We’re Assisting Sheffield BID With a Digital Strategy to Improve City Centre Footfall

Sheffield Business Improvement District (BID) – the not-for-profit business group dedicated to promoting and enhancing Sheffield city centre – has appointed us to support a new strategic push to grow its consumer audience and strengthen engagement with city centre users.

As a business-led organisation, Sheffield BID delivers additional services that complement, rather than duplicate, those provided by the local authority.

After being re-elected for a third term, Sheffield BID will spend the next five years dedicated to “delivering work that strengthens Sheffield’s trading environment, boosts footfall, enhances safety and supports the city centre’s competitiveness as a place to work, invest and operate”.

A key focus for the new term is expanding visibility of events, offers, and activities designed to drive footfall and visitor spend to support the local economy.

To accelerate growth, the BID sought specialist support from within its own levy payer network and identified us as a local partner with strong insight into its city centre audiences.

We advised that the most impactful direction would be a paid Meta Ads campaign, as the highly granular targeting within Meta Suite would allow the ads to target relevant, local audiences across Facebook and Instagram.

After initial conversations and a strong proposal, Sheffield BID decided to partner with the leading Sheffield agency.

Diane Jarvis, CEO at Sheffield BID, exclaimed, “We’re pleased to partner with The SEO Works. As a major city centre employer with a team that reflects the very audiences we’re trying to reach, they bring valuable insight into how people use and experience the city.

This is an ideal opportunity to collaborate on a campaign that’s uniquely focused on place rather than product.”

The campaign will include a variety of user-generated content in the form of videos to capture attention in the feeds and get people excited about what’s happening in Sheffield. The ads will encourage users to sign up to a weekly bulletin so they are notified of upcoming events.

Over time, we will look to expand into surrounding counties, like Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire, to attract visitors from further away.

Alex Hill, our Sales Director, mirrored Diane’s sentiment. He said, “We love to support local businesses with their digital marketing, so being able to assist Sheffield BID means the impact will be felt across the city for multiple businesses. It’s a really special opportunity, and we’re honoured to have been chosen to lead the strategy.”

We have assisted a number of Sheffield-based businesses, including Nam Song, Identity Merchandise and Weldricks Pharmacy.