Darren McKee

My wife said I respond quicker to work emails than I do to her texts.

So she sends me this. 😂

Little humor for today!

I got called out for “liking” my own posts.

Of course I liked it, I wrote it.

Lexus trying to showcase that third row space but let me tell you a little about the current state of marketing.

This photo would have gone viral if you would have shown me how it fits 3 scooters, 4 bags of all different sizes, a kid mattress because one kid only sleeps on that, a clothes basket full of sheets, a Trader Joe’s freezer bag, a mini cooler and a dog.

Because no parent travels this way, like never.

Real talk, the TX Hybrid is pretty fire though.

Real life marketing is in.

Staged marketing is out.

✌️

“My BDR“ 🤮

Hey Account Executives. “A BDR is not YOURS“

You are partners

You are a team

You are equals

That is it.

Thanks for joining my tedtext.

#sales #tedtalk #BDR #SDR

It's been 2 years since I've shared a photo of my family on this platform.

Today that changes, as I've made a very strategic hire for our business.

Everyone kept telling me to hire an EA or a GM or a Chief of Staff. And while I could have looked for the perfect person, I already knew who it was.

And her title was going to be COO.

For 13 years, I've watched her navigate our little family's life.

For 13 years, she's been my ride or die.

For 13 years, I've brought every single decision to her before executing on anything.

Now that our kids are a bit older, it was time to fully bring her into the business that she was already "in."

What you don't know is that this has been happening for the last 60 days and our entire business has changed.

The way I scale.
Where I spend time.
Who I spend time with.
How I charge.
How I articulate my solution.
Where I put my focus.
How I show up.

And it's resulted in two of our best months to date.

Yea. We're building a family business.

Yea. She doesn't post here but her name is Kaitlyn McKee if ya are curious!

For those that know her personally, you know how big of a deal this is and how insanely talented she is.

Time for our next season of growth.

I’m leaving Utah today, long day of travel ahead. Yesterday - for the first time in a few years, I decided to not make a post here and it felt really good tbh. I’ve always prided myself on being the person that shows up every day but over the last few months it just felt a wee bit forced. Posting things I didn’t really want to, repurposing content and overall just feeling like I was losing my desire to write and create.

So I paused.

Moving forward, I’m not really sure. Will share probably 80% of the days ahead but not if I don’t want to, sheesh that feels good to type.

Anyways, Utah LFG - you were so good to me as always. Forever grateful to this land and the people that live here, so much love.

Back to the travel, who knows how that will go today 😂

I’ve got idk like 8 hours of just hanging out in planes and airports and will answer any question that is dropped below on any of these topics:

Sales
Content
LinkedIn
Founder Life
Side Hustles
Coaching Offerings
Fishing
Hunting

Eh and whatever else you want to ask about!

I’m on a mission to slow down.

On Saturday morning, I grabbed the kids and headed to southern virginia (oak level - basset to be exact)

This is where my parents, grandparents and great grandparents were raised. It’s also where I was born until heading to Texas at 7 years old.

Yesterday at 2PM, my dad drove in and told me to get in the truck.

For the next 3 hours he showed me everything.

The furniture plant he worked at.

The furniture plant my grandfather worked at.

The furniture plant my great grandfather worked at.

The furniture plant every other human in my family worked at… (guess I messed this trend up 😂)

Then we headed out into the woods, dad wanted me to walk the same trails my great grandfather walked, pretty darn special tbh.

After that, I took my little one out to go bottle hunting - this is moonshne country so we found some epic stuff in some old barns, sure as hell beats YouTube.

Cell phone didn’t work.
Nothing flashy out there.
Got a 6 pack of beer for $5.97
Grabbed a sausage biscuit for $1.50
Every truck you passed waved
50% of the trucks stopped and talked to us

No idea why I’m writing this here but just doing it, kind of tired of all the scale automate and ai stuff.

So here’s a little journal entry 10/26/25

Where were you born?

Over the last 7 days I went a tad rogue here and didn’t think one time about formatting or hooks or structure or time of day I posted, I just wrote like a human and put thoughts and tips out into the world. Impressions and engagements up 96% this week, 800 followers gained, 822 saves of content, 922 of darrenmckee.co or 531social.com clicked, 12 hours of videos watched which resulted in a top 5 revenue week for me in 2025.

