weskao.com

I typically work with tech leaders on: managing up to a CEO/VP, strengthening your executive communication and presence, and delegating to a team of ICs while raising the bar. Clients are leaders at Amplitude, 1Password, Amazon/AWS, DoorDash, AngelList, Product Hunt, Google, etc. If you’re interested in how I can support you, learn more about my coaching approach:

-> weskao.com/coaching

Writing for 300,000+ tech operators across LinkedIn, Twitter, and Substack.

-> weskao.com/newsletter

Check out my 2-day intensive course: Executive Communication & Influence for Senior ICs and Managers. Alumni include 1,200+ students from companies like Uber, Amazon, Grammarly, Workday, Google, Pinterest, Meta, Expedia, Twilio, Spotify, Anthropic, GitHub, Zillow, PayPal, Atlassian, Netflix, Square, Figma, Stripe, and more.

-> weskao.com/course

Reach out at wes@weskao.com

Executive coach, advisor, instructor

Maven

Maven is a platform for live, cohort-based courses. Learn more at maven.com

Co-founder

Various courses

Built, launched, and grew courses that have reached 500k+ students. Clients included: Section (Professor Scott Galloway), Outlier (from cofounder of MasterClass), Build a Second Brain, Write of Passage, Poo~Pourri, Morning Brew, and more.

Cohort-based courses

altMBA

Created and built the altMBA with bestselling author Seth Godin. One of the first mainstream cohort-based courses. Grew from zero to thousands of students in 45 countries and 550+ cities at $3,000 price point (10x higher than avg online course at the time).

Flite

Head of Digital Marketing

Bare Escentuals

Global Brand Management Marketing

Gap Inc.

Business Analyst

L'Oréal

Brand Management Marketing

Wes Kao is an executive coach, advisor, and entrepreneur who writes at newsletter.weskao.com. She is co-founder of Maven, an edtech company that raised $25M from First Round and Andreessen Horowitz. Previously, she co-founded the altMBA with bestselling author Seth Godin.

Newsletter for 60,000+ high performers on Wednesdays at 8am ET
-> weskao.com/newsletter

Live, 2-day course on Executive Communication & Influence 
-> https://maven.com/wes-kao/executive-communication-influence

1:1 executive coaching for tech leaders 
-> https://www.weskao.com/coaching

Wes Kao

Excited to share my conversation with First Round Capital! I talk about some of my favorite communication frameworks, including a checklist of questions to ask yourself to maximize your chances of getting buy-in.

Would love to hear what you think. Link in the comments.

a16z-backed founder turned executive coach. Helping tech operators improve their executive communication, leadership, and influence

SackBerry

I didn’t start SackBerry to be “just another agency.”
I started it because founders building world-class companies were still invisible online. 

So I built SackBerry with one mission:
"Turn expertise into influence".

What we do:
- Build personal brands for founders, CXOs & investors on LinkedIn, Twitter/X & Instagram
- Grow visibility through social media, PR & paid ads
- Use AI-powered systems to scale presence without scaling headcount

What this means in action:
 ⚡ Took a SaaS founder from “ghost online” to 10K+ followers & weekly inbound leads
 ⚡ Turned a boutique firm’s anniversary into a story that drove clients
 ⚡ Helped a real estate founder build a brand so strong his DMs became his pipeline

Today, SackBerry is:
 ✅ 250+ clients across India, US & Canada
 ✅ 15-member remote team
 ✅ Featured across panels, podcasts & startup events

Founder / Agency Owner

Graphy

Content Marketer

Spayee

Content marketer for an Ed-tech B2B SAAS start-up.
a) Reviewing, editing and writing blog posts to guarantee high content quality.
b) Developing key messaging, branding and positioning statements.
C) WordPress Blog Management & SEO.
D) Writing comprehensive product guides from scratch. (Text, GIFs & Videos).
e) Creating content on Quora to build brand awareness.
f) Managing all the social media platforms including Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn & Twitter.
g) Initiating market research studies and analyze findings.
h) On-site SEO, link building & guest posting.
I) Collaboration with designers and the editorial team on marketing materials.
j) Defining and tracking campaign effectiveness and adjust strategies accordingly.

Achievements:

*Created the comprehensive product guide from scratch, consisting of more than 100 articles.

*Got 500X growth on Spayee platform organically.

*Figured out the already existing deviations and challenges and worked on it, leading to higher user engagements, increased footfall & massive conversions.

Toastmasters International

Vice President of Public Relations

WSE Group

*Collaboration with designers and the editorial team on marketing materials.
*Reviewing, editing and writing blog posts to guarantee high content quality.
*Developing key messaging, branding and positioning statements.

