How LinkedIn ads work?

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When back in the days LinkedIn made its appearance as a professional networking platform sponsored ads were far from joining its realm. However With nearly 700 million active users in 2020, LinkedIn’s expanded from a networking site for professionals to one of the top social media platforms both by count and level of user engagement.

Meanwhile, LinkedIn continued to evolve by adding new features, like live video (livestreams and enhanced video formats) as well as new form of advertising made available for wider use.

However, despite LinkedIn’s growth and advertising opportunities, many marketers or brands still worry that the platform is still too formal or corporate for their audiences.

Truth is — LinkedIn could very well be one of your most underrated marketing channels.

If LinkedIn’s growth has caught your attention and you want to determine if it’s audiences and ad offerings are right for you, it’s important to do some research before devoting more time and resources to this network

Here’s what you’d need to know prior to start advertising on LinkedIn:

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TOP 10 FACTS TO HELP GET YOU GOING:

1.

In Q2 of 2020, LinkedIn revenue increased 21 percent year-over-year (LinkedIn)

2.

LinkedIn has more than 690 million active users. (LinkedIn)

3.

Marketing Solutions is LinkedIn’s fastest-growing segment. It grew 44 percent year-over-year in Q1. (LinkedIn)

4.

In 2019, LinkedIn was voted the most trusted network. (Business Insider)

5.

In March of 2020, professionals watched more than four million hours of LinkedIn Learning content — a nearly 50% increase month-over-month. (LinkedIn)

AUDIENCE TYPE

6.

57% of global LinkedIn users are male. (Statista)

7.

45% of internet users who make more than $75,000 annually use LinkedIn while only 25% of those in the $50,000 to $74,999 range use the platform. (Pew Research Center)

7.

50% of internet users with a college degree or higher use LinkedIn. (Pew Research Center)

8.

Four out of five LinkedIn members drive business decisions at their companies. (LinkedIn)

9.

LinkedIn’s lead conversion rates are 3X higher than other major ad platforms, including Google Ads. (LinkedIn)

10.

As of January 2020, 663.3 million users have been reached by LinkedIn Ads. (We Are Social)

When focusing on generating leads, this is what you should be aware of:

In a study of over 5,000 businesses, HubSpot found that traffic from LinkedIn generated the highest visitor-to-lead conversion rate at 2.74%, almost three times or 277% higher than both Twitter (.69%) and Facebook (.77%). (HubSpot)

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Since LinkedIn is a slightly different audience from other major platforms like Facebook, Twitter, or Snapchat, you’ll want to understand the audience before investing time or resources into a campaign or advertisement.

Now let’s have a look at top 3 most successful post types you could share and promote using LinkedIn ads:

1. Sensational Info-tainment Videos Posts:

Video content has been increasing in popularity on social media sites like Facebook and Instagram over the last few years. On LinkedIn, it’s no different.

In fact, 75% of marketers polled said LinkedIn video content is a successful way of reaching target audiences. Below sharing an example:

Content results:

• Info-tainment based video, with supporting text
• 1,667 reactions
• 807 comments

Success ingredients:

• Brings attention to a major mass-market issue;
• Has an element of sensationalism. Ie. not many people have the courage to approach strangers for an interview/point of view on a controversial topic;
• Offers practical takeaways for a clearly defined audience:

2. Data-driven Perspective Posts:

Content with numbers that prove a point, or data points from experiments/case studies always make for an intriguing read.

In fact, data-driven posts tend to perform better than rants and opinion pieces.

Here’s an example of such a post:

• Numbers-driven breakdown;
• 2640 reactions;
• 195 comments;

Success ingredients:

• A data-revelation: data-driven perspective that calculates the real value of something;
• Powerful use of numbers in context;

3. A personal or a brand success story:

Here the ingredients are fairly self-explanatory: going from bottom up, revealing a time-frame and key achievements:

Content results:

• 85,472 views;
• 2,168 reactions;
• 216 comments;

I’ll let you digest the success ingredients on your own, it does seem to me a fairly successful not to mention – inspirational post (oh, I’ve just given away one of its key success ingredients!:)

Finally, once we’ve looked into some of the key success factors of posting on LinkedIn, let’s dive deeper into its numerous content types and ad formats:

That would be all for today. If you’re looking to run an audit of your own LinkedIn profile (for personal branding) or for your brand to see which content you should be creating & promoting on LinkedIn as well as who to target – feel free to reach out for a FREE audit via hello@steppdigital.co.uk.

Speak soon, as always – don’t hesitate to post questions via our weekly Whatsapp Q&A group on all topics related Digital Marketing.

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STEPP Digital Social Media Team