Please don’t believe the people that say this place is trending down, it’s not. But it 100% is trending down for those that look like others and have abandoned being a human.

Humans win.
Trust wins.

"Stop asking so many people for help, just go read your bible and spend some time alone. The answers will come."

"Stop stacking your days with meetings that don't matter, your calendar is owning you vs you owning it."

"Your Utah trip. Why are you cramming in so many things? Just go for walks and talk to Jesus a bit while looking at some things you don't normally see."

"I know you love the founder podcasts and music because you think that is what is going to help but you should probably read this little book today instead, proceeds to toss it to me."

Things my best friend told me this morning.

A day in the life of a founder who thinks they can do it all alone.

Opened the bible.
Cancelled 11 meeting for in November.
Moved meetings in Utah to be alone in the mountains.
Still listened to music and podcasts, working on that one.

Clarity gained. Decisions made. Feeling better. Shoulders relaxed.

Sales is the best. Walking through O’Hare in Chicago last week and out of the corner of my eye, there was an exec I used to deliver mail to back in 2015.

He was an svp of sales back then and now a ceo of a 200M company.

I knew what he’d been up because I always told myself I’d close him one day and have his name legit written in my notebook, so I turned around.

Mentioned my name and our history together, as well as what I do for a living now.

Related his role to another multi-million arr business I’m currently supporting around LinkedIn and social selling stuff and then left him at the pizza joint.

12 min later, sent a dm to him.
1 day later he sent his email to reach out.
I reached out same day.
Meeting booked today.

What’s that saying? You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.

Keep your eyes open peeps.

Oh and don’t get me started on the guy next to me on the plane, that’s going to be a fun one also. 3B in revenue, currently thinking about social selling and linkedin. Yea that happened to.

Might just hang around airports every day to hit my number moving forward!

Just a friendly reminder that you can burn out even if you love what you do for work.

While I wouldn’t say I truly entered the state of burn out, I got super super close here the last 2 months.

Go go go
Build build build
Scale scale scale
Innovate innovate innovate
Automate automate automate

Sun up to sun down, work related tasks.
Waking up checking emails.
Going to bed checking emails.
Podcasts about work.
Zero lunch breaks.
Family getting 60% of me.
Hobbies went to the wayside.
No breakfast sit down time.
Talking about work with friends.
Thinking about efficiency all the time.

Luckily, I caught myself.

Off to Utah to fish, do a little talk, breathe some fresh air and laugh with friends.

I needed a reset.
I needed a change of pace.
I needed time with Jesus.

P.S. - I know many people will say I’m dumb for sharing this type of stuff but it’s just reality and I want others to understand that this stuff is real.

8 days ago, I sent out 13 personalized messages to some top prospects via a LinkedIn DM - some video, some audio and a few just regular text outbound.

1. No response (but they viewed my profile)
2. No response
3. No response (but they viewed my profile)
4. No response
5. Meeting booked (responded Thursday)
6. Meeting booked (responded Tuesday)
7. No response
8. No response
9. No response (but they engaged with a post of mine Friday)
10. No response
11. No response
12. No response
13. Meeting booked (Responded same day)

When I was first starting out in sales, these types of posts used to make me so frustrated, lead magnet to learn more 🤢

Just save this, you don’t to hit me up to see the messages I send..

Now, I’m in the position to share these types of posts but I will NEVER share them without taking you behind the scenes and walking you through my process, step by step.

Step 1

Create content, 4 pillar framework (will put the visual down in the thread for you, steal it)

Step 2

Get "connected" with your prospect. Do this by engaging with their content, checking out their profile, being in the same threads as them, etc.

Step 3

Study your prospect and their business. Know A LOT. 10-K, Sustainability, Recent Hires, Current Vendors, etc. You should know so much that if you meet with them, they want to hire you.

Step 3

Send the message, video dm preferably

Relevance
Problem
Solution
CTA

"Mike. Appreciate the connect today. Next time I am in Park City I will reach out and we can do dinner, have a few good cro friends out that way. Maybe we can put together a group. Anyways, I’m 17 months post my VP of sales career and am full force on my own now, helping other revenue leaders simplify social selling and linkedin for their teams, it was 80% of our revenue at my last org - had to do the math when we exited the org to own of our largest competitors!

