Living Lab: Digital Adoption for Business Growth

Jonny Ross is one of the business case studies at this one. Living Lab is a free business support masterclass from Leeds Beckett University and Leeds City Council, running as part of Leeds Digital Festival 2026. The morning is built around real SMEs talking about what they actually did, what it cost them, and what they would do differently.

The story Jonny is telling

Before the agency, before the fractional CMO work, Jonny helped run a designer sunglasses e-commerce business. For five years it was the biggest sunglasses etailer in the UK, buying more volume than Debenhams, stocking Oakley, Prada, Dior, Chanel and Ray-Ban direct from the manufacturers, and sitting top of Google for every term that mattered.

Then in 2004 sales fell off a cliff. It took a month to work out why. Google had issued a manual penalty and the site had been pushed to page seven, even for its own brand name. Two SEO agencies and eighteen months later, having spent tens of thousands of pounds on “keep doing what we are doing, it will come back”, turnover was down forty per cent. A consultant in New York charging $250 an hour in 2005 had the site back on page one inside a fortnight. He understood something the UK agencies did not.

That experience is the reason Jonny went into SEO, and it is the reason Fleek is built the way it is. The talk covers what the penalty taught him about relying on a single channel, about buying digital services you do not understand, and about how the same pattern is now repeating with AI-driven search.

What the morning covers

• How SMEs are applying automation, data analytics and AI to improve productivity and unlock growth
• Three business case studies covering real implementation rather than theory, including Jonny’s
• Live examples from Leeds Beckett University and a roundtable discussion
• Business support available through Leeds City Council
• How SMEs can collaborate with universities to accelerate change

Who it is for

• SME owners, directors and senior decision makers
• Policymakers looking at funding opportunities
• Digital practitioners

Agenda

• 08:30 Arrival and refreshments
• 09:00 Welcome from Simon Baldwin, Leeds Beckett University
• 09:05 Business case studies
• 09:50 Questions and observations
• 10:00 Leeds Beckett University live examples and roundtable
• 10:15 Business support from Leeds City Council
• 10:30 Networking

Complimentary co-working space is available in the Knowledge Exchange afterwards, so there is no rush to leave. Stay, work, and carry the conversations on.

Tickets are free and booking is handled by Leeds Beckett University through Eventbrite. Use the button on this page to book your place. If you want to talk to Jonny before or after the session, get in touch with the Fleek team.