Best 10 social media marketing agencies in the UK

Social media marketing is vital to any businesses success, whether you're a plumber or a pastry shop owner. Read all about the best marketing agencies in the UK here.

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Social media is an ever-changing entity of marketing that takes time and effort for business owners to manage. That’s why companies often look to social media marketing agencies for help building and maintaining their social channels.

Our top recommendations for the best social media marketing agencies in the UK are:

  1. Spin Brands: best for managing every aspect of your social media marketing with vast expertise and experience
  2. We Are Social: best for thumb-stopping, creative social campaigns
  3. Digital Media Team: best for businesses wanting to get the highest returns out of their paid social strategy
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Spin Brands

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We Are Social

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Digital Media Team

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One Umbrella

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Burst Digital

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Prohibition PR

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Atomic Digital Marketing

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Our Own Brands

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Yell

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Favoured

Best for

Managing every aspect of your social media marketing with vast expertise and experience

Best for

Thumb-stopping, creative social campaigns

Best for

Businesses wanting to get the highest returns out of their paid social strategy

Best for

Businesses that want quick paid social results and a friendly, communicative relationship with their agency

Best for

Engaging with your customers through socials

Best for

Businesses that want strong PR messaging throughout their social campaigns

Best for

New businesses that need affordable assistance in setting up social accounts

Best for

Creating a bold brand identity and showcasing it through social media campaigns

Best for

Multi-channel advertising on social media

Best for

Businesses that want to boss TikTok social campaigns

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From our research and expert social media marketing experience, we’ve deduced that Spin Brands, We Are Social, and Digital Media Team are the cream of the crop in their respective specialisms. However, the companies in this article are just 10 of over 5,000 agencies offering social media marketing services across the UK.

It is an overwhelming and time-consuming task to research such a huge number of providers, let alone compare the costs of one agency to another — particularly when many fees aren’t readily available online.

This is where our free cost comparison tool comes in handy. The tool is designed by our digital marketing industry experts and helps you pick the right social media marketing agency for your business, by offering you quotes from a number of reputable UK providers.

All you need to do is answer a couple of simple questions and we’ll send you a selection of free, no-obligation quotes in a matter of minutes. It really is that easy.

Or, if you’d like to learn more about the best social media marketing agencies in the UK for small businesses, read on.

Get the best marketing support for your business today Have you used a social media marketing agency before? Request info - it only takes a minute and is a 100% free service

1. Spin Brands

Average cost: £80–£130 per hour

Spin Brands is unlike the other agencies on our list, in that it specialises in one thing and one thing only — and that is social media marketing.

When it comes to social, you can’t get much better than Spin Brands. While other agencies on our list offer social as a component of their digital marketing service, compared to an agency like Spin, the depth of social marketing expertise, experience and results are lacking.

Spin Brands manages every aspect of your social media needs, from producing creative organic content to drive up followers and increase engagement rates, to using ambassadors (sophisticated influencers) to help grow your brand awareness and build a community of loyal customers.

The Spin Brands website is jam-packed with incredible case studies showcasing the agency’s triumphs in one of the most competitive and challenging digital marketing spaces. Successful campaigns include organic social growth, strategy implementation and an incredibly fruitful ambassador campaign for retail giants Lovehoney.

They also boast a unique content marketing strategy that is refreshed every few months to ensure strategies do not become repetitive, bland, and stagnant (a commonly occurring problem in social media marketing).

The list of reasons Spin brands is our number one social media marketing agency could go on, but we have a word count to stick to so here’s our list of pros and cons.

