The Discovery of Content Marketing
Kurtis Pykes had been working as a machine learning engineer in London for only 9 months when the first cases of COVID-19 spread to the UK. There was little productivity in his department, so when talk of a lockdown started circulating, he knew his financial security was on thin ice. The announcement to close all offices and work from home came shortly after. Fortunately for Kurtis, the UK government created a scheme to pay up to 80% of employees’ salaries to prevent mass layoffs amid the crisis. The catch was that employees placed on the scheme were not allowed to work for the company. He was the first person in his company to be placed on the furlough program. So now, with 80% of his salary secured for the next 3 months and absolutely nothing to do at home, Kurtis was left with a choice. He could wait it out and see what happens in 3 months, or send out hundreds of resumes and see who gets back to him. Kurtis chose neither. Instead, he remembered a piece of advice from his line manager, “Write to help improve your thinking,” and used that as his cue to go all out on his Medium blog.
Engineering Attention in an Algorithmic World
Today, Kurtis Pykes is the Founder of Stackedwize, a highly profitable ghostwriting agency that helps freelancers, solopreneurs, and thought leaders build and scale online businesses with content marketing. At the time of writing, Kurtis has generated in excess of fifteen million dollars in sales pipeline for clients via organic channels and states he has set his sights on making that become the minimum standard for each individual client.
The Quiet Years Before the Code Cracked
The progression was anything but a straight line. Prior to becoming an entrepreneur, Pykes was a professional footballer (soccer). After finishing school at 15, he went straight into full-time work as a football apprentice, and when the scholarship ended in 2014, he was offered his first professional contract, which he turned down in search of guaranteed playing time. Thus, he spent the next two years playing semi-professional football on a part-time basis.
At the back end of 2015, many professional clubs were in for Pykes, but the club he was playing for didn’t let him go. Around this time, he had also gotten baptized and devoted himself to Christianity. A club from outside of London requested Kurtis come for a trial, which he did (and they loved him), but upon revision, he realized he was more committed to his faith and didn’t want to leave London to play football. A few months later, he officially retired from football.
He stayed in the church for 4 years and grew to become one of the prominent members in the church community. At one point, Kurtis led a community of 70+ youth and was ordained as a Pastor at 21 years old, where he got significant training in dealing with people. This all ended in 2019. When asked why, Pykes stated, “One day, I just got an epiphany that I didn’t need to go back there. I was working as a postman, which is not where I wanted my life to go, and I figured I needed to cut out irrelevant things to get it back on track. I couldn’t quit my job because I needed money to pay my bills, so I chose the church since it was taking up most of my time.”
In the background, he had been learning how to code and teaching himself math because he was intrigued by the growth of AI. But a few months after leaving, Pykes was contacted by Panorama, a TV show where experts investigate and provide their insights on current affairs. It turns out the church Pykes had been attending was listed as a religious cult. Driven by guilt over his contributions to the church, Pykes decided to communicate with the Panorama team and participated in an exposé that aired in December 2019. During this time, he had left the post office and landed his first engineering role after teaching himself to code.
Pykes was the first AI hire in the digital experience agency he worked for, so much of his job revolved around building prototypes and presenting them to team members to spark ideas. To help him improve communication during these presentations, his line manager suggested he write everything down, but Kurtis took it to the next level and decided to publish it on Medium. To this day, his first blog is one of his most popular articles. But that wasn’t enough to get him to devote himself to writing articles. Pykes only got serious about writing on his blog when he realized he might be made redundant due to the financial disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, and his writing was an instant hit.
Building Pipelines Through Pure Conviction
Pykes has stated the goal for Stackedwize is to scale to 7-figures. The business operates on a ruthless commitment to quality control and audience specificity. Pykes works primarily with technical founders and artificial intelligence leaders, but has tons of experience working with leaders from other sectors, such as marketing and business intelligence. The majority of his clients are brilliant minds who often struggle to translate their complex technical capabilities into compelling, readable narratives, but many are also those strapped for time and want to delegate responsibility so they can focus on other endeavors. A common trap for these leaders is failing to understand how to hook people on varying platforms. Pykes says, “Different platforms adhere to different writing styles, so what works on LinkedIn may not work on X and vice versa. So you must first follow the winning formula while maintaining your message. That is your voice.” Thus, Pykes forces clients to learn from what’s already working on their chosen platform and inject their messaging into those winning formats. The financial results of this strategy are staggering. For one artificial intelligence product management coach, Pykes identified a critical gap in her acquisition model. She was spending $13,000 per month on paid advertising to generate $20,000 in revenue. Her lack of an organic presence made prospects deeply skeptical. They saw the ads, but they could not find the authority behind them.
Pykes stepped in and optimized her entire digital footprint on LinkedIn. He developed a highly targeted lead magnet based on proven, fundamental concepts and the asset exploded upon release. This single act added three million dollars to the client’s sales pipeline, and when coupled with targeted email marketing, it drove the client to her first one hundred thousand dollar revenue month.
This level of scale requires intense, unyielding discipline. Pykes refuses to increase publishing volume until the core strategy is absolutely flawless.
“No piece of content should be able to go live without passing the minimum quality check of ‘Will this help me achieve my goal?’” Pykes explains.
He demands absolute authority from his clients. When founders attempt to soften their writing out of fear of criticism, Pykes strips the hesitation away completely. He removes their safety nets.
“The conviction and charisma you have must bleed into your content with the language you use,” he states.
If a client edits a draft to include phrases like “I think” or “I believe,” Pykes immediately removes them. He argues that such words reduce strong beliefs to mere suggestions. He forces his clients to be assertive. He makes them stand firmly by their expertise. The market responds to that certainty with millions in closed business.
The Algorithm of Human Connection
Six years ago, a deadly virus decided his engineering role was no longer necessary. Kurtis Pykes could have accepted that outcome and faded into the background. Instead, he built his own system for generating demand and capturing attention.
He took the analytical rigor of machine learning and applied it to the unpredictable world of organic publishing. He proved that trust can be engineered at scale if the foundation is built on absolute conviction. He did not just replace his lost salary. He wrote his way into a completely different stratosphere.
Kurtis Pykes is the Founder of Stackedwize, based in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. He helps founders and leaders get discovered, trusted, and paid through strategic organic content. To connect with Kurtis or learn more, visit his LinkedIn profile at https://www.linkedin.com/in/kurtispykes/
