The Complete Guide to LinkedIn Ads

Posted on June 27, 2019

More and more businesses are increasing their social media usage because they understand that it is a great way to generate leads. In the B2B world, LinkedIn is one of the most beneficial platforms to use. However, simply having a LinkedIn page may not be enough to generate leads. That is why more and more businesses are using LinkedIn Ads. During the webinar and written below, you will have a comprehensive understanding of what it takes to develop a successful LinkedIn ad.

Hi there! My name is Emily and I am one of Top Floor’s Digital Marketing Specialists. I’m excited to share how to develop a successful LinkedIn ad. Let’s get started! 

LinkedIn is a great way to not only increase your personal brand awareness, but it is essential to increase the awareness of your B2B company. There are 4 key components when developing a successful LinkedIn ad for your business. 

When to use the ad. You should use LinkedIn ads when there are career opportunities, or when you want to provide value to users. For example, if you want to promote an ebook, event, or special offer, you should use LinkedIn to get the word out. Keep in mind that in order to use LinkedIn ads, you must be posting organically. You don’t want someone to see your ad, then go to your LinkedIn page only to find out that it’s bare.

Your target audience. Social media allows you to connect to your consumers easier than traditional advertising. You can customize your audience based on email lists, company lists, or website visitors. There are 2 different targeting options for LinkedIn: general advertising and career opportunities. The general advertisement is great for promoting events and products/services, while career opportunities are great for recruiting talent. You should note that the more targeting options you choose, the more narrow your audience will be.

Type of LinkedIn ad to use. Here are 5 different ads to use:

1. Text Ad– these are only on the desktop version of LinkedIn. Text ads don’t have as high of a click-through rate, but they are the easiest ones to start with.
2. Sponsored InMail– these are more personalized ads. They are great for recruitment efforts, events, and tradeshow follow-ups. 
3. Sponsored Content– these are the most popular type of ads on LinkedIn. They show a large image with a clear call-to-action. Similar to sponsored in-mail, these are great for recruitments, events, tradeshows. They’re also great for special offers.
4. Display Ads– These ads solely show the image, but they’re meant to improve branding. However, they don’t have a high click-through rate.
5. Job Ads– these ads are specifically for your recruitment efforts.

How to gauge performance. When looking at your LinkedIn ad metrics, there is a lot of analytics and you might not know where to start. The first thing that I like to look at is click-through rates, which shows the number of people who have clicked on your ad. The other two metrics to look at are conversions and engagement. These 3 metrics are the most significant measurements to gauge the ad’s performance. You also want to pay attention to Google Analytics. Through Google Analytics, you will be able to see which ads your audience responds to the most so that you can create better ads for the future. Once you focus on these 4 components, we are confident that your ads will flourish.