Pros:
  • Incredibly competent creative team to help produce assets and create videos for all organic posts
  • Boosting framework strategy (ad optimisation) that gets results so you aren’t wasting money on poorly performing paid ads
  • Multi-channel capabilities spanning from Linkedin to Pinterest
  • Account manager for regular communication across all campaigns
  • Increases in ROI are consistent and effectively displayed in data and analysis
  • Spend time re-working content and turning it into unique posts
Cons:
  • Focuses heavily on mid-market businesses so for smaller businesses can be expensive
  • Specialises in social media marketing only — not the right choice for a business that wants an all round digital marketing service

2. We Are Social: best for thumb-stopping, creative social campaigns

Average cost: £80–£130 per hour

We Are Social is one of the biggest players on our list, boasting clients such as Uber Eats, Samsung, and Netflix.

This agency isn’t cheap, but you pay for what you get and with We Are Social, it’s creative excellence. They are ideal for any business looking to rebrand in an explosive, eye-catching way on social media.

Specialising in a number of marketing categories, We are Social is unmatched when it comes to social media strategising. With expertise built on global research and insight across countless industries, it offers social insights, competitor analysis, social audits and even cultural intelligence analysis, something not offered by other agencies.

Pros:
  • Influencer co-creation to help brands reach new audiences
  • A dedicated team of journalists and writers to help you create not just social posts, but a 12-month roadmap of brand stories
  • Production studio that can help you create videos, podcasts, social commerce content and even documentaries
  • Campaign results readily available on the website to prove success
  • Thorough and in-depth, industry leading social media strategy that guarantees growth
Cons:
  • Costly — a hefty investment for small businesses
  • If you want a simple social media strategy the offering may be overwhelming
Social media marketing agencies usually only offer bespoke pricing.

This is typical of the industry, so if you’d like us to make choosing a provider easier for you, why not use our cost comparison tool to compare quotes for free.

Simply spend one minute answering a few questions, and we will do the rest!

3. Digital Media Team: best for businesses wanting to get the highest returns out of their paid social strategy

Average cost: £50–£80 per hour

Boasting its position in the top 5% of UK agencies, Digital Media Team (DMT) has perfected an approach to paid social that has them sitting comfortably as one of the best social media marketing agencies in the UK.

Specialising in ecommerce marketing, DMT can help grow your business through its tried and tested paid social methods and its Meta business partnership. It is the only UK agency with access to ROI Hunter, a revolutionary product marketing platform (PMP) that helps ecommerce retailers to become more profitable.

Its ecommerce marketing capabilities don’t stop there, as the agency will build a Shopify store for your business and ensure it is optimised for sales conversions.

DMT offers its clients ad retargeting, ad design and omni-channel posting, all with the aim of improving your return on ad spend (ROAS) which is a vitally important KPI for any business wanting to grow and market successfully on its social media channels.

Pros:
  • Constant optimisation and retargeting of ads ensures your ROAS is high and your ad spend remains low
  • Ideal for small businesses as it’s far more affordable than its competitors, yet with Meta Business Partner status and ROI improvement capabilities
  • Initial exploration call gives you an opportunity to run through market position and business goals
  • Experts in paid social ad delivery across a variety of platforms — from Snapchat to TikTok to Pinterest
Cons:
  • Will only work with brands that have at least £3,000 monthly ad spend budget
  • Ecommerce focused marketing — limiting for businesses in other industries
What is return on ad spend (ROAS)?

ROAS is a metric used to determine how successful an ad campaign has been. It is a metric that is typically calculated as the revenue that is generated compared to every pound spent on an advertising campaign.

Let’s say you made £10 for every £1 you spent on a paid social campaign — your ROAS for that campaign would be 10:1.

4. One Umbrella: best for businesses that want quick paid social results and a friendly, communicative relationship with their agency

Average cost: £80 — £130 per hour

One Umbrella has rave reviews, in large thanks to an incredibly personalised service miraculously delivered by one of the smallest social media marketing teams on our list.

Prompt communication is a key factor in selecting an agency, and One Umbrella scores full marks when it comes to quick and effective communication with all of its clients.

Along with its excellent client support, you will get guaranteed results in 60 days or less for any paid social campaigns using One Umbrella’s tried-and-tested funnel optimisation formula. This makes it ideal for those businesses that want quick returns on ad investment.

