacies of brand management and design strategy. Furthermore, her initial experience as a Sales Assistant at Yuan Ming Consulting Management Company allowed her to grasp the business aspect of the design industry, rounding out her comprehensive skill set.
Zara's projects have consistently showcased her commitment to quality and creativity, earning her recognition within the design community. With a keen eye for detail and a passion for elevating consumer experiences through design, Zara continues to thrive as a leader in visual merchandising, setting trends and paving the way for future innovations in the cosmetic and retail design sectors.
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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'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.