Full-Service Marketing Agency: PR, Social, Content, Creative and Video From One Leeds Team

A full-service marketing agency plans and delivers earned, owned and social communications, creative and production for a brand through one team and one strategy, rather than handing each channel to a different supplier. Prohibition PR is an independent, Leeds-based, award-winning full-service marketing agency delivering PR and media relations, digital PR, social media, content, creative, video, influencer marketing, product launches, reputation management and training through one team of around 28 people with one strategic lead, working UK-wide.

Independent agencies offering media, creative and communications under one roof do exist in the UK, but the phrase hides a distinction worth checking before you shortlist anyone. Some, like Prohibition, mean media relations and earned coverage, plus creative, content, social and in-house video production, delivered by a single planning team. Others mean paid media planning and buying with creative attached, which is a different business built on media commission and a different set of people. If you want PR, social, content, creative and video from one UK team, look for an owner-managed agency that can show you the people doing each discipline, and ask early whether "media" means buying or earning.

What is actually included in a full service marketing agency

The honest answer is that it varies, which is why a buyer should ask for a line-by-line scope rather than a services page. Here is ours, as of 2026, grouped the way we plan it. For the broader context of each discipline, our public relations, digital marketing and creative hubs go deeper.

"Media" means two things, and only one of them is in-house here

"Full service" does not tell you whether an agency buys media or earns it. Media relations means persuading journalists, broadcasters and publishers to cover your story, and that is what we deliver in-house. Paid media planning and buying means negotiating and purchasing advertising space on television, out-of-home, print, radio and programmatic networks, and Prohibition does not do that; our integrated marketing agency page sets the boundary out in full. We will produce the TV commercial, the OOH creative and the packaging, and we run paid social to amplify the campaigns we create, but if your brief needs a media agency to buy the space, you will need one alongside us, and we will say so at the first meeting rather than the last.

Full-service versus PR agency versus creative agency versus digital marketing agency

The difference between the four models is which discipline sits at the centre of the plan and which ones are bolted on afterwards. A PR agency plans from the story outwards, a creative agency from the idea, a digital marketing agency from the channel data, and a full-service or integrated marketing agency starts from the audience and the business problem and then chooses the mix. Each is the better buy in different situations.

Against the three alternatives a buyer usually weighs us against: a paid-media agency will outperform us on buying space, but will need someone to earn the coverage and make the content; a PR-only agency will match us on media relations but will subcontract or skip video, design and social; a large network can field more offices than a 28-person independent; what we offer instead is two owner-directors who stay on the account after the pitch. An independent integrated comms agency is the right answer when you want senior involvement throughout and one team planning every channel together, which is the case we set out in plain terms on our why Prohibition page.

When one team beats three suppliers, and when it does not

One agency beats three or four specialists when the channels have to carry the same idea at the same time and the cost of them drifting apart is high. That covers product launches, repositioning, recruitment campaigns, public information and behaviour change work, reputation-sensitive campaigns and anything on a tight timeline. A single specialist is the better answer when the job is genuinely one-channel, such as a pure SEO programme, a national media buy, or a brand identity project with no activation attached.

Integration pays in practice because of what gets removed. With separate PR, social and creative suppliers, the brand team becomes the integrator: three briefings, three sets of research, three timelines and three reports that do not reconcile. When the press angle, the influencer brief, the video treatment and the social calendar come from the same concept and the same planning meeting, the photographer on the launch shoot already knows which image the picture desk needs and which crop the paid social team wants, because they sat in the same room.

Reputation-sensitive work is the clearest case. When an issue breaks mid-campaign, PR, social and content all have to move together, immediately: holding statements, paused scheduled posts, community responses, revised creative. If those sit with three agencies, the first hour goes on conference calls. In our model one team pauses the calendar, drafts the statement, briefs the spokesperson and adjusts the content plan, with Chris Norton leading the response personally and Worldcom partner agencies brought in if the incident crosses borders.

How the work runs: Create, Engage, Convert as a method

Create, Engage, Convert is the operating sequence every brief follows, not a strapline. It starts with the business problem and ends with a report against the KPIs agreed at the beginning.