One Umbrella’s client selection process is thorough and includes a list of four collaboration criteria, ensuring the relationship between you and the agency is going to work before you make a big investment on any social media projects or campaigns.

Pros:
  • Free 45-minute consultation provided that assesses six factors of your business to determine your goals
  • Adaptive brand positioning enables your marketing strategy to fit your audience more specifically, enabling you to find more loyal customers in less time
  • Heavy focus on conversion optimisation enables businesses to guarantee a higher return on investment (ROI) than using other agencies that focus less on funnels and client journeys
  • Excellent customer commitment is evident through long term ‘partnership’ mindset
Cons:
  • Zero focus on branding and creative production means you are limited in what other social media aspects One Umbrella can support with
  • Very sales focused media agency — if you are more concerned with brand awareness and community building than ROI, they aren’t the agency for you
Get the best marketing support for your business today Have you used a social media marketing agency before? Request info - it only takes a minute and is a 100% free service

5. Burst Digital: best for engaging with your customers through socials

Average cost: £300–£2,500 per month, depending on package

Burst Digital offers a wide variety of digital marketing services, specialising in social media management and four key areas of focus — strategy, attraction, engagement and conversion.

Using Burst Digital as your agency is ideal for businesses that want to regularly engage with their customers across social platforms via DMs and comments. The agency does this on your behalf, whilst also helping you create GIFs and Instagram filters to help you entertain your social media following.

They are also the most environmentally conscious out of the agencies on our list. They reward clients that have a positive impact on the planet with discount rates, and plant a mini forest for every project they undertake.

You’ll get posts published during peak engagement hours, a well-maintained regular posting schedule and strategic boosting of posts to ensure your KPIs are met, whether they be engagement rates, click throughs or impressions.

Pros:
  • Offers reduced rates to businesses and non-profit organisations that are positively impacting the planet
  • Branded content creation to help you attract audiences
  • Posts are optimised for conversions, leads and sales
Cons:
  • Recurring paid social ads can increase ROAS because ad campaigns are not being re-focused regularly enough

6. Prohibition PR: Best for businesses that want strong PR messaging throughout their social campaigns

Average cost: £80–£130 per hour

As well as being a multi-award winning PR agency, Prohibition also offers full-service social media marketing management.

This includes one of Prohibition’s specialties — in-depth competitor analysis. This involves studying active users’ references and hashtags as well as finding out which social media platforms your prospective clients are active on.

When working with Prohibition you will also benefit from the team’s impressive ability to create buyer personas by profiling your brand’s social media target audience requirements. This will help you in targeting the right audience for your social campaigns.

Other services include competitions and campaign promos and a community management monitor to help you build a rapport with your followers, as well as promote positive brand awareness.

Pros:
  • Provides monthly reports to keep you up to date with progress and track KPIs
  • Media coverage easily secured for your social campaigns and competitions due to its award-winning PR agency
  • Works closely with you to develop a content writing style guide that matches the tone of your business
  • Thorough paid social strategy that includes a seven-day audit and an ad account audit and tune-up
Cons:
  • Video and creative content although available, is not as adept as other agencies
  • Branding also lacking

7. Atomic Digital Marketing: best for new businesses that need affordable assistance in setting up social accounts

Average cost: £20–£40 per hour

Atomic Digital Marketing proudly holds the title of Clutch’s Digital Marketing Agency of the Year 2021, and for good reason.

It prides itself on thorough social media reporting, and working with them will give your business access to actionable and insightful monthly reports across all social platforms.

This will include key metrics, post analysis, and even hashtag analysis, allowing you to monitor performance and make executive decisions.

They offer brand new businesses the perfect platform to kickstart their social media journeys, effectively setting up and branding all required social media channels on a company’s behalf.

You can benefit from Atomic’s impressive post designs and reliable scheduling at optimal times, as well as grow your following and expand your audience through a proficient community management service.

This includes consistent social media engagement with your followers and collaborations with influencers, among other things.

