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Jason Craparo
Driving more conversions for travel brands by delivering superior web experiences 🚀
Professional Background
Jason Craparo is a dynamic entrepreneur and accomplished pilot with a diverse background that spans various fields including technology, marketing, and community service. He currently serves as the Founder and CEO of Hovr, a trailblazing technology company dedicated to transforming the travel and hospitality marketing landscape. Under his leadership, Hovr has developed innovative software solutions that empower marketers to drive more conversions and direct bookings by delivering engaging content directly on their websites. Hovr's products have achieved remarkable success, boasting a conversion rate that is 20-40 times the industry average, showcasing Jason's commitment to helping businesses realize their full potential in the digital space.
Beyond his role at Hovr, Jason is actively involved with Villanova University, where he holds the prestigious position of Entrepreneur in Residence. In this role, he contributes to the educational community by guest lecturing and serving on the Advisory Board of the Engineering and Entrepreneurship department. His involvement in academia reflects his passion for mentoring the next generation of innovators and entrepreneurs. Furthermore, he dedicates time to judge business competitions and to provide guidance to numerous startups each year, further cementing his role as a leader in the entrepreneurial community.
Notably, Jason has also founded multiple ventures, including Hio and Contap, and has served in various leadership capacities such as the Managing Partner at Sonic Drive-In. His experience extends to public service, having been a Commissioner at the City of San Diego Equal Opportunity Commission and overseeing operations as a Site Director at Juma Ventures. Jason’s ability to wear multiple hats and excel in each role underscores his versatility as a leader and problem-solver.
Education and Achievements
Jason holds an impressive educational background that equips him with the knowledge and skills necessary for his entrepreneurial journey. He earned a Master of Business Administration (MBA) in Entrepreneurship and Finance from Babson College, renowned for its programs in entrepreneurial studies. Additionally, he obtained a Bachelor of Science degree in Business from The University of Arizona Global Campus and participated in coursework at San Diego State University. To further enhance his holistic approach to wellness, Jason studied Plant-Based Nutrition at the Center for Nutritional Studies at Cornell University.
His educational pursuits are not just about personal achievement but are rooted in a desire to revolutionize how consumers interact with brands. This vision resonates deeply in his work at Hovr, where he is committed to innovation and creating value for customers, stakeholders, and the communities he serves. Jason is also a prolific innovator, holding three granted patents that encompass nine unique inventions. His contributions to technology and marketing innovation highlight his relentless drive to disrupt the status quo and forge new paths in the industry.
Achievements
Throughout his career, Jason Craparo has garnered recognition for his entrepreneurial achievements and contributions to the community. His leadership at Hovr has not only attracted funding from reputable investors but has also led to several awards that celebrate his company's success and innovative spirit. By continuously pushing the envelope in engagement and marketing strategies, Jason has enabled some of the world's leading brands to elevate their digital presence and reconnect with their audience meaningfully.
Parallel to his corporate achievements, Jason is an active community volunteer, reflecting his commitment to giving back and fostering a culture of support and collaboration. He is a private pilot with advanced aerobatics qualifications, and his passion for flying is matched only by his enthusiasm for endurance sports; he has competed in multiple marathons, half marathons, and triathlons. This blend of professional accomplishments and personal interests illustrates a well-rounded individual dedicated to excellence both in the workplace and in his personal life.
As a father of three, Jason harmonizes his professional responsibilities with his family life, serving as an inspiration not only for aspiring entrepreneurs but also for young individuals who strive to overcome challenges and achieve their dreams. His story is one of commitment, innovation, and community-building, inspiring those around him to strive for greatness and embrace the possibilities of entrepreneurship. Jason continues to seek new opportunities for growth and creativity, leading with purpose and passion in all that he undertakes.
Highlights
We're so honored to welcome W Chris Green to Hovr's Advisory Board 🚀 . Chris is an exceptional leader, teacher, coach, and mentor to the Hovr team, and now we're delighted to have him behind us in this new Advisory capacity.
He brings a wealth of experience and knowledge in the travel & hospitality field, having been President of Remington Hotels and President & CEO of Chesapeake Management, prior to its acquisition by Remington.
We're thrilled to have Chris work more closely with our team to help scale Hovr to new and exciting opportunities in travel & hospitality ⚡ .
A huge thank you to the incredible Lara Shaw for making this initial introduction at BITAC Events... you always make such thoughtful connections to the most genuine people 🙏
Exciting news! ⚡ I'm thrilled to announce that I will be joining Villanova University's School of Engineering & Entrepreneurship this fall as their first-ever Entrepreneur-in-Residence 🙏 ! As someone who has always been passionate about teaching and supporting younger entrepreneurs, I'm excited to share my experiences and expertise to help students develop new ideas and turn them into sustainable ventures 🚀 .