Quick audit and it looks like you have 17 AE's but only 1 of them has created content in the last 30 days and only 3 have left comments on their prospects content in the last 60 days. Big miss here, easy one to fix though. You have time next week for me to ring your cell?"

Step 4

Respond IMMEDIATELY when they do, they are active and you want to capitalize on that.

Step 5

Book the meeting, don't send your calendar link or anything like that and don't ask for their email address, you should know it. If you have to, just confirm what you have.

Step 6

Put that meeting in your Hubspot and pat yourself on the back. I’m still working on that part.

Conclusion:

Happy Prospecting. And yes, I do this stuff every single day.

Offerings: (darrenmckee.co)

1:1 Coaching
Team Training (in-person or virtual)
Cohort (December open now, half sold out)
Speaking (Booking for 2026 NOW)

Fun new one 😳

December 10K Cohort Sponsorship:

Team Training 60 Minutes
1:1 Coaching for CRO or Founder (45 min)
2 posts mentioning the sponsorship
1 spot in December cohort
1 531social.com license

“If you don’t engage with others, it won’t matter how good your content is.”

That’s the first thing I tell every single person that comes to me for help growing on this platform.

This is one of the few places where people don’t really care if you are a ceo, 3x founder or exec at a fortune 500.

So before I ever teach them how to create solid content, I tell them to do this.

(go ahead and save this so you can come back to it later)

- 5 comments to 1st degree connections (prospects and clients - not peers)

- 5 comments to 2nd degree connections (switching feed to recent helps)

- Responses to all comments on your content (respond with a question)

- 5 DMs (video if possible - profile view folks, prospects, engagement, etc)

- 3 connection requests (don't expect connections if you don't connect)

That takes about 20-34 minutes 👆

If they can’t do this, all the other stuff I’m teaching them in weeks 2-4 won’t matter.

Hope this helps someone today.

4 years ago I was told I’d never make it as an AE selling SaaS. Today I’m on a flight to go present to 60 SaaS Founders on how to sell in 2026.

3 years ago I was laughed out of a building in downtown Raleigh because I was talking about LinkedIn. In two weeks I’m presenting on LinkedIn in the exact building to that exact company.

2 years ago I was told no “real” company would hire me to coach their teams on social selling. Just signed a long term contract to support a vista backed 200M company, right on the heels of supporting a 200M blackrock backed company. And in talks with a 3B goldman backed company. And several other “real” companies in pipeline..

1 year ago I was told I’d be back selling because building a startup wasn’t really in my DNA and I wasn't cut out to be a founder. Well, I’m here and things are looking good so I hope that person puts their eyes on this post 😉

6 months ago I was told I wasn’t a “real” speaker. Over the next 365, I’m on stages all around the world, doing what? Teaching. You were right, I’m not a “speaker.” Kick rocks.

I don’t think about these statements often but they are simply fuel when I need to dig deep.

We cookin.
We built different.

Darrenmckee.co

There are 67 sales books in your office but your buyer is a head of procurement.

Your LinkedIn feed is filled with sales people but your buyer is a head of talent development.

The conference you are at is full of sales people but your buyer is a head of information technology.

See how this doesn’t make sense, do this instead 👇

Read what your buyers read.
Fill your feed with your buyers content.
Go to conferences to learn with your buyers.

The moment I stopped SURROUNDING myself with “sales stuff” was the moment I started to crush my number quarter after quarter.

Big thanks to the revenue team at Pendo.io for bringing me in to talk about all things LinkedIn and Social Selling.

This isn’t a want anymore, it’s a need.

Darrenmckee.co
531social.com

This week, LinkedIn had me present to 350 of their Sales Navigator customers. Before the session, I was asked about my slides/deck for the training.

I responded, “I run without slides. This will be more of a teaching session with me actually showing folks how to do stuff instead of screenshots.”

This is my coaching philosophy, show don’t tell. They want to know you still have the sauce, that you actually still do this stuff day in and day out.

Visually walk someone through the process then pause and ask them to do it.

My goal is never to deliver slides that recap my session. My goal is always to have those attending learn 1-2 things that will transform their next month.

It’s different. It’s me.

A couple things:

Many of you asked last week if I could help get your reps up to speed with LinkedIn and Sales Nav, yes totally can. Below are a few ways.

