Small Business Scheduling Meets Social Impact: Inside MentorCity’s mission

I stay because I like your team. I like the newsletter. I like the new features that are coming out…I recommend YouCanBookMe over anyone else.”  

- Shawn Mintz

MentorCity is founded on a simple yet powerful belief: meaningful conversations can transform lives. It’s an intuitive online platform that empowers organizations to launch, manage, and scale effective mentoring programs. From intelligent mentor-mentee matching to goal-setting tools, progress tracking, discussion forums, and resource libraries, MentorCity supports every step of the mentoring journey.

As a trusted leader in mentoring software, MentorCity helps organizations worldwide—from governments and corporations to schools and nonprofits—cultivate human connection and growth through structured, impactful mentorship.

For Shawn, MentorCity is more than just a business—it’s personal.

Mentoring is based on the experience that someone went through,” he says. “You’ve been there, you’ve done that. Now you can guide others.”

From supporting newcomers and students to helping people facing housing instability or disability-related challenges, Shawn’s vision is clear: mentorship isn’t just support, it’s a strategy for social change.

Since 2016, YouCanBookMe’s small business scheduling software has been a behind-the-scenes partner in Shawn’s mission—streamlining bookings and automating thousands of mentorship conversations so the MentorCity team can focus on what matters most: building meaningful connections.

Why YouCanBookMe: Shawn’s story

The challenge

MentorCity exists to help people form meaningful relationships through mentorship, and that mission has only grown more urgent as the organization expands its partnerships with government agencies, school boards, and nonprofits worldwide.

Unfortunately, as demand grew, so did a quiet bottleneck: scheduling.

I remember spending so many hours just scheduling meetings,” Shawn said. “It was painful… Brutal.”

Whether it was demos, onboarding calls, or support sessions, each interaction required multiple emails and time-consuming back-and-forth. Even with a team behind him, Shawn considered hiring a full-time assistant just to manage the meeting load.

The solution

Instead, he turned to YouCanBookMe.

“I must have been looking up 'how do I schedule meetings,’ or something like that. And you guys came up,” Shawn recalled. 

I didn’t even look at any competitors. I just tried YouCanBookMe and I fell in love with it.” - Shawn Mintz

What might have been a costly staffing decision became a seamless tech solution. With YouCanBookMe, MentorCity now automates its entire meeting flow—from demo requests to onboarding and support. Links are embedded across the site, and outreach emails offer prospects and clients instant access to book time with the right person on the team.

Round robin scheduling distributes meetings evenly, while automatic redirecting ensures individuals looking for mentorship (rather than partnerships) are directed to MentorCity’s free global network, saving the team hours each week.

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The outcome

Since adopting YouCanBookMe in 2016, the team has booked over 3,100 meetings, each one a step toward helping someone grow, feel supported, or change the course of their life.

Freed from the friction of manual scheduling, MentorCity has expanded its reach across sectors, partnering with associations, post-secondary institutions, corporations, and governments. But its impact goes even deeper.

They’ve helped parents raising children with disabilities, individuals recovering from eating disorders, and people facing housing insecurity or loneliness connect with mentors who understand their journey—and can walk beside them through it.

Now, with YouCanBookMe powering the backend of their bookings, Shawn and MentorCity can focus 100% of their time on facilitating meaningful social change.

Deep dive into MentorCity’s booking pages

MentorCity's booking page

MentorCity’s booking page is clean, branded, and built for clarity, giving prospects and clients a seamless way to connect with the right team member.

Here’s what stands out:

• Team member selection
  Bookers can choose who they’d like to meet with thanks to YouCanBookMe’s team availability feature.
• Appointment types
  MentorCity manages availability by allowing users to choose between different meeting lengths (e.g., 30 minutes or 1 hour), depending on the nature of the conversation.
• Configurable booking form
  Custom fields in the configurable booking form qualify intent, with multiple-choice responses making meetings clearer from the get-go.
• Branded visuals
  The custom booking page prominently features MentorCity’s logo and uses a clean, consistent layout that aligns with their overall brand experience.

This simple but powerful setup reflects MentorCity’s mission: making meaningful conversations easier to book, manage, and grow from.

✨ Bonus ✨ Learn from the pros—Shawn’s top business advice

Shawn Mintz doesn’t just run a mentoring platform—he lives the values it’s built on. And one of the biggest lessons he passes on to his team, mentees, and fellow founders is simple but powerful: Rejection equals success.

It’s not just a motivational quote—it’s how MentorCity started.

When I launched MentorCity, I made 500 cold calls,” Shawn recalls. “I got rejected over and over again—but those rejections were what helped me build connections. They’re what led me to my first client.”

That same mindset is now deeply embedded into the company’s culture. Whether his team is reaching out to hospitals, associations, post-secondary institutions, or government programs, rejection is never the end of the road—it’s a signal they’re getting closer.

One of our salespeople said the other day, ‘Now I’m starting to get rejected, so I know I’m getting closer to success,’” Shawn shares proudly. “That’s the attitude we encourage.”

By reframing rejection as progress, Shawn not only builds resilience within his team but also empowers them to stay mission-focused, knowing that every tough call or unanswered email is part of a bigger journey. It’s a lesson in grit, perseverance, and belief in the impact of what they’re doing.

And for a company devoted to creating meaningful human connections, it’s the perfect reminder that success doesn’t always follow a straight line.

Software built to connect, backed by purpose

MentorCity’s mission is deeply human: to create a world where lived experience becomes a stepping stone for someone else’s growth.

By sharing wisdom across generations, industries, and life paths, they’re proving that mentorship can be a catalyst for lasting change—and that every conversation matters.

Today, thanks to YouCanBookMe, MentorCity runs more smoothly than ever. With the back-and-forth of scheduling completely automated, Shawn and his team can pour their energy into what they do best: facilitating transformational connections.

From the very first call to the thousandth life changed, YouCanBookMe is proud to power the work that MentorCity was built to do.

Ready to spend less time scheduling and more time making a difference? Get started for free and see how YouCanBookMe can help you turn every meeting into meaningful impact.