Three cities. Three buzzing venues. Countless ideas, insights and eye-opening moments. The Northern Marketing Festival 2025 wrapped up this week after an energising three-day tour through Liverpool, Leeds and Manchester bringing together hundreds of marketers from across the region for an unforgettable week of bold thinking, practical wisdom and proper Northern pride this week.
With sessions spanning playfulness in marketing, tactical insight and the unmistakable grit of the North, the festival offered plenty to look at and learn from – and not just from the stage. Across three cities, hundreds of marketers gathered to challenge share ideas, forge new connections and celebrate the role of marketing in driving change.
From bold branding to brave conversations, from packed-out panels to post-session pints – here’s a look back at the Northern Marketing Festival 2025 in pictures.
This year’s festival kicked off in Liverpool for the first time, form the magnificent Royal Liver Suite.
From Liverpool, the festival opened with creative firepower – from Top Trumps to TikTok – as speakers explored the role of brand legacy and cultural fluency in today’s fast-changing media landscape.
In Leeds, the conversation turned transformational, with McCann’s Jamie Peate urging marketers to “unblock” their thinking and use creativity as a business lever, not just a campaign tool.
And in Manchester, we saw the festival end on a high, with practical sessions on future-proofing media strategies, embracing search beyond Google, and bringing personality into digital and print experiences alike.
We heard how playful ideas delivered £40m in extra revenue for Aldi. We saw how brands are adapting to a fragmented search world by focusing on ‘talkability’. We were reminded that print still has the power to connect – and that being Northern isn’t just a postcode, it’s a creative mindset.
For all the pictures from this year’s event click here.
This year’s Northern Marketing Festival is made possible with the support of headline sponsors SBS, Automated Analytics and Embryo, alongside regional partners Royal Liver Suite, Growth Platform and Poke Marketing, and a host of industry supporters including Hub, Pathway, ICG, Vision One, Canny Creative, Made Brave, Buy Media, Lucid Link, Print.com, Tal Agency, Wolfenden, Colony, McCann, Be Broadcast, Impression Digital, Sun Branding and Tall.