1:1 Coaching
Group Cross-Company Coaching
In-Person Team Training
Virtual Team Training
SKO (discount if clear blue water is involved)

Most stuff is here darrenmckee.co

If you need testimonials, there are 100+ down on the bottom of my page here - have fun!

Talking about hobbies will book more first meetings than any work related post ever will, I can promise you that.

The bar for being a human has never been lower.

I love fishing. Anyone else?

The face that managers all around the world are making this morning. Thousands and thousands of people just sent that text that says:

“Hey. Have a few minutes to chat today?”

Followed by a phone call or zoom about how they are leaving and have accepted another offer.

For the last 90 days, your A players have been having calls with leaders that see their potential.

For the last 90 days, you have been asking about nothing but pipeline and haven’t sent one message of appreciation.

What did you expect?

Bout ta be a tough Q1 for a lot of folks.

Hope those ai agents can close the 3M delta you are about to have 😉

The bar for being a human has never been lower.

Molly from Tabs will be the marketing leader everyone is studying here in a few short years. Calling it.

Thinks different.
Built different.
Cares more.

This was 2012. Shirt was $2.99, pants were $5.99 - both from thrift stores. Tie was my dads. Shoes were from an old shoe shine shop. Sometimes people leave their shoes and they sell them cheap, Allen Edmonds for $39.00. Bag was from the clearance rack at J. Crew “factory”

I didn’t have much. But, I had all I needed to be the best mail room kid in NYC.

My pops used to tell me that it didn’t matter what I did, as long as I tried to be the 1% in that “thing” then people would recognize.

I had never been to NYC before, the largest building in my town was like 7 stories.

Couldn't afford to live in the city so we
decided to rent a 350 square foot 3rd story walk up in Bloomfield, NJ - I told people Montclair 😉

None of the windows really closed.

Washer was in the basement, was coin operated and rarely worked.

Bathroom was in the kitchen, yea odd - not sure about that.

Bedroom door wouldn't shut because the bed took up 80% of the room.

Heat came from the downstairs unit, floors got warm but never got above like 62 degrees.

Car was a 1997 Avalon with no muffler, loud as heck and not on purpose.

But, it is where we had our START.

It wasn't glamorous but it is what we had and for a kid without a degree, I went for it and simply tried to be the best.

My first 3 hours of work each day paid for my transit into the city, $28 for those hours.

Patterson 72 Line
Newark
Path
WTC
Walk

Here are some of the things I did that took me from living in that small tiny apartment to getting where I am today👇

1 - Never stop telling people hi, you are one head nod away from your entire life changing

2 - Study your craft like crazy, but also know everything about your client or icp (get in their world and out of yours)

3 - Surround yourself with people WAY WAY smarter than you

4 - Be willing to relocate early in your career, we moved 6 times in 8 years

5 - Always have 2 people willing to hire you by next Friday

6 - Start creating content NOW, it will change your life - do double what you think is necessary

7 - Get a coach (If you can’t afford it, find a mentor or ask your company to pay for it)

8 - Your partner is your superpower, choose wisely here

9 - Get really really good at something, 10,000 hours (I’m feeling this now and it’s insane what happens)

10 - Celebrate your wins often, kudos folder

11 - Have fun, love people and laugh daily

Pretty cool to write this as I’m on stage today in California talking about my life and career, sheesh a lot can change in 14 years.

My two companies:

531social.com (GTM Social Selling)
Darrenmckee.co (Coaching, Training, Speaking, Brand)

Oh and I did find a sponsor for this event this week, it’s ME.

I’m representing my dang self.

And my posts make way more revenue than when I post about others even if they pay me. Just sayin.

Go be great.

Time to speak then surf.

San Diego is cool.

When one of the worlds largest clinical research firms pings you with a few days notice to come lead a social selling training for their revenue org, you say yes.

Thanks for having me in, Parexel.

4 weeks ago: Glass & Window Company
3 weeks ago: Logistics Company
2 weeks ago: Marketing Firm
1 week ago: Global Financial Institution
Today: Clinical Research Company

This isn’t a want anymore, it’s a need.
This isn’t a fad, it’s part of the playbook.

Darrenmckee.co

Today I walked into my old employer’s office, company called Insperity. Been gone 5 years and still their biggest fan. They didn’t ask me to post this but I’m doing it anyways.

