Meet Marcus Raiyat, the founder of CircleMount Media.
With a background in mathematics and a passion for learning, Marcus has honed his skills in marketing, branding, and web development through self-teaching and hands-on experience.
Before venturing into the world of digital entrepreneurship, he achieved remarkable success in the trading education industry with his venture, LogicFx, providing educational resources to traders.
Marcus's journey to becoming a prominent figure in the digital landscape also includes a stellar gaming career during his university years, where he ranked 2nd in Europe.
Let's jump into how Marcus created it.
Marcus, can you walk us through your teenage years and how your success in the gaming world shaped your outlook on business and success?
"My teenage years were pretty standard. Grammar school kid, competitive hockey to regional level, chess captain, mathematics and physics olympiad and house parties. Hit the grades to get into uni. That takes us to when I was 18/19. My path deviated from the norm when I found competitive online gaming.
I took my University team to be the UK champions for 2 years running and we were ranked 2nd in Europe.
So how did this shape my outlook for my current business? Gaming really accelerated important lessons that usually are very financially expensive. When gaming, in a competitive sense, high-risk continual controlled losses are common.
The only way to overcome them is with genuine accountability and self-reflection. Without gaming, I estimate over a decade of actual business experience would be required to gain the same knowledge picked up in a year of competitive gaming.
Competitive gaming encourages focusing on the small things and proper planning. Which, funnily enough, is exactly what is required for any successful start-up.
It might sound cliche, but it is usually the boring stuff that works. It is easy to get suckered into just the attractive big picture and overlook the small baby steps required to get there."
Having studied actuary maths, how do you think formal education has influenced your journey, especially when you transitioned into marketing, branding, and web development?
"Formal education had little direct influence on the businesses I started, however, whilst there I met colleagues, friends and partners who helped mould a lot of my ideas into reality. I suppose naturally enjoying mathematics and creativity helped a bit too. For those who are interested, I contemplated becoming a professional artist in my early teens. "
What challenges did you face when teaching yourself about marketing and branding, and how did you overcome them?
Are there any resources or strategies you found particularly helpful?
"The biggest challenge with marketing is that there are no clear rules. Anything goes, and it’s all about how you execute your ideas.
I think the best resource is to go out in the world and observe what successful brands are currently doing using tools like Facebook Ad Library (a tool that shows you all the meta ads run by any company at a quick search) and pick up what works well, and try and find gaps they’ve missed.
Focus on the gaps, and build your uniqueness from there. "
LogiKFx provided educational resources to forex traders and saw significant traction. What was the inspiration behind founding it, and what strategies did you employ to make it stand out in the industry?
"Offering online educational material was a natural progression for Logikfx since a lot of the technology we provided required a decent understanding of macroeconomics. We wanted to expand our customer base beyond those with pre-existing knowledge and make it more accessible to a wider audience that wanted to get into macro-trading.
To stand out, we built tools similar to those used in macro-based funds and made them usable for your average-joe retail trader. We show full transparency on exactly how the technology works, all the data sources, and how to build it for yourself.
We also do not hold any introducing broker (IB) or affiliate agreements with any brokerage firm to eliminate all possibility of conflict of interest. Something that no competitor is willing to do.
This not only showed the true value of our product but also gave our users confidence in all of our material. I found this approach really helped us shine in the financial industry, as it gets a bad rep from the shady, unethical practices mostly driven by selfish money-hungry tactics."
After LogicFx, you founded CircleMount Media. How did your previous experience shape the vision and direction for this new venture? And how do the two companies differ in terms of mission and approach?
"Funnily enough, the missions are pretty similar. With Logikfx, we aim to help retail traders understand market dynamics faster, whilst, with Circleount Media, we are helping local businesses flourish in the online space.
Both help those in need and both require similar innovation in such competitive spaces."
Every founder faces ups and downs. Can you share a particular challenge you faced while building your companies and how you turned it into an opportunity or learning experience?
"The biggest challenge I particularly faced was thinking that everybody was my customer. Casting the net too wide, and in the wrong places.
I highly recommend starting small, marketing to audiences size that directly match your budget. If you’ve got £2k a month to spend on marketing, don’t try to target the whole world.
Focus on a city, county or region. I think this was the biggest obstacle I didn't fully understand until a couple of years into starting my first business."
You have a knack for building successful websites and understanding branding. What do you think founders need to pay the most attention to when building their brand?
"Visual aesthetics activate the emotion you want your ideal audience to feel when using your product. It’s all about emotion.
If you want your product to save time, make sure it's fast and easy to use. If you want your product to feel enjoyable include light-hearted comedic features, not-too-serious aspects, etc.
Focusing on the emotions felt will take your branding much further than just what looks pretty. "
For those looking to dive into the entrepreneurial world, especially those coming from a different academic background like yours, what advice would you give to navigate the transition successfully?
"Don’t quit. Every idea can be highly successful, provided the execution is correct. If you’re not successful yet, it means your execution needs practice. Avoid changing ideas too frequently at the start.
And something else that’s important - only compare yourself to businesses that have the same target audience as you. I think it's easy for founders to fall victim to false comparisons leading to inaccurate business decisions.
If you’re a takeaway, don’t take marketing tips from a Michelin-star restaurant.
And finally double down on things you’re already good at, rather than spending time on things you're bad at. Early on this will heavily accelerate your results. Once the money’s coming in, employ someone else to do the stuff you suck at. "
You've worn many hats – from gamer to actuary, to founder, to marketer. How do you effectively balance and harness these diverse skills in your business ventures? And how have they complemented each other?
"Balancing personal identity and responsibilities is a never-ending journey. Contrary to what some may think, I believe consistent change is net positive. Picking up hats from walks of life that are distant from your current path helps you grow the most.
I sometimes sacrifice becoming the best at certain skills, learning 60-70% of the knowledge, which is enough to know exactly who I need to partner with and what needs to be done.
Knowing when to be a perfectionist and when to learn enough to get the job done is something every entrepreneur needs to practice to succeed.
To do this effectively, I plan my year in advance, right the way down to what needs to be done each day.
Without a plan, there is no direction. Without direction, there is no destination."
As CircleMount Media continues to grow, what's next on the horizon for you? Are there any exciting projects or expansions in the pipeline that you can share with budding founders for inspiration?
"All of the projects I work with now are hand-picked and exciting. I’m partnering with businesses I would personally use and treat them with the same attention as if they were my own. It means I won’t be taking on many clients and instead focusing on growing ideas beyond the limits that founders thought previously possible."
If you could recommend any book to a founder, what would it be and why?
"The only book I’d ever recommend is thinking fast and slow. It is the ultimate guide on self-development and how to be accountable. Without those two skills, everything else is irrelevant."
Interested in learning more about Marcus and his companies? Find his links here: LogicFX, CircleMount Media and his Instagram
We look forward to building with you,
The foundercentre team
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