    Achievements:
*Comprehensively researched and proposed a suitable digital marketing and social media plan for the two major businesses of WSE Groups – Volercars and LYVE Games. 

*Figured out the already existing deviations and challenges and worked on it, leading to higher user engagements and rigorous PR.
Successfully implemented creative collaborations and contests.

Marketing Content Manager

Redefined Rhapsody

My love and quest for poetry and open mics have instigated me into founding this platform. Getting all the poets in one place and giving them a platform to present is the vision and mission. 
Here is the link to Insta profile:

https://instagram.com/redefined_rhapsody?utm_source=ig_profile_share&igshid=1a653a1oj9kc4

Founder

Blogger

I help in LinkedIn Growth 🚀 | TedX & Josh Talks Speaker| Influencer Marketing on LinkedIn| Personal Branding for busy Founders | Ghostwriter for Founders | LinkedIn Organic Growth | B2B Lead generation| Founders PR 🔥

I’m Sakshi Darpan, Founder of SackBerry Media, a personal branding and social media agency that’s helped 250+ founders, CXOs, and investors build their online presence and win trust in the digital world.

In the last 3 years, we have worked with clients across India, Dubai, US & Canada while generating millions of impressions for them!

What I do: 
- Build magnetic personal brands on LinkedIn, Instagram, and Twitter/X
- Grow visibility for brands through social media strategy, PR, and paid ads
- Use AI-driven systems to scale outreach, content, and operations without adding extra headcount

🌍 What makes me different
I don’t believe in cookie-cutter content. I believe in storytelling that actually makes people stop scrolling, pay attention, and remember you. My clients don’t just get followers, they get leads, speaking gigs, media features, and opportunities they didn’t even know were possible.

📌 Beyond business
I’ve grown my own brand to 90K+ followers on LinkedIn by sharing my learnings in real time
I’ve been invited to speak on panels, podcasts, and judge startup events!
I’ve built an agency that runs on strong systems, so I can take vacations (sometimes a full month!) while the business grows


✨ What drives me
 Helping founders and brands turn their expertise into influence. 

Let's chat: sakshi@sackberry.com

Sakshi Darpan

In the last 2 months I have worked 3-4 hours a day, but the business ran as usual.

- Running a marketing agency with 35+ clients 
- Onboarding 3 clients a month
- Working on client retention

It's a chaos & as a single founder it got a little too much for me.

So, before It took away all my peace, I stepped back a little & let life play out.

- Attended a tonne of wedding functions
- Had a great Diwali week with friends & family
- Hosted another Diwali party for my team members
- Spent another 2 weeks with my parents in Chhath Puja
- Did journal, started to walk outside without fail 

Mostly I let life play out without stressing about everything 💜

Loved it :3

Do you ever slow down?


#PersonalBranding #Founder

It took me 5 years and 97k+  followers to truly understand this.
Because when you strip away the likes, views, and comments what really builds a personal brand is trust.

📍 Networking > Contacts = Trust
 I don’t measure my brand by how many people I know.
 I measure it by the 40 trusted humans who’ve referred me, vouched for me, and said my name in rooms I wasn’t in.

📍 Presentability = Trust in first impressions
A D2C founder once told me he hired us because we looked like people who get things done.
Since then, I’ve stopped seeing styling as shallow.
The first 10 seconds build or break trust before the next 10 slides even begin.

📍 Relationships > Sales = Trust over time
Some of SackBerry’s highest-ticket clients came back more than a year after the first conversation. We stayed in touch. We showed up.
 When the timing was right, they remembered.

📍 Visibility = Silent Trust
 Half the prospects who get on a call with me say,
 “I’ve been reading your posts for months.”
 Even if they never liked or commented once.

Consistency builds silent trust with people you don’t even know are watching.
That’s the real story of personal branding.

It isn’t hacks, trends, or virality.

It’s trust, built day after day.

And this is why SackBerry exists to help founders build trust at scale.

What does a personal brand mean to you?


#PersonalBrand #Branding

I visited a country with just 1.2 Cr of population.
While the city I stay in alone has 3.5 Cr of population. 

I spent the whole 7 days in Mauritius at 3 different beach-facing properties.

Life here doesn’t revolve around “what’s next?”.
It revolves around “what’s now?”

- People walk slowly.
- Cars actually wait.
- Shops close early.
- Beaches stay empty even in the middle of the day.
- And the locals are always smiling like they know something we don’t.

It felt like someone had lowered the world’s volume.
And because of that, I naturally slowed down too.