Listen. Running a company is hard. The back office, the hr stuff, the crazy world of healthcare, the payroll - it’s all a zoo at times.

To be honest, as a founder - we just want to run our business and take care of our customers.

And yes, they will be my first call when we start to bring on employees at 531social.com which will be in a few short months.

Grateful for the time I spent there, truly a world class organization led by remarkable humans!

I impulse purchased a boat from craigslist in 2020. Everyone told me not to do it, but those were desperate times..

Boats are expensive.
Boats always break.
You won’t use it after the first year.

All things I heard. Blah blah blah.

This thing has been a beast. Legit do nothing on it but change the oil, don’t even witnerize the thing.

6 years later. It just sat for 5 months, and the darn thing fired right up. With a tad of smoke. Same thing every year, it’s wonderful.

Like it just said, “let’s make some memories this summer.”

No chance they see this but shout out to Mercury Marine for building the Mercruiser 3.0 - straight up bullet proof.

Long story short, buy fun things even if people tell you not to 😂

Tactical content opens doors, personal content closes deals.

90,000,000 impressions with zero dollars of ad spend. That is the power of this place when you commit for 5 years and 7 months. Those numbers above are how many times my content has been displayed on someone else’s feed.

Impressions aren’t everything but for me, they are a huge data point when I dive deep into tracking and tracing new relationships and revenue. Also dig engagement metrics and those are at 200K for the last 365, honestly more happy about that than the 90M.

It’s taken me a very long time.

I could have taken short cuts.

I could have implemented strategies that went against my beliefs.

But, I chose to put my head down, study and master the art of authentic storytelling.

And it feel super comforting laying down at night knowing that I did this my way and now I can help others do the same, “their way.”

Seeing my feed filled with people that have worked with me, yea that’s the good stuff.

Seeing those same people hire for their team because of recent growth, yea that’s the good stuff.

Seeing those same people raise seed - b rounds, yea that’s the good stuff.

Seeing those same people celebrate massive 6 figure contract wins, yea that’s the good stuff.

Seeing those same people transform their side business into their own personal ventures, yea that’s the good stuff.

Seeing those same people generate more eyeballs than their entire marketing department, yea that’s the good stuff.

Feeling like I’m right where I’m supposed to be.

Transferring what I know to other people and helping them do it in 15 months vs 5 years and 7 months.

P.S. - December Cohort is getting close to 50% capacity which is insane to me considering we are still a month out. No, I am not doing one for November - taking some down time to comeback refreshed to end the year and start the new.

Here is a quick tip that will help you close more deals, it truly is revolutionary. Get on a plane and present all proposals over 70K in ACV (Annual Contract Value) - stop sitting behind your laptop when all of your decision makers are in the same office in Minnesota watching you struggle to screen share your proposal slide.

The revolutionary thing is sarcasm fyi. Listen, I am coaching sales teams around the world right now and the data says that plane tickets = quota attaining reps.

To the CFO or CRO who are declining a $600 plane ticket, $350 hotel and $300 bill in food, stop doing that. It is the equivalent of one of your reps asking for you to get them a coach and you saying no - MAKES ZERO SENSE. If you need data, go look at your "closed won" deals over the last 7 years and back into ACV and "win stories" and you will see a direct correlation with "in-person time" and revenue.

P.S. - If you are a rep and get approval to go present that proposal, please for the love of all things sales, BOOK OTHER MEETINGS WHEN YOU ARE IN TOWN so that your report can say - "Presented 217K ARR deal to ABC Company, did lunch with a closed lost opp from last year and ended up having an in person meeting with Joe from Target. Oh and snuck into a little happy hour event with some industry folks and locked in 3 meetings for next week, well worth the $1250."

Around 466K people have viewed my LinkedIn profile since early 2022, you might want to save this post because I am going to tell you why this deeply matters and how to possibly achieve this yourself. And no, nothing is gated - you just get it here by reading.

When you get someone to your profile:

they can binge content (learn)
they can read recommendations (trust)
they can go to your website (tracking & revenue)
they can confirm authenticity (more trust)
they can see where you engage (new people to learn from)
they can see common connections (more trust)
they can read about you (curiosity)

How to do it:

1 - Comment often on other's content because this puts your name in rooms you have never been in before. Not just little comments because you feel like you have to but deep and interesting thought filled engagement. And for the LOVE OF ALL THINGS LINKEDIN - please stop engaging solely with your 1st degree connections. Aim for 15 comments per day to new people.