1. Brief and discovery (Create). We start with the commercial or reputational challenge, not the channel. Audience research, social listening and market data establish who needs to think or act differently, what is stopping them, and which objectives we are all signing up to. We also track what ChatGPT and Perplexity currently say about the brand.
2. Strategy and creative platform (Create). One creative idea is developed jointly by PR, social, content and video specialists, so it can earn coverage, work in a feed and carry on film. If an idea only works in one channel, it goes back to the drawing board.
3. Activation across channels (Engage). Press office, influencer programme, content calendar, production and paid social amplification run from one timeline with one account lead.
4. Live optimisation (Convert). Live tracking of coverage quality, reach, engagement, traffic and sentiment, with budget and content moved toward what is working.
5. Final reporting (Convert). Everything is reported in one framework using AMEC-aligned proINSIGHTS, linking activity to sales, listings, web traffic, share of voice, sentiment, sign-ups and behaviour change rather than to vanity metrics.

Proof: one team across earned, social, creative and video

Around 60% of our work is consumer PR, so the clearest examples come from consumer brands and charities. Between them these three show the same team delivering earned media, in-house video and photography, and social and influencer work, in different combinations depending on the brief.

• Yorkshire Cancer Research, Step Out for Yorkshire (earned, video and social). Our in-house video team produced three participant case-study films, we mapped five exercise routes, ran a radio day with the charity's chief executive and repurposed the films across social. The campaign delivered 130 pieces of coverage, 116 of them broadcast, with a 29M coverage reach and 9K social engagements.
• Goldsmiths, The Gift of Giving (in-house video and photography). A YouTube-first brand film with three story edits, six-second bumpers and a stills shoot feeding social, web and point of sale. The work reached more than 1.7 million YouTube views, and the campaign reported over £1M in total sales with a topline multichannel ROI of £7.94.
• C4 Energy, Ignite Your Fire (social, influencer, creative and paid amplification). Influencer mapping, videography and photography, social edits, a hero film, OOH creative and paid amplification from one team. Results were 86M impressions and 82M engagements, both above KPI, and a 27% follower increase above KPI.

On the FMCG side, a three-month campaign for Primula secured coverage in more than 50 national titles and supported a Morrisons listing for its new product development, and Better Eggs progressed from challenger launch to major retail presence and finalist status at The Grocer Gold Awards. That sustained consumer growth model is what our Growth Catalyst programme packages for food, drink and FMCG brands.

What it costs and how engagements are structured

Full-service work in the UK is bought one of two ways, and the fee covers different things in each. A retainer buys a fixed monthly allocation of senior and delivery time across PR, social and content, with planning, reporting and account leadership inside the fee. A project buys a scoped campaign with a defined output, usually a launch or a seasonal burst, priced on the days each discipline needs. In both cases, production costs such as shoot days, crew, talent, influencer fees and paid social budget sit outside the fee and are scoped separately, so you can see agency time and production spend as two lines.

Two points worth knowing when comparing quotes. First, an integrated retainer should cost less than the sum of three specialist retainers, because the research, planning and reporting that each specialist would charge for separately happen once. Second, fees scale with seniority of time and number of disciplines live in a given month, not with the number of channels on the logo slide, so ask any agency to show the time plan behind the number. We scope every engagement against the brief rather than publishing a rate card, and we will tell you if a brief is better served by a project than a retainer.

How to compare integrated marketing agencies in a pitch

A services list cannot tell you whether an agency plans as one team or operates as separate departments sharing a reception. These questions can, with the answer you should expect from a genuinely integrated agency.

