Driving Record Admissions Through Powerful Digital Marketing

The Business.

The Cut & CraftThe Cut & Craft is a group of independent British steak restaurants, founded in York in 2018 combining premium steakhouse dining with a modern, design-led atmosphere. Since launch, the brand has expanded to three flagship locations with a Leeds restaurant opening in 2022, and a Manchester restaurant in 2025. They specialise in house butchered steaks, fresh seafood, signature cocktails from locally-sourced ingredients, and creating a “celebration restaurant” experience for everything from corporate lunches to date nights and birthdays. As the founders invested heavily in expansion – including major refurbishments and new sites – they needed their digital presence to keep pace with the quality of their restaurants and the scale of their ambitions.

The relationship with LOCALiQ started as a truly local connection. A Senior Digital Advertising Consultant at The York Press lives on the same street as one of The Cut & Craft Guest Experience Managers and is involved in the same PTA. With The York Press also being in the Newsquest Media Group, they knew LOCALiQ well and knew that we were well positioned to help The Cut & Craft solve their digital marketing challenges and drive online growth.

LOCALiQ partnered with The Cut & Craft to build a joined-up performance marketing strategy that would support both day-to-day trading and longer-term expansion. The engagement began around the launch of the Leeds site and was designed to give the team a clearer, more controllable way to drive demand across every location. Location-specific SEO and PPC campaigns were developed, ensuring that search activity reflected local audiences, trading patterns, and growth priorities.

A key part of the partnership was LOCALiQ’s ability to respond quickly to what was happening on the ground. When The Cut & Craft team identified that weekday lunchtime trade in Manchester was slower than they wanted, LOCALiQ built a focused campaign to promote The Cut & Craft as a premium yet accessible lunch option in the city. Messaging and targeting were tuned specifically to that time and audience, turning a real-world pressure point into a clear performance objective that digital marketing could solve. Over time, this helped establish the Manchester site as one of the go-to spots for weekday lunch, easing pressure on the team and strengthening the venue’s reputation.

Crucially, the work didn’t happen in isolation from the business. The Cut & Craft marketing team had regular meetings with LOCALiQ, with fast responses to day-to-day questions and monthly reporting that could be overlaid with internal booking data. This allowed them to go into leadership meetings with a joined-up story: what was happening in search and paid campaigns, and how that aligned with bookings across York, Leeds and Manchester.