Pros:
  • Very affordable and fairly priced compared to other competitors
  • Dedicated account managers that respond quickly to any queries
  • Specialists in TikTok social advertising, with powerful retargeting campaigns and reporting
  • Clear stats demonstrating agencies success — 6.2 average ROAS across 100+ global clients
  • Affordable rates for such a reputable agency
Cons:
  • Video content is lacking and no production studio for video ads or campaigns
  • Reviews are strongly related to web design services not social media marketing
We get it, there are plenty of agencies offering similar services, and it can be time-consuming reading through reviews and analysing comparison tables…

So why not save time and effort by using our social media marketing service comparison tool?

Simply answer four to five questions about what you need and you’ll receive bespoke pricing and service information to make it easier to select the best provider for you. It only takes a minute and there are zero obligations.

8. Our Own Brand: best for creating a bold brand identity and showcasing it through social media campaigns

Average cost: £90–£130 per hour (20% discount for nonprofits and early stage startups).

Our Own Brand (OOB) offers complete social media management through outsourcing, so you can sit back and let one of the UK’s strongest brand creators do the hard work for you.

The agency will take care of your social strategy, brand campaigns, paid social and content creation.

And when it comes to content creation, you can feel confident OOB’s competent production team will create a suite of beautifully branded content that includes films, photography and short social media videos to enrich your social media presence.

If you are after a total rebrand that can be promoted successfully across all your social media channels, look no further than OOB.

Pros:
  • Proven ROI results across countless social media campaigns, including most recently a 223% increase in impressions and 53% increase in engagement for a music festival social campaign
  • One of the strongest production teams available across all agencies — ideal for video campaigns
  • Brand consultancy, workshops and a proficient rebrand offering before you begin moving forward with any social media activity
  • Solid content creation offering — from custom graphics and GIFs to AR lenses and infographics
Cons:
  • Very expensive compared to other agencies, setting you back at least £120 per hour
  • Little offering of community engagement and influencer social media marketing

9. Yell: best for multi-channel advertising on social media

Average cost: Bespoke pricing

Yell specialises in social media advertising across a number of different channels, and as a Meta Business Partner demonstrates particular campaign expertise on both Facebook and Instagram.

Although it doesn’t offer content creation or community engagement, its innovative Smart Performance solution is a standout feature that can streamline advertising in just a few clicks.

It does this by driving visitors to your website using social media, search and display advertising, which is great for businesses that want to focus efforts on targeted ads across social.

Yell also offers unified reporting across all channels, so you can monitor how each ad is performing and, in turn, keep track of any KPIs to ensure the agency is delivering.

Pros:
  • Offers Smart Performance — a fully managed blended advertising solution that enables advert creation across multiple channels in minutes
  • Increased visibility and potential for organic social growth as a result of being advertised on Yell.com’s online network
  • Access to an online dashboard with stats updated daily to monitor paid social performance
Cons:
  • Limited social media offering — no content creation or video production
  • No community engagement or influencer marketing

10. Favoured: best for businesses that want to boss Tik Tok social campaigns

Average cost: £80 – £130 per hour

Favoured is one of the smaller agencies on our list but that by no means belittles their effectiveness as one of the most exciting social media management companies in the UK.

Particularly known for its in-house video production team, Favoured is the perfect agency for any business that wants to market successfully on TikTok. They have a dedicated team of experts and a proven track record of ROI results on the popular social platform.

The agency also specialises in micro influencer marketing and has a host of reliable contacts and collaborators to assist you in driving engagement and increasing followers for your social media channels.

They also offer content creation and long-form copywriting to help you capture audiences with engaging content and social posts, ensuring they are the right tone and target the ideal audience.

