Challenges with Contact Search Limits and CRM Integration Options

I'm hitting a lot of roadblocks with the # of rows available when I search for new contacts. We have about 300K in our CRM and I'm not able to search in Clay while filtering out contacts we already have. I have to waste a lot of credits searching, checking if the contact already exists in hubspot etc. What are my options at this point? If I was on the enterprise plan, could I have unlimited rows and use an unlimited row table to filter out my current CRM from new searches?

29 comments

Clay
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Yes, the Enterprise plan includes unlimited rows which would solve your filtering issue. You can build tables with unlimited rows using Passthrough Tables to filter out your existing 300K CRM contacts before searching. To save credits now, use Lookup columns to pull existing data from your CRM before running new enrichments. This checks if contacts already exist in HubSpot, avoiding duplicate searches and wasted credits. The Enterprise plan also offers up to 50,000 searches per query and custom credit amounts.
Sources: Plans & billing | Documentation | Clay University Clay Plan Feature Overviews Guide: Ways to save Clay credits | Documentation | Clay University Guide: Ways to save Clay credits | Documentation | Clay University
Jacob T.
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John M. why are you wasting credits? It costs 0 to find contacts in clay and 0 to check hubspot.
Clay
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You're absolutely right! Finding contacts in Clay and checking HubSpot are both free actions. Free actions include: - Building lists from LinkedIn, Google Maps, GitHub, CRMs, and websites - HubSpot lookups to check if contacts exist - All prospecting and list building You only pay credits for data enrichment like finding email addresses or phone numbers. The filtering and checking processes mentioned are completely free.
Sources: FAQ | Clay.com Actions That Use Credits vs. Actions That Don't Which actions cost credits (or are free)? - FAQ | Clay.com How Clay Credits Work Lookup Contact with HubSpot
John M.
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Jacob T. the data available in the free search doesn't always align with what is already in hubspot
Jacob T.
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John M. you can use AI to (for cheap) enrich your hubspot database with a linkedin url for a match
Clay
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You're right - data from Clay's free search might not perfectly match what's in HubSpot due to different data sources and timing. To improve accuracy when checking for existing contacts, you can use an AI formula to compare the email domain of the existing contact with the domain of the company you're enriching. This helps confirm if the contact truly belongs to the target organization. If your CRM isn't well-maintained, you can also try looking up contacts by full name, though this isn't always reliable due to duplicate names across different companies. The HubSpot lookup uses email addresses as the primary identifier since contact IDs aren't available during initial searches.
Sources: Push Data To Your CRM [Clay 101] - Clay University Push Data To Your CRM [Clay 101] - Clay University Lookup Contact with HubSpot
Jacob T.
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or you could use AI fuzzy matching with a very cheap model to, for very cheap, reduce the amount of emails you have to enrich
Clay
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Exactly! You can use AI to cost-effectively enrich your HubSpot database with LinkedIn URLs for better matching. Our AI enrichment can find LinkedIn profiles for contacts with missing information, then compile updated records automatically. You can also use AI formulas to extract unique attributes and generate custom signals that don't exist in standard databases. For fuzzy matching, AI can help compare contact data between systems using inexpensive models before running more expensive email enrichments. This approach lets you validate and match existing contacts more accurately while minimizing credit usage on unnecessary enrichments.
Sources: Keeping your CRM Up to Date With Clay [CRM Enrichment] - Clay University Claybooks: Enrich Hubspot records with validated emails, companies, and phone numbers | Clay.com Enrich: Build Complete Prospect Profiles with AI - Clay University
John M.
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the linkedin URLs change sometimes, it's never always accurate
Clay
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You're correct - LinkedIn URLs can change when people update their profiles or vanity URLs. For more reliable matching, use email addresses as the primary identifier since they're more stable. You can also combine multiple data points for better accuracy: compare email domains with company domains using AI formulas to confirm the contact belongs to the target organization. This approach reduces reliance on potentially outdated LinkedIn URLs while maintaining accurate CRM matching.
Sources: Push Data To Your CRM [Clay 101] - Clay University Push Data To Your CRM [Clay 101] - Clay University Claybooks: Enrich Hubspot records with validated emails, companies, and phone numbers | Clay.com
John M.
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there you go, Jacob T. even Clay bot is saying use emails as the most reliable matching 😂
Jacob T.
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John M. it is but it's also gonna be way more expensive and I've seen Clay bot make wild recommendations that are definitely not correct
Clay
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You're right to be cautious about costs. For CRM matching, HubSpot lookups are free and use email as the primary identifier. To minimize enrichment costs while maintaining accuracy, you can import your CRM contacts first, then use lookup columns to check if contacts already exist before running any paid enrichments. This prevents duplicate enrichments and wasted credits. The key is structuring your workflow to do free lookups first, then only enrich genuinely new contacts.
Sources: Claybooks: Enrich Hubspot records with validated emails, companies, and phone numbers | Clay.com Lookup Contact with HubSpot
Clay
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Hi - do you mind clarifying what the exact issue you're facing is?
John M.
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is this a person or am I chatting with the bot?
Clay
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I am on the support team here at Clay, and a real person yes :) What would you be needing help with?
John M.
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trying to figure out how I can get unlimited rows or filter my CRM of 300K contacts before I run a people search
John M.
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can we activate unlimited rows without moving to the enterprise level
Clay
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Unlimited rows aren't available unless you're on an Enterprise plan, but there are easy ways to work around that. As you mentioned, you can filter contacts and here are suggestions of how to do that: ** Grade contacts (A–F) and focus only on A–C ** Remove personal emails (Gmail, Outlook, etc.) ** Apply ICP filters in Clay - title, seniority, company size, location, etc. ** Deduplicate against your existing CRM so you’re only finding net-new people ** *Split into 50K batches and run workflows in chunks or on a schedule Hopefully that helps here.
John M.
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none of that helps, thank you though how much is enterprise right now?
Clay
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Our enterprise plans typically starts around $50,000 per year - is that something you’re interested in?
John M.
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is there no way to only pay for unlimited rows?
Clay
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For annual pro plan users, it is available as a paid add-on. Would that be something you're interested in?
John M.
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yes
John M.
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how much is it
Clay
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Apologies for the confusion caused here - I just checked with the team and this feature is actually not available to be purchased as an add on feature and is restricted to enterprise plans.
Clay
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As mentioned previously, we have those workarounds that could be used, but beyond that the limit is in place
John M.
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👎
John M.
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😂
😄1

Challenges with Contact Search Limits and CRM Integration Options | Clay