1. Who is my single strategic lead, and what else do they run? One named senior person accountable for every channel, with the owner-directors still involved after the pitch.
2. Show me the people who will do the video, the design and the press office. Named in-house staff, not "our production partner" discovered on day one.
3. Does "media" mean buying or earning? A plain answer, with the gap named. Ours: earned in-house, paid social amplification in-house, media buying not offered.
4. Walk me through one campaign where PR, social and video were planned in the same meeting. A specific story with the sequencing, not three separate case studies stapled together.
5. How do you report? One framework across all channels tied to agreed business KPIs, ideally AMEC-aligned, rather than a coverage book plus a social dashboard plus a video view count.
6. What happens if an issue breaks on day three of the launch? A named crisis lead, a holding-statement process and the authority to pause social and paid activity as soon as the statement is agreed.
7. What would you tell me not to buy from you? An integrated agency that cannot name a service it does not offer is a bundle, not a team.

If you are shortlisting specifically on PR, social and content in one team, our comparison of ten UK agencies that combine the three covers the PR-led end of the market in more detail.

Independent, Leeds-based, working UK-wide

Prohibition was founded in Leeds in 2012 by Chris Norton, who still runs it with fellow owner-director Will Ockenden. We are independently owned, around 28 people, and all of them sit in one office in Leeds, with clients across Yorkshire, the North and the UK. There are no satellite offices, and the two owner-directors still own the business, which is why the people who pitch are the people who deliver. International reach comes through our membership of the Worldcom Public Relations Group, a vetted network of independent agencies we can bring in for markets we do not cover directly.

The agency has won more than 45 industry awards in the past ten years, including PRCA Medium Sized Agency of the Year 2022, multiple CIPR PRide Awards, three 2022 CIPR Golds and a PRCA DARE Grand Prix. Our own content is a working example of the integrated marketing solutions we sell: the Embracing Marketing Mistakes podcast, hosted by Chris and Will, has held a UK Apple Podcasts Marketing chart top-five position for 14 months and passed 550K downloads.

Frequently asked questions

What is a full-service marketing agency, and what is included?

A full-service marketing agency delivers strategy, earned media, social, content, creative and production through one team and one plan. At Prohibition that means PR and media relations, digital PR, social media, content, campaign creative, design, video and photography, influencer marketing, launches, reputation management and training, all in-house. Media planning and buying and web development are not included.

Does "full service" mean paid media buying or media relations?

It can mean either, so ask. At Prohibition it means media relations and earned coverage delivered in-house, alongside creative, content, social and video. We run paid social to amplify our own campaigns, but we do not plan or buy TV, OOH, print, radio or programmatic media.

How is a full-service marketing fee structured in the UK?

A retainer buys a monthly allocation of senior and delivery time across the agreed disciplines, with planning, account leadership and reporting inside the fee. Production costs such as shoot days, talent, influencer fees and paid social budget sit outside the fee and are scoped separately. Project fees work the same way for a single scoped campaign.

When is one agency better than three or four specialists?

When several channels must carry the same idea at once: launches, repositioning, recruitment, public information campaigns, reputation-sensitive work and tight timelines. A single specialist is better when the job is genuinely one-channel, such as a national media buy or a standalone SEO programme.

Can an independent UK agency handle media, creative and communications under one roof, or do I need a network?

An independent agency can, provided the disciplines are genuinely in-house and you confirm which kind of media it offers. Prohibition delivers PR, social, content, creative and video from one Leeds team and uses Worldcom partner agencies for international markets. A network is the better choice mainly when you need owned offices in several countries.

How does an integrated agency handle a reputation problem mid-campaign?

One team pauses scheduled social and paid activity, drafts holding statements, briefs spokespeople and revises the content plan at the same time, because PR, social and content report to the same lead. At Prohibition, Chris Norton leads crisis work personally and our Reputation Guardian programme covers preparedness before anything breaks.

How does Create, Engage, Convert link insight to commercial results?

Create establishes the audience, the barrier and the business objective. Engage builds one creative idea that runs across earned, owned, social and video. Convert reports everything in one AMEC-aligned framework against sales, listings, traffic, sentiment, share of voice and behaviour change.

Next step: a scoping conversation

If you are weighing a full-service marketing agency against briefing three or four specialists, the useful first step is a scoping conversation rather than a credentials deck. Bring the brief, the budget band and the channels you think you need. We will tell you which disciplines belong in-house with us, where a partner is needed, and whether the work is a retainer or a project, before anyone writes a proposal.