Pros:
  • Industry experts on hand to help excel your campaigns - including a former Apple marketing lead as co-founder
  • Consistently meet deadlines for projects and clearly communicate performance against KPIs
  • Micro influencer marketing service increases engagement by 60% on average, and this includes relationship management and asset creation
  • Free social media marketing audit to get you started
Cons:
  • Smaller team means content output isn’t as frequent as at larger agencies, so there are limitations on big campaigns
Get the best marketing support for your business today Have you used a social media marketing agency before? Request info - it only takes a minute and is a 100% free service

How to choose the right social media marketing agency for you

When making an executive decision about which social media marketing agency you want to work with, it’s important to consider the following question:

What makes a good agency and what is it I’m looking for?

Dedicated platform experts

Agencies should offer support for every social media platform but particularly the big two — Facebook and Instagram — and the rising star, TikTok.

Think about your industry and what platforms your customers frequently use. An agency specialising in a particular social platform could be more beneficial.

Niche industry experts are stronger than all-rounders

Half of the battle of succeeding on social media is understanding what your followers want, what they are thinking and what content they will engage with.

Agencies that specialise in particular industries (like ecommerce) will be better placed to look after your social media channels for your online business as they will have tried-and-tested industry knowledge.

The tools at their disposal and the features they have

Social media management tools are in abundance, so you’d expect your agency to use the very best of the best. Be sure to ask them what tools they are using — here are some examples of what you’d want them to have:

  1. monday.com or Coschedule for scheduling social posts
  2. Adobe suite, and particularly Photoshop or similar for producing graphics
  3. Data analytic tools
  4. Consistent engagement on platforms and influencer marketing management tools

Quick and efficient response times with strong customer support and open communication

Want something sorted out on your Facebook page and need it done right now and not in two days? You need a team of fast responders who you can easily get in touch with, particularly if you are fully outsourcing your social media management.

Proof of success

You want proof of the agency’s achievements, through case studies, positive ROI and ROAS examples and the awards they have won.

Their own social media presence

A social media agency with a terrible social media presence doesn’t spark confidence.

They set clear, measurable KPIs

Once confident with your brand they should be able to set performance targets that can be monitored so you know they are doing a good job and can see what is working and what isn’t.

Client retention

Retained clients are happy clients – if they have been working alongside companies for a long time you know they must be doing a good job.

Next steps: compare social media marketing agencies

To summarise, the best social media marketing agencies available in the UK are:

  1. Spin Brands
  2. We are Social
  3. Digital Media Team
  4. One Umbrella
  5. Burst Digital
  6. Prohibition PR
  7. Atomic Digital Marketing
  8. Our Own Brand
  9. Yell
  10. Favoured

Each agency has its own unique selling points, but any business looking to achieve huge success through social media marketing should look no further than Spin Brands.

You can’t get much better than an agency that has developed an incredibly effective ad optimisation framework strategy and built a team of dedicated account managers. Even better, they’re happy to rework and tailor content to guarantee an increase in ROI.

When it comes to creative social media marketing however, We Are Social is undeniably the best option. Its dedicated team of experienced content creators and impressive production studio are perfect for those businesses wanting to exceed through video content.

Those businesses that want maximum return on ad spend and a guaranteed chance of profiting from paid social campaigns, should be opting for Digital Media Team as its agency.

The problem is there are so many social media marketing agencies to choose from, and as is clear from our review, the majority of them offer different fees for various campaigns and projects.

The easiest way to get over these hurdles and be sure you are picking the right agency for you is to use our free cost comparison tool.

By using the tool, you will receive direct pricing quotes from some of the UK’s top social media marketing agencies, saving yourself time and money.

Simply spend a minute answering four to five easy questions and we will do the rest.

Written by:
Ross has been writing for Startups since 2021, specialising in telephone systems, digital marketing, payroll, and sustainable business. He also runs the successful entrepreneur section of the website. Having graduated with a Masters in Journalism, Ross went on to write for Condé Nast Traveller and the NME, before moving in to the world of business journalism. Ross has been involved in startups from a young age, and has a keen eye for exciting, innovative new businesses. Follow him on his Twitter - @startupsross for helpful business tips.

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