2 - Create content from 4 pillars, you can't look the same daily. The 4 pillars are here in this post via a visual (https://lnkd.in/ekkgGrgs)

3 - Follow 5 people daily, many of you expect followers but never follow anyone.

4 - Connect with humans you actually want to engage with, it is wildly important to actually take a look at someone's profile before you add them into your sphere. Do they post? Do they engage? Can you learn from them? Do you have common connections? Are they kind? Do they add value to you? Can you add value to them?

5 - Recognize people when they actually visit your page. Closed my largest deal of the year with a CMO of a massive org by simply saying, "Mark! Thanks for stopping by, appreciate you." Went on to coach his entire revenue org out west.

6 - Don't be afraid to click the repost (don't add thoughts) when you see good content in your feed, I am tracking this data hard right now and my profile views deeply spike when I do this - gets you into another sphere of talented humans.

7 - DM's are everything. New connections, dm them. Old connections, dm them. Introduce people to people in DMs (did you know you can send group dms to folks? yea that is a game changer)

8 - Be sure your profile is complete. Headline easy to read, like 5th grade level. About section filled out. Featured section done. Banner photo complete. Recommendations down below. The list goes on but you have to have get your house in order here if you want people to come visit.

Ok.

That is enough now, go do some of this stuff and watch what happens over the next 15 months. Your mind will be blown by the opportunities that fall into your lap after 450 days of consistency!!

darrenmckee.co
531social.com

If you engage someone’s content and/or send them a DM, guess what happens?

Your content appears in their feed and their content appears in your feed.

This stuff ain’t rocket science.

But it don’t work if you don’t work.

Everyone expecting without giving.

Bar is low. Real low.

It’s icy outside which means 32 games of mahjong in our house. I’ll be honest, I didn’t grow up in a “games” family but my wife did and when she started talking about tiles and racks and all this mahjong stuff.. I was a bit skeptical.

A few games later, I was hooked.

Then, I was on a call coaching an epic human and he mentioned his wife made “🀄️” tiles..

So. Of course, I had to get some.

They are elite and our family is obsessed.

dearmahjong.com

P.S. - Your entire LinkedIn presence doesn’t have to be about yourself, shout out some others every once in a while. Just sayin.

A few things I’m most proud of over the last couple of months:

Officially 3 months without email on my phone for my new company, desktop access only.

Committed to a 9AM-3PM schedule and have only had a couple days where I failed at this, huge difference and revenue hasn’t changed.

Officially signed up for a personal trainer, business was growing but so was my weight and that needed to change. 24 me will be back shortly.

Become comfortable saying no to things I don’t really value or care to do, even if that means losing money or upsetting people.

Spent way more time outside enjoying nature and picking up old hobbies with old and new friends.

But, to be honest - I don’t really like content like this because it seems unattainable for some. “Some” was me not that long ago.

And I’m going to keep it real, I couldn’t do all of these things above if I hadn’t put an insane amount of effort into my craft over the last 10+ years.

Your time to slow down is just around the corner, and my hope is that it doesn’t take you as long as it took me.

Been a wild 4-5 weeks.

I’m tired but it’s hard to even say that because I dreamed, hustled and prayed to eventually have days like these.

Now it’s happening.

Time to rest, recover and ge the work life pendulum back in line.

Being a founder is terrifying at times, every day there are 31 things that go wrong and it can be an emotionally draining experience.

Today I was having one of those days, so I picked up the phone and called a guy that I knew would pick me up and speak to me slowly but with accuracy.

If you don’t know Alex Boyd then I’m sorry, and if you do then you will totally understand this post.

Grateful for founders that answer the phone calls from other fellow founders.

You are a gem, dude.

This dude behind me is my secret weapon and the reason 531social.com is what it is today, and why every sales team in the world who cares about social selling will be a user here very shortly.

Today, claude went down and I was like:

“Does that mean our clients will be affected?”

Brian Ruddy laughed at me so hard with a few added choice words and said, “You have the best engineers, we have 2+ fallbacks. They are fine and won’t even know.”

We have a demo on the whole product Thursday with 80 people already joining, anyone is welcome.

