I'm new to Clay so I think I must be missing something maybe... Here's my issue: I have a table populated by a find people step. I am refining the filters of the "Find People" step based on what I'm finding. If I delete all the rows then none get re-imported. If I don't then I don't know which rows currently match my Find People criteria, and which ones no longer do... How would I do this better?
When refining Find People filters, click the source column in your People table to edit search parameters. This won't remove previously added contacts but will append new ones based on your updated filters. To manage existing rows that no longer match your criteria, you'll need to manually remove specific rows from your table after updating filters. The best practice is to iterate and refine your filters in the preview stage before importing - preview your results, adjust filters as needed, then import when satisfied.This prevents the need to manage mismatched rows later.
Ok, but preview is just that, a preview. So this doesn't really meet my needs... And more generally, I need to understand how you can downsize a table from what it is. Let's say I have a table that now has grown too large for the enrichments I want to run, so I'm now adding a new filter like the number of people per unique company - do I then need to just rebuild everything???
To downsize your table effectively, use filters to manage large datasets without rebuilding everything. For managing existing rows: ** Apply filters to display only data meeting specific criteria (like company size limits) ** Use the filter options: equal to, contains, greater than, less than, etc. ** This lets you see which rows match your new criteria without deleting anything For people-per-company limits: ** You can set limits on results per company in Find People searches ** Apply number filters to control company employee counts or other metrics *Best approach: 1. Apply your new filters first to see what matches 2. Manually remove rows that don't meet criteria 3. Use filtered views to work with subsets without losing original data This prevents rebuilding while giving you control over your dataset size.
Hi Raphael, I totally get your frustration! You're absolutely right that preview doesn't solve the core issue. Let me give you some practical solutions for managing and downsizing large tables without having to rebuild everything. For Your Immediate Need (Downsizing Large Tables): Option 1: Use Filters + Write to Table 1. Apply filters to your current large table (like "number of people per company" or whatever criteria you want) 2. Add a "Write to Other Table" column to send only the filtered rows to a new, smaller table 3. This creates a clean, reduced table with just the data that matches your current criteria Option 2: Duplicate + Filter Strategy 1. Duplicate your entire table (this copies the structure and formulas, but not the data) 2. Import your source data again with tighter filters from the start 3. This gives you a fresh table with the same enrichment setup but smaller dataset Option 3: Export/Import Method 1. Filter your current table to show only the rows you want to keep 2. Export as CSV 3. Create a new table and import the filtered CSV 4. Rebuild your enrichment columns (this is the downside, but sometimes worth it for a clean slate) For Managing "People Per Company" Filters: You can add a formula column that counts people per company, then filter based on that. Something like: ** Add a formula to count occurrences of each company domain ** Filter to show only companies with X or fewer people ** Use Write to Table to move those filtered results to a new table *Best Practice Going Forward: Start with a "Discovery Table" approach - use cheaper enrichments and broad filters first, then use Write to Table to send qualified records to more focused "Enrichment Tables" where you run expensive operations. This way you're not wasting credits on records you'll ultimately filter out. The key insight: Clay is designed for this kind of multi-table workflow rather than trying to manage everything in one massive table. Does this help solve your downsizing challenge?
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Don’t delete the rows. Instead, just click “Run again” on your Find People step it will refresh the existing rows to match your new filters. If you want a clean view: Add a “Match” column that checks if the row still meets your current logic. Or duplicate the table and re-run the search fresh with new filters. Deleting rows breaks the link between the step and its output better to let Clay handle updates by re-running.
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