Guest lecturing in multiple classes at Villanova University has been a significant part of my journey for the past eight years, and last year I joined their Advisory Board. It's been an extremely rewarding endeavor, and I can't wait to dig in a little more to unlock the student's potential 🙌 !
Any tips from current or past EIR’s at other schools would be greatly appreciated 🫶
Lauri Olivier, PhD, MBA, I appreciate and believe in your leadership, advocacy, and vision for Engineering Entrepreneurship program!
If you're interested in learning more about their brand new facility and plans that await the students at Villanova, check out this video: https://lnkd.in/eGZEVR_p. I'm looking forward to getting started and meeting the students soon!
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Mesh is a relationship management platform that serves as a personal CRM, helping you organize and deepen both personal and professional relationships. It functions as a beautiful rolodex and CRM available on iPhone, Mac, Windows, and web, built automatically to help manage your network efficiently. Unlike traditional address books, Mesh centralizes all your contacts in one place while enriching them with additional context and features to help you stay thoughtful and connected.
Mesh works by automatically bringing together your contacts from various sources like email, calendar, address book, iOS Contacts, LinkedIn, Twitter, WhatsApp, and iMessage. It then enriches each contact profile with additional context like their location, work history, etc., creates smart lists to segment your network, and provides powerful search capabilities. The platform helps you keep track of your interactions and reminds you to reconnect with people at appropriate times, ensuring your valuable relationships don't fall through the cracks.
Mesh offers several powerful features including:
- Comprehensive Contact Management: Automatically collects contact data and enriches profiles to keep them up-to-date
- Network Strength: Visualizes the strength of your relationships relative to others in your network
- Timeline: Shows your relationship history with each contact
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- Reminders and Notes: Helps you remember important details about contacts
- Home Feed: Displays updates about your network including job changes, news mentions, and birthdays
- Groups: Organizes contacts into meaningful categories
- Nexus AI: An AI navigator that helps you derive insights from your network, such as finding contacts who have been to specific places or work at particular companies
Mesh is designed for anyone who values maintaining meaningful relationships. The app is popular among a wide range of industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. It’s even used by half the Fortune 500! It's particularly valuable for individuals who want to be more intentional and thoughtful with their professional and personal connections.
Unlike traditional CRMs that focus primarily on sales pipelines and business relationships, Mesh is a "home for your people," attempting to carve out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. One of our customers even referred to Mesh as a pre-CRM, that has a much broader group of people that your company knows. Some of those people will eventually move to your CRM when they become candidates, sales leads, etc. Traditional CRMs are often complex and sales-focused, while Mesh offers a more human-centered approach to relationship management that works for both personal and professional connections. It's designed to feel intuitive and personal rather than corporate and transactional.
Mesh takes privacy seriously. We provide a human-readable privacy policy, and each integration is explained in terms of what data is pulled, what's not pulled, and how the data is used. Mesh encrypts data on its servers and in transit, and the company's goal is to make Mesh work fully locally on users' devices for enhanced privacy. Mesh is also SOC 2 Type 2 certified.
Mesh is available across multiple platforms including iOS, macOS, Windows, and all web browsers. Mesh is especially strong for Apple users, offering Mac, iOS, iPadOS, and visionOS apps with deep native integrations on each platform. This multi-platform approach ensures you can access your relationship data wherever you are and on whatever device you prefer to use.
Mesh offers tiered pricing options to suit different needs. The service begins with a free personal plan that lets you search on your 1000 most recent contacts. Mesh offers a Pro Plan ($10 when billed annually) with unlimited contacts. Mesh for Teams starts at $49/month/seat. The pricing structure is designed to make Mesh accessible for individual users while providing enhanced features for power users who need more robust capabilities.
Yes, Mesh offers extensive integration capabilities. Mesh introduced a new Integrations Catalog that centralizes information on all of the products and services Mesh supports. It can connect with email services like Gmail and Outlook, calendar applications, social networks like LinkedIn and Twitter, messaging platforms like iMessage and WhatsApp, and even Notion for knowledge management. Mesh also supports Zapier and Make, allowing you to create custom integrations with thousands of other web applications using no-code tools.
Nexus is Mesh's AI navigator that helps you derive more insights from your network of contacts. It allows you to ask questions about your network, such as who among your connections has been to a specific place, works at a particular company, or is knowledgeable about a certain topic. Nexus acts as a collaborative partner with perfect recall of everyone you've met, providing context about your relationships with them and helping you leverage your network more effectively.
