LinkedIn Advertising: How Much Should I Spend (BONUS: In-Depth Guide To Placing Ads)
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Are you thinking about using LinkedIn to find more clients? According to HubSpot, the business site is actually 277% more effective at lead generation than Facebook and Twitter.
But just posting updates on your Personal Profile or Company Page may not be enough to get you paying clients. From time-to-time you’ll also likely need to reach out to a wider audience on the world’s largest professional network, with a targeted message or promotion.
The best way to do that is to run ads on the platform. In the article below I cover the following items:
- LinkedIn Advertising Overview
- Creating a Budget
- In-Depth Guide to Running LinkedIn Ads.
LinkedIn Advertising Overview
Ads on the business site allow you to increase your visibility to other business professionals. Using the targeting features that LinkedIn advertising offers ensures that you will reach members of your target group efficiently. This in turn will build brand awareness, deepen relationships and deliver leads.
When advertising on LinkedIn, the ads are sold by auction. Advertisers will bid against other advertisers who are trying to reach the same target audience you are. So the highest bid typically gets the ad placement.
Creating a Budget
While LinkedIn advertising can help increase sales, many marketers are unsure about how much they should budget. According to LinkedIn, “You can get started with any budget and stop your ads at any time.”
But determining the right amount can be confusing. While spending more will reach more people, you don’t want to use up your entire marketing budget on the first campaign. On the other hand, you don’t want the amount to be so small that it doesn’t deliver results for you.
The best answer is to spend what you are comfortable spending. Set a budget that matches your needs and circumstances. LinkedIn’s minimum for ads is $10.00 per day. If that’s all you can afford, then make that your ads budget. As you have success, you can always increase the spend amount.
When advertising on the channel you have three ways you can control your spending: Total Budget, Daily Budget and Setting Bids.
Total Budget
If fast results are your goal, then use Total Budget. LinkedIn will spend your specific budget then the campaign will end.
Daily Budget
If you want a longer running campaign but you want to cap the amount to be spent, then this is the right option. The ad will stop once the budget is depleted. Then it will begin running the next day.
Setting Bids
With this option, you can choose the maximum amount you want to pay on impressions and clicks. If you are running an InMail campaign, then you will select the maximum amount you want to spend on delivered InMails. When you set bids, you won’t pay more than the amount you bid.
BONUS – In-Depth Guide to Running LinkedIn Ads
Setting up and running LinkedIn ads requires just seven easy steps to running ads. I detail them below.
- Self-Service or Account Team
- Using Campaign Manager
- Ad Format
- Ad Creation
- Targeting
- Your Budget
- Measuring and Optimising Your Ads
Self-Service or Account Team
If you want to have total control of the LinkedIn Advertising process, then the self-service route is for you. You can use the Campaign Manager to create and configure the ad, run it and monitor the progress.
However, if you’re uncomfortable with the process, you can have LinkedIn’s Account Team handle it for you. With their combined expertise, this option often provides a higher level of strategy, which in turn attracts a better audience for you.
LinkedIn’s Account Team will help you in every stage of the ads process.
Campaign Manager
This is LinkedIn’s tool for creating and running ads on the platform. After your ad is launched, you can also find the analytics associated with your campaign. It’s a good idea to set your Campaign Manager account up first and explore the functionality before creating your first ad.
Ad Format
There are eight ad formats to choose from on the channel. Here’s a quick explanation of each.
Text Ads
Text ads don’t appear in member feeds. Instead, they can be seen at the top, bottom or side of the feed. They feature an image with text. Be sure to make your text short and compelling so it will convert better.
Single Image Ad
Show your target audience an image with text in this ad type.
Carousel Image Ad
Highlight multiple photos of your product or service in this ad.
Video Ad
Message your target audience or show a product or service with a video ad.
Follower Ad
This format encourages people to follow a certain company page.
Spotlight Ad
This ad utilises the data on a user’s profile to personalise the ad and make it more attractive to the person seeing it.
Job Ads
Get the word out about an opening with a job ad.
Message Ad
Deliver a customised message through LinkedIn’s Messenger platform. This is the most expensive ad type because you are charged on a pay-per-send basis.
Ad Creation
When you are using the Sponsored Content option, you can use an existing update or create a new one.
With Text Ads, you need to create or obtain the image, the headline and the text and bring them together in the Campaign Manager. It’s a good idea to have a link associated with your ad so that hen a user clicks it, they are taken to a page with more information.
Targeting
Work through the targeting criteria to create your target audience. As you do that, Campaign Manager will show the estimated audience size. Remember, bigger is not always better. While you want to create a broad audience, you will also want make sure it has relevancy to your brand.
If you use the Audience Expansion option, LinkedIn will find and target audiences that are similar to yours. This is an effective way to reach LinkedIn members who you may have overlooked.
Set Your Budget
After setting your targeting, you will need to decide the type of bids you want to place: Cost-per-Click (CPC) or Cost-per Impression (CPM).
CPC
The CPC option is the best choice when there is a direct conversion tied to the click. For example, when you want LinkedIn members to enter into a lead capture system, register for a workshop, or download a podcast.
CPM
If your goal is to just get eyes on your ad and build brand awareness, then select cost-per-impression.
Measuring and Optimising Your Ads
Engagement counts on LinkedIn, just as it does on Facebook. So ads with good engagement will appear more prominently. So it’s important to continually tweak the ad so it performs well.
This requires viewing the analytics regularly and making adjustment so the ad continues to perform well.
Wrapping it Up
If you are trying to market to other business professionals, then LinkedIn is the place to focus your efforts. Using LinkedIn ads ensures that your messages will reach the right users in an efficient manner.
If you’d like to learn more about LinkedIn advertising, this is a topic we cover in Day #6 of our up-coming ‘Linked In or Left Out’ Bootcamp which starts on 29th November 2021.
If you’d like to find out more about the bootcamp you can check out what we’ll be covering HERE!
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Alan Martin is a social media speaker and coach with Chat Marketing.
Having worked with clients from various industries, we’ve learned that sometimes you need to think outside of the box to find the most effective targeting options.
