Welcome to the Afterword Journal, the brainchild of Effie and Zack. This will be unlike any other blog you’ve read. It’s casual. It’s unfiltered. It’s detailed.
Our hope is that this will be a place where you can ask those technical questions you’ve wondered about but aren’t sure where to begin. You’ve had that spark—an idea that made you pause and wonder, “How on earth do I do this?” There’s nothing we enjoy more than solving problems in our profession, and our inboxes and minds are always open.
It would be helpful to introduce ourselves and share how we got into this profession. Effie’s journey into this world began in August 2018 when I pulled out my cell phone at the hospital and Googled “how to plan a funeral” to begin the planning process for my dad, Michael. I was surprised by how little information was available to me and that the process required in-person visits—especially since, up until that point, I had made all of my purchasing decisions online. At that time, I was working at Shopify, a commerce platform powering millions of online stores, so my entire world was online. I met Zack in 2019, and we began working together.
Zack’s interest in the profession stemmed from the sudden death of his mentor at Google; he found it difficult to locate the grief resources he needed. Before Afterword, Zack spent over 10 years in Silicon Valley working for companies like Google and Workday. We combined our technical backgrounds and moved into a funeral home to learn as much as we could about how you serve your communities. We sat in on arrangements, listened to first calls, attended removals, and observed embalmings (with permission from families). We learned just how much work goes into planning a service and how important it is for a family to host one.
A fun fact about Afterword is that before we built our platform, we helped over 450 families host virtual memorials and livestreams during the first two years of the pandemic. In doing so, we learned—directly from families—the true importance of having someone handle every aspect of the service experience.
At Afterword, we initially set out to build an online planning solution so that families could plan from wherever they are. While I still believe that online planning is the future of funeral planning, we quickly realized there were immediate ways to help funeral homes run their businesses more efficiently. I’ve gained a deep appreciation for the crucial role that Funeral Directors play in the communities they serve. We know that software can never replace you. We strongly believe in the important work you all do and that software can be built to help you manage the administrative aspects. Regardless of age or generation, there will always be families who want to plan in person, while others, like me, are more comfortable making these difficult decisions online.
As we developed our case management platform, we began integrating AI into Afterword to eliminate the extra work you’re doing. For example, some of the Funeral Directors we work with would meet with a family, jot everything down on paper, and then manually enter it into their software later. We saw an opportunity to streamline this process: instead of doing double work, they could simply take a photo of their worksheet, and we would create the case and generate the necessary documents. As we dug deeper into your workflow, we became even more excited about AI’s potential in communication, compliance, and ID verification. I have to say, this was also a surprise to me—I hadn’t always seen the huge value AI could bring to the funeral profession. I was worried that it might remove the important human touch, but that concern came from thinking of chatbots, AI-generated videos, and similar applications. AI is improving rapidly, and I’m incredibly excited about the ways it can help you with the administrative tasks so you can spend more time directly with families!
Here’s what you can expect from us: raw, unfiltered honesty (yes, even if it means voicing an unpopular opinion), deep dives into the technical nitty-gritty, and a spirit of collaboration—we’re here to listen and answer your burning questions. You’ve taught us so much about this profession; now it’s our turn to help you navigate the technical world.
Our inboxes are always open.