Come hang: https://lnkd.in/eVpbaAi4

Today was validating. Launched 531social.com for the enterprise.

So dang glad I built a community before building a product.

Still hard but much easier.

I knew I could coach 2,000 people per year by myself but getting to 2,000,000 people per year required me to think differently.

Huge thanks to Eric, Jennifer, Brian and Billy for the countless hours building this thing.

Time to build a legacy.
Time to retire our kid’s kids.

LinkedIn and Social Selling isn’t a want, it’s now a need.

P.S.

If you are an individual wanting access, there is a 10 day free trial open on the site - tap in.

Current me is looking back at old me and smiling from ear to ear. This week, a dream of mine comes true. It won’t be something public, but something that I never could have imagined accomplishing.

If you are reading this, and feeling like nothing is coming together. Stick with it, your time is almost here.

12 years ago I was flipping pizza.
10 years ago I was delivering mail.

✌️

Zoom in. It’s cool. I promise.

LinkedIn & Social Selling Coach in the middle.
Sequences & Tasks on the right.
Accounts on the left.

531social.com for teams is live.

Fully LinkedIn compliant. Proven.

$30/month for individuals.
$49/user/month for enterprise.

A team of 85 reps = $50K/year.

If it helps each rep close just 1 deal at $25K...

That's $50K spent for $2.1M in closed won.

I can promise this will be the best tool in your stack and one your reps actually want to log into every single day.

Holler if you want a demo. DM, text, email, form on site, idc - I will see it and get right back to you.

P.S.

I built this because I needed it.
Now you can have it.

Some odd work things I do:

I use the desktop version of LinkedIn 90% of the time.

I don't schedule content here, just post when it feels right or when a thought hits my brain - posting at the same time daily is probably crippling your impact but that is just my take.

I rarely take my laptop out of my office space.

I don't really work from home, choose to go into an office from 9-3 daily. Call me weird but it just feels right to me.

I am very very close to having zero email access on my phone, down to ONE.

I do not have any AI tools as apps on my phone, desktop only.

I work off of one screen, laptop only.

I am up to 50% of my meetings being on the phone while walking or in the car vs zoom or google meet.

I rarely respond to a "work" email post 5PM, we are in sales - we aren't surgeons. If someone needs me NOW, they can text me.

I don't use slides for my trainings or presentations, just my thoughts paired with words and a lot of show and tell.

I choose to fly to important meetings vs sitting at my standup desk from on a tiny screen.

I try to meet 3 people every single week that were non existent to me last week, this has been a massive unlock.

I don't believe that working more hours makes your more money, I think it might actually hurt you in the long run and cause you to lose in many other areas of life.

Alright, that is enough.

Time to go get ready for a dove hunt tomorrow with the family.

I just can’t work from home. Started to prospect but then ended up in researching turkey decoys, so I left the house to go buy some. Then started thinking about fishing, so I texted two friends and booked a trip to the coast to chase redfish. Then I went to the garage to get a topochico and ended up working on the sprinkler system which led me to look at our grill and realize I’m out of propane, headed to the store again. It’s only 11:15 😂

Sheesh. Good thing my content is cookin fromthis morning and booking me revenue because lord knows I ain’t workin.

It took me 16 years of working for other people before I took a leap and started working for myself. And sheesh, I’m glad it took me that long because this stuff is insanely hard and all the things I learned from those previous leaders and founders have set me up to have a fruitful next few years being self employed.

I know all the posts out there tell you to jump and to bet on yourself and that YOU CAN DO IT, but I’m also a firm believer in building the foundation and making data and heart driven decision.

Learn all you can.
Build on the side.
Get to 130% of your w2 pay.
Then jump.

Might take 16 years like me.

Or don’t, and have a wonderful career being an “in”trepreneur where you build inside of companies and change lives that way!

LinkedIn is wild. Posted about a fishing trip coming up soon and two of my all time most favorite outdoor brands ended up texting me. Yes, content to comment to text. This place is absolute magic for D2C/CPG and experiences. B2B tech is a tiny tiny portion of this place, don’t forget that.

Yesterday taught me a lot about sticking to the script and trusting the process. For 6 years, I’ve been fully committed to this social selling stuff. Even when leaders and influential people told me it was all a fad and that I should just hang it up.

