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Soraya Hernandez
Global Market Intelligence - Business Growth & Strategy - Executive Leadership - Startup Adviser, Mentor, Founder
Professional Background
Soraya Hernandez is a dynamic and influential advocate in the realm of disruptive innovation. With an impressive career as an International Business Strategist, she possesses a unique blend of commercial, management, and technical skills that enable her to excel in various sectors, including both Fortune 500 and startup environments. Her experience spans multinational and multicultural contexts, providing her with deep insights in operational efficiency, business development, and strategic consulting. Soraya has a rich history of working with diverse industries, including consumer goods, pharmaceuticals, retail, hospitality, and financial services.
Throughout her career, Soraya has been dedicated to stretching the boundaries of innovation by mobilizing teams, building communities, and delivering exceptional value. Her collaborative spirit and creative problem-solving skills have played a crucial role in driving change within organizations. She is passionate about establishing long-term relationships with stakeholders, both external and internal, ensuring that teams are aligned and empowered to achieve organizational visions.
As a passionate entrepreneur and founder, Soraya extends her expertise as a mentor and adviser to intrepreneurs and entrepreneurs. Her ability to connect, strategize, and build successful enterprises is noteworthy, and she is especially focused on helping new ventures align their resources and bring their ideas to fruition, creating not just commercial success but also a positive societal impact.
Education and Achievements
Soraya Hernandez has a robust educational background that has equipped her with the necessary skills to thrive in her professional endeavors. She studied a Bachelor of Science in a dual program of Civil Engineering and Business at the prestigious University of Notre Dame. In pursuit of further specialization, Soraya obtained her MBA in International Business and Operations Management with honors from Quinlan School of Business at Loyola University Chicago, all while fulfilling her professional responsibilities.
Soraya's commitment to continuous learning and sharing her knowledge is evident in her various roles within educational and innovation-driven organizations. She has contributed significantly by mentoring students, judging competitions, and advising aspiring entrepreneurs to help them navigate the complexities of starting and growing their businesses.
Notable Roles and Organizations
Soraya has held several high-profile positions throughout her illustrious career. She currently serves as the Senior Vice President of Consulting for the Consumer Division at GlobalData Plc, leading initiatives that transform consumer insights into actionable strategies. In her role, she not only drives business performance but also advocates for innovation that aligns with her vision of being a force for good.
Beyond her extensive work with GlobalData, Soraya's dedication to education and mentorship is reflected in her previous roles as a judge and mentor for institutions such as the Chicago Student Invention Convention at Chicago Innovation and the McCloskey New Venture Competition at the University of Notre Dame. Additionally, her involvement with the ShoppingGives Foundation as a Founding Board Member showcases her commitment to social enterprise and community impact.
Soraya has also served as a strategic business adviser at AdvisoryCloud and as a startup mentor at 1871, where she utilized her expertise to cultivate new ideas and encourage entrepreneurial thinking within a collaborative environment. Her assessment and strategic guidance have helped numerous startups navigate the challenges they face in their formative years, leading to robust business models and successful market entries.
In terms of client consulting, Soraya previously held positions at Euromonitor International as a Senior Client Consultant and Key Accounts Strategy Manager, where she gained profound insights in market research and strategy development. Her early career experience at Nielsen as a Hispanic Market Territory Manager provided her with a strong foundation in market intelligence, honing her skills in consumer insights analysis.
Moreover, as the co-founder of EW Financing Services and managing principal at her own International Strategic Business Consultancy, she adeptly combined her knowledge of finance and strategy to create business solutions that cater to clients' diverse needs.
Achievements
Soraya's career is marked by numerous achievements that reflect her unwavering commitment to innovation and community impact. Her efforts as a mentor and advocate have not only fostered talent in the entrepreneurial ecosystem but have also significantly contributed to the advancement of the organizations she has worked with.
Her ability to bridge the gap between various functions and cultivate an environment conducive to growth and innovation makes Soraya a respected leader in the field. She is especially noted for her contributions to success-driven frameworks that empower individuals and groups to achieve their potential.
In summary, Soraya Hernandez is a visionary leader whose multifaceted expertise in international business strategy, market intelligence, and consumer insights positions her as a key player in the world of disruptive innovation. Her wealth of experience, combined with a commitment to community-oriented entrepreneurship, continues to inspire and enable those around her to reach new heights, proving that business can indeed be a force for good.
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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
- Smart Search: Allows you to search using natural language like "People I know at the NYT" or "Designers I've met in London"
- 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.