A Leeds-based financial services firm was invisible for every search term that mattered commercially.

They ranked on page one for their brand name and nothing else. Their competitors held position one through three for every term their potential clients were actually searching. The firm had good people, strong reviews, and a credible track record. None of it was visible to anyone who did not already know them.

A six-month programme combining technical SEO, a content strategy built around financial services questions people actually search, and targeted link acquisition brought them to position one for their three highest-value keywords. Organic leads increased 78% in six months.

Position 1 for 3 commercial keywords. Organic leads up 78% in 6 months.
£14bn
Leeds financial services sector UK's largest outside London
Leeds LEP 2024
1st
Fastest-growing UK city by employment rate 2023-24
ONS 2024
78%
Organic lead increase for Leeds FS firm after 6-month SEO programme
Asquare AI client data
Plain English

What social media advertising actually is, explained simply

Word of mouth used to be the most powerful marketing in the world. One happy customer would tell three friends. Social media advertising is word of mouth at scale: except instead of telling three friends, one piece of well-placed content can reach three thousand people who look just like your best customers. The catch is that you have to earn the right to be there. Nobody forwards an advert. They share something that taught them something, made them laugh, or made them think. The skill is making content that does one of those things AND sells.

Permission marketing is the privilege of delivering anticipated, personal, and relevant messages to people who actually want to receive them.

Seth Godin
Permission Marketing (1999)
Godin's insight, written before social media existed, predicted exactly how it would work. Interrupting people with irrelevant ads builds resentment. Earning permission by being genuinely useful, entertaining, or interesting builds the kind of audience that actually buys. The brands winning on social media in 2024 have permission. The ones losing are still interrupting.
NEWS
1st fastest-growing UK city by employment rate 2023-24. Leeds is the UK's fastest-growing city by employment and hosts the largest financial services cluster outside London. Competition for digital visibility among professional services firms has intensified significantly.
Source: ONS 2024 / Leeds City Region LEP
The social media reach funnel
How audiences move from unaware to customer
Awareness reached by content
Consideration engaged with post or ad
Intent visited your website
Conversion contacted or purchased

Retargeting is the mechanism that moves people from Consideration to Conversion. It shows ads to people who already know you, at the moment they are closest to deciding.

Why Leeds businesses are investing in social media advertising now

£14bn
Leeds financial services sector UK's largest outside London
Leeds LEP 2024
1st
Fastest-growing UK city by employment rate 2023-24
ONS 2024
78%
Organic lead increase for Leeds FS firm after 6-month SEO programme
Asquare AI client data

Leeds has the largest financial services cluster outside London. Direct Line, Yorkshire Building Society, First Direct, and Lloyds Banking Group all have major presences here. The city is also the UK's fastest-growing by employment, attracting national businesses and intensifying competition for customers and talent year on year.

Industries we serve in Leeds

Financial services (Direct Line, Yorkshire Building Society, First Direct) Legal and professional services Retail and fashion (Asda, Marks and Spencer) Technology and digital agencies

Social Media Advertising services
for Leeds businesses

Paid social campaigns that target the right audience with creative that stops the scroll. Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn advertising managed end-to-end.

Audience strategy and targeting

Audiences built from your actual customer data: demographics, interests, lookalikes from your best customers, and retargeting lists of people who have already visited your site. We target people likely to buy, not just people who loosely fit a category.

Creative development

Ad creative that earns attention. Images, carousels, and short-form video scripts. We brief, produce, and test multiple variations. Most accounts run one creative for months without testing. We test systematically to find what actually converts.

Meta advertising (Facebook and Instagram)

Full Meta campaign management across feed, Stories, Reels, and Messenger. Every placement and bidding decision is made against your actual conversion data, not default settings.

LinkedIn advertising

LinkedIn lets you target by job title, seniority, company size, and industry. Higher cost per click than Meta, but for B2B businesses with high-value clients, the lead quality is in a different category. We manage the full setup and optimisation.

Retargeting campaigns

Ads shown to people who have already visited your site or engaged with your content. Retargeting consistently delivers the highest ROAS of any paid social format because the audience already knows who you are.

Performance reporting

Cost per result, ROAS, reach, and frequency reported monthly with analysis of what is working and what we are changing. We do not dress up weak results with impressive-looking reach numbers.

Questions from Leeds businesses

Is Facebook advertising still effective in 2024?
Yes, for the right business types and with the right creative. The mistake most businesses make is treating Facebook ads like print ads: a static image with a logo and a phone number. The ads that work in 2024 look like content, not ads. We build creative that fits the feed, not creative that interrupts it.
Should we use Meta or LinkedIn for B2B advertising?
It depends on who you are trying to reach. LinkedIn gives you more precise job title and company targeting, which is valuable for reaching specific decision-makers. Meta has far larger reach and lower CPCs, which works for B2B businesses with a broad target audience. Most B2B businesses benefit from both, used for different objectives.
How much of our budget goes to Asquare AI versus to the platforms?
We charge a management fee for running your campaigns. Your ad spend goes directly to Meta or Google. We will explain the split clearly in our proposal. Our management fees are structured to scale with what you are spending, so they represent a smaller percentage as budgets grow.
Is digital marketing competitive in Leeds?
Yes. Leeds is the UK's fastest-growing city by employment, which means more businesses, more competition, and a higher bar for digital visibility. Financial services, legal, and tech businesses in Leeds are all investing significantly in digital.
Do you work with Leeds financial services businesses?
Yes. Leeds has the UK's largest financial services cluster outside London. We understand the compliance sensitivities, the longer consideration cycles, and the search behaviour of financial services customers.

Ready to grow your Leeds business?

Get a free social media advertising audit for your Leeds business. We will identify your biggest opportunities and tell you exactly what we would do first.