I knew my purpose and I couldn’t squander this skillset I was gifted, it’s a bigger purpose for me.

So, I kept going and didn’t stop.

And thank the lord that I did, because it’s changed my entire life and hopefully the lives of my clients.

All of the below happened in a 24 hour period:

Peter Ostapko announced his partial lineup for Kinsmen Summit and my name was listed next to Trey Kennedy and Jordan Raynor, as well as others whom I could even imagine sharing the stage with in Branson but here we are. Doing the thing.

Josh Landrum shared a picture of me alongside the founder of StoryBrand referencing my coaching with Donald Miller, no chance I could do this without your guidance Josh.

Closed 2 enterprise deals for DarrenMcKee.co where I’m building out the LinkedIn and Social Selling motion for a 4B and 90M organization, brands I grew up knowing about.

Filled our 30th spot for our April Cohort.

Booked 2 1:1 coaching clients.

Inbound lead for a team training with a 35B manufacturing company to train on all things LinkedIn and Social Selling.

Brian Ruddy built in contextual design for 531social.com and shipping it in the next few days, more on that soon. About to cook.

Took my kids to school.
Went for a few walks.
Brainstormed about the future with Kaitlyn.
Took kids to archery practice with my mom.
Ate dinner as a family.
Sipped a good whiskey.

“Big small business and we boomin.” - Tobe

Sent this dude a dm in June of 2020, been boys since. Join us at 12 EST today to kick it and talk some prospecting strategies. You won’t want to miss it, I promise. Feeling like being an open book today and just giving it all away. Oh, his name is James Buckley and you prolly already know him.

See y’all soon: https://lnkd.in/e_wZw59W

Sheesh by the end of 2026, 531social.com might be the only tool left in the LinkedIn & Social Selling GTM ecosystem. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. I can’t imagine raising a round or selling a tool while knowing you are wildly against terms and conditions of LinkedIn.

Sure. Our tool might not be as fast and you might have to do more human touches but I can sleep at night.

It really is that simple

Create organic content
Send great DMs
Follow and engage with your ideal client
Stay consistent (most can’t do this)
One action away from your life changing

2026 is the year I’m on stages sharing the simple truths.

Up next 👇

San Diego
Miami
San Deigo
Hawaii
NYC

Speaking these into existence 👇

London
Barcelona
Sydney
Mexico City
Copenhagen
Berlin
Zurich
Dublin
Vancouver
Victoria, Texas (where I was raised)

Clause in contract “family rider” because well, I didn’t work this hard to travel and see the world without my most important people.

Darrenmckee.co

Million dollar deals are being closed every single day because of people sharing content and engaging with their community and prospects here on LinkedIn, this place is on an absolute tear right now - never seen it as dialed in as it is today.

A few years back, I was told that LinkedIn & Social Selling was a fad and that it would fade away but here we are 2, 3 and 4 years later absolutely stacking wins for my clients. From B2B SaaS to Commercial Real Estate to Home Services and everything in between, just winning.

Next opportunity to learn:

February Group Coaching which my new banner photo reflects the start date, just opened today and 46/50 slots are currently open. This will be the 18th group of 50 leaders I have put through this since launching darrenmckee.co

Additional opportunities:

Team Coaching
1:1 Coaching
6 - Month Retainer
Speaking (SKO & Offsite)

Will be around today to answer any questions you may have, 160+ testimonials down on the bottom of my page as well if you are looking to see what folks are saying.

Additionally - happy to answer any question you have about sales, linkedin, brand, social selling, content, life, etc.

Fire away.

LinkedIn for real estate agents is legit “blue ocean” right now. Fun chats with my man Ryan Serhant.

To be honest, it’s just “blue ocean” in general.

The bar for content, sales and being a human has never been lower.

This is my fav way to use LinkedIn, it’s legit undefeated. If you had 2 days in San Diego and then 2 days in Miami, what are your go to food choices (breakfast, lunch, dinner, coffee, desert, etc)

For context. Totally down for maybe one over the top experience per city but we always lean more toward local neighborhood type cuisine. Want to be embraced into the culture of both locations.

Staying in Mission Bay (San Diego)
Staying in Brickell (Miami)

I could as AI but tbh I’m just sick of it and want to talk to some humans, Gemini or GPT or Perplexity hasn’t stepped foot in one of these places, just sayin.