Linkedin is one of the fastest-growing social media platforms and an excellent place for B2B businesses to advertise.
With over 850 million users worldwide, Linkedin is also one of the biggest sites from which you can find potential customers. We're going to discuss some best strategies that can help you advertise your business on Linkedin effectively and help you connect with relevant leads to grow your business faster.
What are the benefits of advertising on Linkedin?
Advertising on Linkedin is one of the best ways to get your products and services in front of a highly relevant audience.
Linkedin users are more likely to be interested in your product or service than people on other social media sites. This is because many Linkedin users visit the site to search for information related to their work and career. Since Linkedin’s members are highly engaged and visit regularly, advertising on this platform can help you find potential customers quickly.
When you advertise on Linkedin, you’re targeting a network of highly-engaged professionals. These people are actively looking for ways to grow their businesses, so if you can grab their attention and tell them what you have to offer, you’ll have a better chance of converting them into customers than on other social media networks.
40% of B2B marketers surveyed indicated that LinkedIn as the most effective channel for driving high-quality leads. LinkedIn users can use demographic data to target the right people based on their job title, company, location, industry, and seniority. On top of all this, 4 out of 5 members drive business decisions and you can potentially reach 14.6% of the world's population! Marketers see up to 2x higher conversion rates on LinkedIn. LinkedIn’s range of tools for audience targeting means website visits originating from the platform are more likely to increase conversions on B2B sites.
Which types of ads are available?
Here are a few different types of ads you can create for Linkedin:
Sponsored content
Sponsored content (or native advertising) is a great way to advertise on Linkedin as it’s easy to create and you can target your audience based on things like demographics, job title and location.
The content is presented where your audiences are spending all of their time - in their feed. These ads come in four different formats - single image, document, video and carousel (multi-image) ads.
Sponsored ads are great for:
Sharing your thought leadership
Showcasing your products or services
Promoting an event
Message ads
Message ads allow you to send direct messages via Linkedin Messages to prospects. There are no character limits and you can also add a lead generation form to collect the details of leads.
This type of ad is very effective because it isn't cluttered by many other advertisers and Linkedin reports that 1 out of 2 people open a Linkedin Messager ad.
Text ads
Text ads are known as Pay Per Click (PPC) because you only pay for them when a prospect has clicked on it - similar to the PPC model on Google Search. In other words, you are only paying for ads that work at attracting your audience. With these ads you can take the audience to your website or another landing page of your choice when they click. Ads are text-based (duh!) and limited to a short 100 characters and a URL and call to action.
Dynamic ads
Dynamic ads personalise your advert to the audience member. These ads use Linkedin profile data like photo, company name and job title to personalise the ads. Dynamic ads are available in three formats - follower, spotlight and job ads.
Best practices for Linkedin ads
There are a few best practices you should follow when creating ads for Linkedin to maximise their effectiveness.
Clarify your objective
Selecting your objective is the first step in new objective-based advertising. Choosing your objective helps us streamline and customize your campaign creation. An objective is an action you want your customers to take after seeing your ad. Objectives are grouped into 3 categories:
Awareness campaigns maximize a brand’s share of voice through impressions.
Consideration campaigns encourage customers to take action to find out more about your business. The actions are usually clicks that take them to a landing page, or other engagement such as encouraging social actions and views.
Conversion campaigns are focused on lead generation and the ability to track actions on your website such as whitepaper downloads or lead generation capture.
Choose the right audience
Once you understand how to create Linkedin ads and have tried a few out, it’s important to take note of which ones perform best. This will help you better understand your audience and how to connect with them better in the future. Be specific with your targeting options - chose quality over quantity.
Set the right budget
The reach of your ad depends on the budget you set. You might have the ability to choose from a Pay Per Click model or Cost Per Impression which relates to conversion or brand awareness objectives.
Timing
When creating ads, you can choose different date and time settings. Set your ads to run continuously, or you can choose specific dates and times when you’d like your ads to appear on the site.
Create a compelling ad
The headline and image of your ad are two of the most important elements. Use these elements to grab attention and make your ad stand out from the rest.
Make the copy super clear
Your ad text should be concise, and clear enough for the reader to understand what your product or service is about. Make sure the reader knows exactly what you’re offering and have a clear call to action.
Linkedin analytics
One of the best ways to understand what’s working with your ads and what isn’t is to set up a detailed Linkedin ad report. Your ad report will allow you to track pretty much all of the important metrics for your ad campaigns, including impressions, clicks, cost per action (CPA), ad spend, and conversion.
Make sure that you are tracking the links that your ads are redirecting to. You can do this by setting up a campaign tracking link to ensure that you are getting accurate tracking across all of your ad campaigns.
Another important part of analysing ads and campaigns is making sure that you are monitoring the demographics that are responding to your ads.
The easiest way to do this is to use the “demographic breakdown” metrics within the ad report. By doing this, you can easily see how many clicks and impressions your ads are receiving from each demographic, which will allow you to make the necessary changes to your campaigns if needed.
Final words
Now, you know what Linkedin is, how it works and the advantages of advertising on Linkedin. The best part about advertising on this platform is that it allows you to target your ideal customer based on demographic, interests, and job title. The high engagement rate of Linkedin makes it a perfect place to run ads, especially if you’re looking to build your brand and grow your business.
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