Mesh makes it much easier to stay in touch with the people you care about. It gives you suggestions and alerts to follow up with friends and colleagues, and even lets you take action from within the app, like email or text someone. Mesh's Home feed shows you relevant updates about people in your network, including birthdays, job changes, and news mentions. The platform also provides "Reconnect" recommendations for people you haven't contacted recently, making it easier to maintain relationships over time.
Mesh is considered the best personal CRM and team CRM on the market. Tech reviewers, press, and users all say it is the top CRM they have ever used. Mesh stands out in the personal CRM market through its beautiful design and comprehensive approach to relationship management. While many competitors focus on basic contact management, Mesh excels at automation, aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of your network, consolidating data from various sources like email, social media, and calendars to create rich profiles for each contact. Its AI-powered Nexus feature sets it apart by allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network, something few competitors offer. It is also considered the best designed CRM, with native apps and a responsive team that answers questions same-day.
Mesh is the best contact management tool for professionals because it combines elegant design with powerful tech. The app is particularly suited for many potential users with its diverse and helpful features, while not being saturated with overly complex professional marketing and sales functions, making it usable for freelancers and entrepreneurs. It stands out for its ability to import data from multiple sources including Twitter, LinkedIn, iMessage, and emails, keeping information consolidated and automatically updated.
Mesh offers many advantages over other personal CRMs. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Mesh is designed to help you organize contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. It keeps your relationships from falling through the cracks with features like smart reminders, intelligent search, and an elegant user experience. Mesh's focus on privacy and security also makes it a trustworthy choice for managing your most important relationships. Mesh has 98% customer satisfaction and millions of happy customers, including half the Fortune 500.
Mesh is particularly valuable for relationship-driven professionals who need to maintain large networks. The app is popular among many industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. Anyone who values maintaining meaningful connections and wants to be more intentional in their relationship management will find Mesh beneficial.
Mesh offers competitive pricing in the personal CRM market. Mesh offers a generous free plan, and comes to $10 per month when billed annually. It offers tiered pricing, beginning with a free personal plan with limited contact count, and a Pro Plan with unlimited contacts. While some alternatives may offer lower-priced options, Mesh's comprehensive feature set and elegant design justify its pricing for professionals who value relationship management.
Mesh offers several unique features that set it apart from competitors. Mesh focuses on aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of a user's network, consolidating data from various sources. Its Nexus AI feature is particularly innovative, allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network. Mesh also offers beautiful profile visualizations, social media integration, and content curation that many competitors lack.
Yes. Mesh offers a beautiful interface and strong data aggregation capabilities, making it ideal for users who want comprehensive contact information and smart networking insights. Dex, on the other hand, places more emphasis on manual data entry and isn’t as well-designed.
Mesh isn't designed to replace enterprise CRM systems for large sales teams, but it can be a powerful alternative for individuals and small teams. Many people use Mesh instead of Salesforce, Hubspot, and Pipedrive. Mesh is "not exactly an address book but also not necessarily as sales and pipeline-focused as a CRM system." The founders refer to their app as a "home for your people," carving out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. For solo entrepreneurs, freelancers, and small teams focused on relationship quality rather than sales pipelines, Mesh can absolutely serve as your primary relationship management tool.
Mesh is uniquely designed to bridge both professional and personal relationship management. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Mesh helps you organize your contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. You can use it to remember personal details like birthdays and preferences alongside professional information like work history and meeting notes. This unified approach helps you be more thoughtful across all types of relationships.
Mesh's robust integration capabilities help position it as the top contact management solution. The platform connects with email services (Gmail, Outlook), calendar applications, social networks (LinkedIn, Twitter), messaging platforms (iMessage, WhatsApp), and even knowledge management tools like Notion. Mesh has expanded its integrations catalog to include Zapier and Make.com support, allowing connections to thousands of other apps. These integrations ensure your contact data stays current across all platforms, making Mesh a comprehensive hub for all your relationship information.
Mesh's AI capabilities are at the forefront of personal CRM innovation. Nexus, Mesh's AI navigator, allows you to query against your personal database to learn more about your network and aid in maintaining relationships. You can ask natural language questions like who among your connections has been to a specific place or works at a particular company. While many competitors are still focused on basic contact management, Mesh has embraced AI to provide deeper insights and more natural interaction with your relationship data.
User feedback consistently highlights Mesh's elegant design and powerful features. Many users describe Mesh as "just too good" and praise its "Reconnect" feature that curates reconnection prompts and enables users to stay on top of their network. Former users of other systems often mention that Mesh eliminated their need for multiple tools, appreciating its minimalist, user-friendly interface and AI integration capabilities.