Superclean Person Names

Clean messy person names for cold email personalization, CRM systems, and lead lists.

What does Superclean Person Names do?

Superclean Person Names uses AI to intelligently clean and normalize person names from lead lists, LinkedIn exports, and CRM exports.

• Fixes ALL CAPS — "JOHN SMITH" becomes "John Smith"
• Extracts first names — "Dr. John Michael Smith Jr., PhD" becomes "John" for cold emails
• Handles special cases — McDonald, O'Brien, van der Berg formatted correctly
• Strips unwanted content — Removes titles, credentials, emails, phone numbers
• Detects non-English — Flags names in CJK, Arabic, Cyrillic for review
• Instant API mode — Sub-second single-name cleaning via Standby HTTP server

What else can Superclean do?

If you're cleaning lead data, you might also need:

• Superclean Company Names — Clean messy company names for cold emails and CRM
• Superclean Job Titles — Normalize job titles for lead scoring and personalization
• Superclean Product Names — Clean product names from e-commerce data
• Superclean Places — Normalize location data from lead exports
• Superclean URLs — Clean and normalize URLs from lead data
• Superlead ICP Scorer — Score leads against your Ideal Customer Profile with AI

Why clean person names?

Your lead lists show the same person different ways:

• "JOHN SMITH"
• "Dr. John Smith, PhD"
• "john smith"
• "Smith, John"
• "MR. JAMES WILSON JR., MBA"

Clean data means better:

• Cold email personalization — "Hi John," instead of "Hi DR. JOHN MICHAEL SMITH JR.,"
• CRM consistency — Proper formatting across all records
• Segmentation — Accurate name-based filtering and deduplication

How to use Superclean Person Names

1. Paste your person names into the input field (one per line)
2. Select your output style (First, Casual, or Formal)
3. Click Start and download your cleaned results

Output styles

Style	Best for	Before	After
First	Cold email	Dr. John Michael Smith Jr.	John
Casual	CRM, general	DR. JOHN SMITH JR., PhD	John Smith Jr.
Formal	Contracts	dr john smith jr phd	Dr. John Smith Jr., Ph.D.

First (for cold email)

Just the first name. Perfect for cold email personalization.

• "Dr. John Michael Smith Jr., PhD" → "John"
• "Mary-Jane O'Brien" → "Mary-Jane"
• "van der Berg, Johannes" → "Johannes"

Casual (default)

Full name without titles or credentials. Keeps generational suffixes.

• "DR. JOHN SMITH JR., PhD" → "John Smith Jr."
• "mary-jane o'brien" → "Mary-Jane O'Brien"
• "JOHANNES VAN DER BERG" → "Johannes van der Berg"

Formal

Complete professional formatting with all components.

• "dr john smith jr phd" → "Dr. John Smith Jr., Ph.D."
• "MARY O'BRIEN MD" → "Mary O'Brien, M.D."
• "prof johannes van der berg" → "Prof. Johannes van der Berg"

Standby mode (instant API)

Standby mode keeps a warm container running so you get instant person name cleaning without cold-start delays. Instead of starting a full Actor run, you make a simple HTTP GET request and get results in milliseconds.

This is ideal for:

• Clay enrichment steps — single-name cleaning inline
• Make / n8n HTTP modules — real-time name normalization in workflows
• MCP agents — AI tools that need instant person name data

Standby URL

https://superlativetech--superclean-person-names.apify.actor?token=YOUR_API_TOKEN

Or use a Bearer token in the Authorization header instead of the token query parameter.

Clean a person name

$curl "https://superlativetech--superclean-person-names.apify.actor?token=YOUR_API_TOKEN&input=DR.+JOHN+SMITH+III"

First name only

$curl "https://superlativetech--superclean-person-names.apify.actor?token=YOUR_API_TOKEN&input=DR.+JOHN+SMITH+III&style=first"

With your own OpenRouter key (BYOK)

curl -H "X-OpenRouter-Key: sk-or-..." \
  "https://superlativetech--superclean-person-names.apify.actor?token=YOUR_API_TOKEN&input=mcdonald,+sarah+jane"

Query parameters

Parameter	Required	Description
input	Yes	Person name to clean
style	No	Output style: first, casual (default), or formal
model	No	LLM model (default: openrouter/auto)

Headers

Header	Required	Description
X-OpenRouter-Key	No	Your OpenRouter API key for BYOK

Response format

{
  "id": 1,
  "input": "DR. JOHN SMITH III",
  "output": "John Smith",
  "confidence": 0.95
}

Error responses

Code	Cause
400	Missing input parameter or invalid style
405	Non-GET request
500	Unexpected server error

Special capitalization

The Actor correctly handles:

• Scottish/Irish names — McDonald, MacArthur, O'Brien, O'Neill
• Dutch/German names — van der Berg, von Braun (particles lowercase)
• Italian names — da Vinci, di Caprio
• Hyphenated names — Mary-Jane, Jean-Pierre, Saint-Martin

How many names can you clean?

There's no limit. Process as many person names as you need — from a handful to hundreds of thousands. The Actor scales automatically.

