Sift

Problems

As a fast-growing Series A startup building the first observability stack for hardware sensor data, Sift was caught in a familiar trap. Just a month before their new Head of GTM Operations, Ivan Gaal, joined, they had deployed Salesforce through an off-the-shelf implementation. Team turnover had left the system largely unattended, and the data lacked structure and ownership, leaving their 20-person team without the visibility they needed to make decisions. The result was a system that had become virtual shelfware.

"We had just deployed Salesforce about a month before I started with a standard, out-of-the-box setup, but the data management processes weren't tailored to our specific needs yet," explains Ivan. "The organization was looking for something more aligned with how we actually work."

The challenges extended beyond customization needs. As the sole administrator working to configure a Salesforce instance for their unique requirements, Ivan was navigating the complex task of managing data, establishing processes, and supporting a rapidly scaling team that had grown from 20 to 42 people in less than a year.

"There was a growing sense that Salesforce might not be the right fit for us," Ivan notes. The team found themselves working around an overly complex UI, slow performance, reporting limitations, and workflow constraints that made it difficult to build the processes and automation they needed. "Overall, it felt too complex and rigid for our needs as a forward-thinking, innovative Series A startup," he explains.

For a company empowering engineers to build the machines of tomorrow through unified observability that seamlessly ingests, stores, and analyzes vast amounts of sensor data, having clean, accessible data in their own CRM was critical. Yet their current system was creating more friction than value.

Solutions

Sift implemented Clarify as their CRM, with Ivan evaluating it against other modern alternatives like Attio. The decision came down to Clarify's development velocity, flexibility, and ease of use - including features like inline editing and streamlined admin functions - along with the promise of being part of an evolving platform rather than a rigid, out-of-the-box solution.

"The strengths were the speed of development - it seemed like you guys were releasing a ton of new features. But what really stood out was that working with the Clarify team felt like more of a partnership versus a transaction, and that collaborative approach would probably get us a little bit further," Ivan explains.

Clarify’s modern interface immediately addressed their core frustrations. The inline editing capabilities and intuitive UI made both populating their dataset from ground zero and auditing existing data significantly easier, allowing Ivan to quickly create views and manually clean data with complete confidence in accuracy.

Sift leveraged Clarify's flexibility to implement their structured sales process, using the MEDDIC deal qualification framework with custom fields for metrics, economic buyers, decision makers, and pain points. They built automated notification workflows that alert the team in their shared Slack channel when critical deal fields like amount or next steps dates need attention.

The team also adopted Clarify's autonomous features, including meeting prep summaries, call recording and transcription, and automated deal summaries - particularly valuable when meeting new contacts at their target accounts.

Karthik Gollapudi, Co-founder & CEO at Sift, said “We moved off Salesforce to Clarify, and within two weeks our data actually made sense—for the first time, everything was accurate. Now our team barely touches admin work, and we finally have the visibility we need to grow. It’s the first CRM that feels like it was built for how early-stage teams actually work.”

Karthik and Austin - Co-Founders of Sift

Outcomes

The transformation has been remarkable, with Sift achieving measurable improvements in data quality and operational efficiency that directly impact their go-to-market execution.

100% data accuracy achieved: Within just two weeks of implementing their automated notification system, Sift reached 100% data completeness in their CRM. "We now have literally 100% - the alerts don't even fire anymore because our deal data set is 100% clean," Ivan reports.

Dramatic time savings on administration: The switch eliminated the administrative headaches that had plagued their Salesforce experience. "It's just a lot more user-friendly and more lightweight than Salesforce, which, especially at our size, we don't need to be spending a ton of time doing administrative configuration when it can be done in about one-tenth of the time with something like Clarify."

Seamless integration with sales process: Clarify has become integral to Sift's daily operations, powering their stand-ups and forecasting calls with custom views tailored to their tier-based account strategy focusing on their top 100 strategic accounts.

The sales team has embraced features like color-coded multi-select values for forecasting views, creating intuitive red-yellow-green scoring systems, and the AI-powered meeting preparation that provides relevant background for calls with new prospects.

Foundation for strategic growth: Most importantly, Sift now has the data foundation they need to make informed decisions as they scale. "The data in your CRM as your source of truth is the most critical, important piece of why we invest all these resources and effort to manage all these different systems," Ivan emphasizes. "So that we can provide the business the insight that we need, and act on it, and make decisions that are rooted in reality."