For one week, I slipped into their pace:
📍Woke up with the sound of waves
📍Sat with my tea looking at the water
📍Took long, quiet drives through green roads
📍Watched people fish like it was a meditation
📍Saw families sit by the beach for hours, doing absolutely nothing
📍Ate lunch without checking my phone 14 times
📍Didn’t hear a single honk for days 

Of course, I also took a couple of important calls because that’s life now.

But even then, the vibe was so relaxed that I didn’t feel like I was “working”.

What plans do you have for next year?


#Travel #PersonalBranding

I am hiring for 5 marketing roles for salary ranging between 30K-50K!

We recently expanded our services.

Clients? 
We’ve been signing them almost every single day.

But here’s the funny part:
The work has been pouring in, finding good marketing talent has been tougher than I expected.

We’ve been scouting like crazy, interviewing endlessly, and yet it feels like the market is drained out of the right resources.

So I decided—why not put this out here?
👉 We’re officially hiring for 5 marketing roles:
- Linkedin & Instagram Ghostwriters
- Social Media Managers
- Customer Success Manager
- Instagram specialists
- Marketing generalist who can do a bit of everything

💰 Salary range: ₹30K – ₹50K

If you’re someone who loves building brands, creating content that actually works, and wants to grow with a team that’s scaling fast, this might be your cue.

- Drop a comment
- Tag a friend,
- DM me 
- Email us: talent@sackberry.com

#hiring #marketing #personalbranding #socialmedia #growth
#digitalmarketing

It took me 3 years to build a 6-figure USD agency with a 15-member team.
But you can do this in less than a year!

When I look back at how SackBerry grew, I see two very clear chapters.
📍 The version of me who did everything out of instinct.
📍The version of me who finally built the agency like a real company.

>>> Things I’d definitely do again:

1. Build a strong content-first culture.
Good content saved us.
It made our content sharper, our clients happier, and our brand more trustworthy.
 
2. Focus on founder-branding instead of generic content.
“Show your face. Tell your story. Build in public.”
My founder-led content attracts inbound clients, builds deeper trust, and got me invitation to Josh Talks, Ted talks & multiple events.

3. Create systems before scaling the team.
If you scale without systems, you create stress, not growth.
The day we documented processes, built workflows, and set up a strong lead-gen + delivery engine…
things finally became predictable.

4. Invest early in client experience.
 Clear communication +  Weekly updates + Smooth onboarding.
 A team that genuinely cares.
 Clients don’t remember the content, they remember how you made them feel.

>>> And now… the things I’d never repeat:

1. Saying yes to every client who enquired.
 Some deals gave money.
 Most gave headaches.
 The wrong clients drain your team, drain your time, and drain your peace.

2. Undercharging out of fear.
 In the beginning, I kept pricing low because I was scared someone would say no. But the reality?
People respect you when you respect your pricing.

3. Hiring too fast.
 I thought more people = more growth.
 But more people without the right roles and systems = more chaos.

4. Doing everything myself for too long.
 I used to check every caption, approve every design, handle every escalation.
 It wasn’t leadership, it was fear.
 The day I let go, my team finally grew.

5. Putting content over mental health.
 There were days I posted even when I was anxious, exhausted, overwhelmed…
 because I believed consistency = survival.

Agency life isn’t glamorous.
It’s messy & unpredictable.
Sackberry made me who I am.
And I wouldn’t trade this ride for anything.

What lesson you learned in the past year?


#PersonalBranding #Content

I’ve lost at least $5K worth of leads in the last 6 months.

Not because of bad content.
But because I didn’t follow up.

Believe it or not, but your warm audience is sitting & watching you.
- Every “We should work together” DM
- “X viewed your profile” notification from a dream client.
- A like/ comment on your post from your potential client

I know how to spot them & take action.
But, I lost track.

So over the last 60 days, I built an AI-assisted follow-up system that does 3 things:

1. Surfaces signals (profile views, DMs, post engagers) into one list every morning.
2. Scores intent (title, company, comment context) so I know who to ping first.
3. Sends gentle nudges (pre-approved DM/email templates) on Day 0/2/7
Most importantly, I get everyday reminders on who to follow up with

Result?
 → Replies I’d been “meaning to send” finally went out.
 → 3 calls booked last week from old warm leads
 → Pipeline looks healthier without posting more

If your content works but the follow-up system doesn’t, money leaks.

Want the checklist of all tools I use + the 3 messages I use?

Comment FOLLOW UP and I’ll share the exact workflow and templates.


#PersonalBranding #InstagramGrowth

Before SackBerry ever existed, I spent 3 years working in jobs that honestly felt nothing like each other.

→ 2 years in a tiny startup Spayee
We grew from a team of 4 to 30.
My manager was the co-founder himself.
I was a 19 year old in my first job who did everything "Content" & nailed it.

