7 Key Elements of a Successful LinkedIn Advertising Campaign
LinkedIn is a place for professionals to network and for B2B brands to get the word out about their offerings. This professional social space can help get the eyes of influential decision makers on your content. With over 690 million members, the power to positively impact businesses is there.
Advertising on a B2B platform is a little different from a platform where the focus is more B2C based. So let’s take a look at some best practices when creating an ad campaign on LinkedIn.
1 | Know Your Types
First, it’s important to know the type of ad you are paying for so that you can design the elements of your ad properly. There are a couple of different types of paid ads on the platform, so let’s break them down a bit.
- Sponsored Content: also known as native ads, these show up in users’ feeds. They can be a carousel, single image, or video ad. LinkedIn labels these ads as “promoted” in order to distinguish it from regular content.
- Sponsored Messaging: this option allows you to directly advertise in a user’s inbox, giving it a more personalized feel. LinkedIn does have a cap on how many members can receive a sponsored message ad per month.
- Text Ads: these ads show up along the top and right-hand side of a user’s desktop feed. They allow a brand to cast a wide net on a budget and can be great if you are looking to build strong leads with a professional demographic.
- Dynamic Ads: these ads show up in the right rail of LinkedIn and are personalized. For example, a user’s photo could show up in these ads. However, users do have the opportunity to change their privacy settings if they find these ads a little too personal.
2 | Location, Location, Location
Location is the only mandatory targeting field you have to set when running an ad campaign on the platform. You can get specific with a city or metropolitan area, or you can widen the net by selecting a state or a country. It’s important to think about who your target audience is when setting this targeting element. For example, if you sell only to companies in the United States, it wouldn’t make sense to advertise to people in Canada.
3 | Headliner and Follow-Up Act
Write an engaging and concise headline that grabs your target audience’s attention. Headlines should be 150 characters or less. Then follow it up with descriptive copy and a clear call to action (CTA) to guide your audience on what they should do after viewing your ad. Informative, engaging content is what increases your return on investment (ROI).
4 | Don’t Disregard the Specs
Don’t disregard ad specs–platforms provide them for a reason! Doing so could mean that your text is truncated or your image is cut off. Not only can it mean missing information for your target audience, but it looks highly unprofessional, something no one wants on a platform of business professionals! Social media platforms have a tendency to change specs every once in a while, so be sure to check in with LinkedIn’s sponsored content guidelines often.
5 | Take Advantage of an Audience Template
Brands new to advertising on LinkedIn can take advantage of audience templates, which can help you set up your targeting. These templates can let you select from the right mix of targeting options without going through all the manual steps to get there. It can also help you save time while still running an effective ad campaign.
6 | Avoid Hyper-Targeting
Hyper-targeting is used on social platforms like Facebook or Instagram to reach niche audiences that you may not know to look for. However, on LinkedIn, decision makers are already actively looking for connections and companies to work with, and hyper-targeting can cut down on your reach. A good rule of thumb is to not add more than two to three targeting facets to a single ad campaign. Ideally, you’d like for the target audience to be over 50,000 to be the most effective on LinkedIn.
7 | Tailor Made
Pay attention to your initial insights on an ad campaign. Once you know more about your target audience, you can begin to tailor your content to be more relevant for each segment. This further allows you to do A/B testing to see what performs best.
Final Thoughts
Advertising on LinkedIn is perfect for B2B businesses, allowing you to reach movers and shakers as well as top-level decision makers. Once you start running a campaign, don’t just sit back on your laurels. You’ll need to continually analyze your campaign’s performance and tweak it as the behaviors of your audience change–and they will change often!
Need help running an effective LinkedIn Ad strategy? Tintero would love to help! Our innovative team is ready to help your business grow with digital strategies that truly work for your unique needs! Schedule a free consultation today to learn more about how we can help your brand with our data-driven approach to marketing.