For best performance, batch your requests. Processing 1,000 names at once is more efficient than 10 separate runs of 100 names each. For batches over 5,000 items, increase the timeout in Settings → Run configuration (e.g., 1800 seconds for 10K names).

How much will it cost you?

This Actor uses pay-per-result pricing:

Names	Cost
1,000	$1.00
10,000	$10.00
100,000	$100.00

Volume discounts apply automatically:

• Bronze (100+ items): $0.0009/name
• Silver (1,000+ items): $0.0008/name
• Gold (10,000+ items): $0.0007/name

AI model costs

This Actor uses the Apify OpenRouter integration for AI processing. Token costs are billed to your Apify account at OpenRouter rates.

The default model (openrouter/auto) automatically selects the most cost-effective option, typically adding less than $0.05 per 1,000 names.

Bring your own key

You can bring your own OpenRouter API key instead of using the built-in Apify integration. This routes AI requests directly through your OpenRouter account, so token costs are billed there instead of your Apify account.

To use your own key, paste it into the OpenRouter API key field in the Advanced section. The key is encrypted and never logged.

Input parameters

Parameter	Type	Description
items	array	List of person names to clean (one per line in the UI, or JSON array)
item	string	Single person name to clean — API shorthand for integration callers (Clay, Make, n8n). If both item and items are provided, item is prepended to the list
style	string	Output style: first, casual, or formal (default: casual)
model	string	AI model to use (default: openrouter/auto). Set a specific model for higher-quality confidence scores. Browse models
openRouterApiKey	string	Optional. Your own OpenRouter API key for direct API access (encrypted)

Input example

{
  "items": [
    "JOHN SMITH",
    "dr. mary jane o'brien, phd",
    "McDonald, Ronald",
    "johannes van der berg",
    "MR. JAMES WILSON JR."
  ],
  "style": "casual"
}

items also accepts objects, which is useful for API and MCP integrations:

{
  "items": [
    { "input": "JOHN SMITH" },
    { "input": "dr. mary jane o'brien, phd" }
  ],
  "style": "casual"
}

For API and integration callers who want to clean a single value without wrapping it in an array, use the item shorthand:

{
  "item": "dr. mary jane o'brien, phd",
  "style": "casual"
}

During the Actor run

The Actor processes names in batches for efficiency. You'll see progress updates as each batch completes.

If you provide invalid input (e.g., an empty list), the Actor will stop immediately with an error message explaining what went wrong.

Results are available in real-time — you can start downloading cleaned names before the full run completes.

Output format

Results are saved to the default dataset. Each cleaned name is a separate item.

You can export results as JSON, CSV, Excel, or other formats directly from Apify Console. Or access them programmatically via the API.

Output example

[
  {
    "id": 1,
    "input": "JOHN SMITH",
    "output": "John Smith",
    "confidence": 0.95
  },
  {
    "id": 2,
    "input": "dr. mary jane o'brien, phd",
    "output": "Mary Jane O'Brien",
    "confidence": 0.92
  },
  {
    "id": 3,
    "input": "McDonald, Ronald",
    "output": "Ronald McDonald",
    "confidence": 0.90
  }
]

Field	Description
id	Row number (1-based, matches Apify's displayed row numbers)
input	Original person name before cleaning
output	Cleaned person name
confidence	Confidence score from 0 to 1 (lower scores may need manual review)

Confidence scores

Each result includes a confidence score from 0 to 1:

• 0.9+ — High confidence, no review needed
• 0.7-0.9 — Moderate confidence, spot check recommended
• < 0.7 — Low confidence, manual review suggested

Non-English names automatically receive confidence 0 and should be reviewed.

Integrations

Superclean Person Names works with any tool that can call Apify Actors:

• Clay — Add as an enrichment step in your Clay tables
• Make — Use the Apify module to run the Actor
• Zapier — Trigger runs and retrieve results automatically
• n8n — Self-hosted workflow automation

You can also use webhooks to trigger actions when a run completes — for example, send a Slack notification or automatically import results into your CRM.

Using Superclean Person Names with the Apify API

The Apify API gives you programmatic access to run Actors, retrieve results, and manage datasets.

Node.js:

import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

const client = new ApifyClient({ token: 'YOUR_API_TOKEN' });

const run = await client.actor('superlativetech/superclean-person-names').call({
  items: ['JOHN SMITH', 'dr. mary jane o\'brien, phd'],
  style: 'casual'
});

const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
console.log(items);

Python:

from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient('YOUR_API_TOKEN')

run = client.actor('superlativetech/superclean-person-names').call(run_input={
    'items': ['JOHN SMITH', "dr. mary jane o'brien, phd"],
    'style': 'casual'
})

items = client.dataset(run['defaultDatasetId']).list_items().items
print(items)

Check out the Apify API reference for full details, or click the API tab above for more code examples.

Your feedback

We're always improving Superclean Actors. If you have feature requests, find a bug, or need help with a specific use case, please open an issue in the Actor's Issues tab.

When Apify asks to share your run data with us, we encourage you to opt in — it's the fastest way for us to spot edge cases and improve results. Sharing is completely optional (you can toggle it anytime under Account Settings → Privacy), and shared runs are automatically deleted by Apify based on your plan's data retention period. We only use shared data to debug issues and improve this Actor.

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