Yes, LinkedIn Ads Work for B2B
I hear a lot from potential clients that they tried LinkedIn and it was too expensive. “We were getting our ads in front of our audience, but conversions were so expensive.”
I won’t wholeheartedly disagree with this sentiment. LinkedIn ads CAN be expensive when compared to tactics lower down in the funnel, such as paid search. However, LinkedIn has 2 incredibly unique things that make it a must-have for B2B companies looking to build out their top and mid-funnel strategies:
The targeting by job function, title, and seniority is unmatched. No other advertising platform comes close. If your product is perfect for a very specific work function, you will not do better than LinkedIn to get in front of that target, especially now that in-person industry conferences are canceled for the foreseeable future. And, by the way, you can still use LinkedIn to get in front of this audience even when they don’t “hang out” on LinkedIn all day. I’ll tell you how.
Like with Google Search Ads, so much of how much you pay per click or per conversion is in YOUR hands. I have found that a few important tweaks to configuration, audience, and creative can cut your CPC in half or more, and actually increase your conversion rate at the same time. Not all popular B2B targeting methods are as malleable as LinkedIn ads.
So here it is, my master list of tips and tricks for making LinkedIn work for B2B lead conversion.
Know Your Objectives: Don’t use video views, brand awareness, or engagement objectives if you’ll be analyzing cost-per-lead or cost-per-conversion metrics to judge success. They won’t look pretty. These Objectives are for increasing name recall, awareness, and preference only.
DO use website visits, lead gen, or conversions objectives. These allow the algorithm to optimize impressions that are more likely to perform an action. One caveat: Never use the lead gen objective on its own, because it doesn’t allow access to the LinkedIn Audience Network, which is key. Always pair it with a mirrored Conversion campaign.
Speaking of LinkedIn Audience Network, turn it on. Always. This is one of the ways to get better reach and frequency, at a lower CPC. Yes, it lowers your control of where people see your ad. But do you really care where they see it? Is that important enough to warrant double the expense? Nope.
Four ad variants minimum. Always start your campaign with at least 4 variants. This is because LinkedIn will only show an individual ad to a single target once every 4 days. Considering that so many ad impressions will be missed by your target, it’s important to allow LI to show your message every day.
Audience size matters: If you’re looking for brand awareness and recall, try to build an audience of at least 100k. Need to do a hard sell such as a demo request or free trial? Try narrowing your audience down to 1000 - 5000 people, using a combination of firmographics, demographics, and engagement patterns.
Narrow by function and industry: These are my 2 favorite filters when building an audience. Job Titles can be so varied, that much of your actual target audience will be left out when you use them. The combo of function and industry allows you to get super specific with your ad copy and imagery for the best results.
Lookalike Audiences are great if you have the minimum size seed list of 300 matched accounts. However, be aware that they are static lists, they don’t update as new people qualify for the audience. Create new lookalikes often, and add to your seed list when you can.
The best content for lead generation: Gated content that is job-function specific, video (great for mid-funnel), and free trial offers.
The worst content for lead generation: Request a Demo Today!
Bidding: Always use the lowest bid recommended and stay away from Automated Bidding. This is almost the exact opposite of the bidding strategy I employ with Google search ads.
Do you have a 1% CTR? Lucky you! This means that your content is compelling and performing pretty well compared to standard LinkedIn ads that it is competing against. Switch to CPM, instead of cost per click, to take advantage of your CTR and save some money!