→ 1 year in a fast, high-pressure startup Unacademy
I led a team of 14 here.  
Very intense.
Very “figure it out and move”.
I had to learn, try, fail, and get up again in real-time.

At that time, I thought I was just “doing my job”.
Now I know I was collecting lessons that I’d need much later.

Here are the ones that shaped me the most:

📍How people actually work
 Everyone isn’t motivated by the same thing.
 Some people need clarity, some need freedom, some need reassurance.
 You can't lead everyone in the same way.

📍How to manage under pressure
 Startups don’t give you the luxury of slow learning.
 That pace trained me.
 It taught me how to stay calm even when everything around me was on fire.

📍 What good leadership really looks like
 I worked with leaders who supported me…
 and leaders who drained me.
 Both taught me what to do & what not to do.

📍Growth is uncomfortable
Those 3 years pushed me out of my comfort zone so many times that discomfort became normal.

And I didn’t realise it then, but all of this became the base for SackBerry.

I already knew how to build a team, communicate, set expectations & stay calm under pressure.

Those years made me a better founder long before I ever became one.



#PersonalBranding #Marketing #Content

SackBerry Media is proud to be the Social Media Partner for MysticVerse Global 2026, happening on 6–7 February 2026 in Dubai. 

From the early days of my business, I’ve believed that building a personal or company brand is about purpose, not just posts. 

And MysticVerse is exactly that kind of space.
- They brings together ancient wisdom (astrology, reiki, vaastu) with modern tools (AI, wellness tech) to help people and organisations evolve. 

- The blend between tradition + innovation, inner work + outward impact is how we build content for founders.

What we’ll do together:
📍 Help amplify the voices and ideas shaping conscious business and wellness.
📍Create content that highlights why MysticVerse matters 
📍And why you might want to be part of it

I am really excited about this!


 #MysticVerseGlobal #SackberryMedia #PersonalBranding #Storytelling #Wellness

AI is 10X cheaper. Still, zero clients left us because of "AI".
In fact, we still onboard clients every month.

Here’s how we do it at SackBerry 👇

1. Founder Deep-Dive Calls
Not interviews, but conversations.
The kind where a founder forgets they're being recorded.
We dig into:
 — how they think
 — how they solve
 — what shaped them
 — what they actually believe
By the end of this call, we know their voice better than any “brand guideline” ever could.

2. Narrative Mapping
Every founder has a pattern. 
Their rhythm, their instincts, their go-to analogies, the emotions they lead with.
We map all of that.
Their story arcs.
Their non-negotiables.
Their angles, opinions, contradictions, and quirks.
This is where the personality gets built. The persona behind the posts.

3. Context-Rich Writing
This is magic. ✨
We don’t write “content.”
We write like someone who knows:why the founder started,what they’ve gone through, what they’re building and what they won’t compromise on.

Every post sounds like: “Of course the founder wrote this.”
(And even their best friend wouldn’t doubt it).
Because personal branding is not about writing louder.
It’s about writing truer.

And when founders sound like founders not marketers, not templates, not AI their audience trusts them more, faster, deeper.
This is the SackBerry difference.
We don’t create voices.
We reveal them.

Do you think AI will take on creative jobs?


#PersonalBranding #Leadgeneration #AI

My biggest case study is a million-dollar client & I pitched him through cold outreach.

People assume big clients come through fancy networks, warm intros, or some “secret connection”.

Mine didn’t.

My biggest case study is a million-dollar founder running a public company in the travel space.
Believe it or not but it started with something extremely simple:
A cold DM.

No one vouched for me or introduced us.
I wasn’t “known” then.
I just sent a message because I believed I could genuinely help.

And he took a chance on me.

And from there, we took his account from 15K → 100K followers within a year.

Here’s what that one DM turned into:

📍 a massive confidence boost
📍 the proof that cold outreach isn’t dead
📍 one of my strongest partnerships
📍 a turning point for my agency

People overcomplicate growth.

But honestly, so much of my journey changed the day I stopped overthinking and simply sent the message.

Sometimes the opportunity you’re waiting for…
is one DM away.

So tell me, what’s the one message you’ve been procrastinating?
And what’s stopping you from sending it today?


#PersonalBrand #Marketing

taplio

The Battle

Wes Kao

Sakshi Darpan

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance ScoreWes Kao's LinkedIn Performance

Performance ScoreSakshi Darpan's LinkedIn Performance

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

taplio

The Battle

Wes Kao

Sakshi Darpan

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Wes Kao's LinkedIn Performance

Performance ScoreSakshi Darpan's LinkedIn Performance

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

Performance ScoreWes Kao's LinkedIn Performance