A Comprehensive Guide towards Using LinkedIn Ads

A Comprehensive Guide towards Using LinkedIn Advertising


The goal at LinkedIn is to turn advertising into a science. They even put together a step-by-step tutorial on how to start advertising on LinkedIn in the quickest, simplest, and most efficient ways possible. All of the science is presented.
However, as all marketers and advertisers are aware of, what they do is not purely an exact science. Art and science are uniquely combined in advertising. Today, we'd like to discuss the finer points of LinkedIn advertising.

Here, we'll outline a five-step process for successful LinkedIn advertising and discuss some strategies for maximizing your impact at each stage.
A Brief Overview of LinkedIn Advertising
Step 1: Choosing your goal
Modern digital marketing is built on the concept of "Objective-Based Advertising," which forms the basis of all LinkedIn ads. The key to succeeding in LinkedIn advertising is effectively understanding your own objective.
What goals do you have for your campaign? Your campaign manager will present you with a variety of options:
Awareness
When planning a campaign that is primarily aimed at people who have never seen or interacted with your brand, choose Brand Awareness. Consider it the "introductory" category.
When creating an awareness campaign, concentrate on your "elevator pitch": How would you introduce your company to a someone who has never heard of it?
Tip: While awareness campaigns are frequently used to "introduce" a brand to a target audience, that isn't their only purpose. Additionally, you can use awareness campaigns to highlight business announcements, debut new products or services, or simply advertise particularly memorable content.
Consideration
The central part of your digital sales funnel is consideration. At this point y our goals will begin to become more targeted and specific. You want your audience to take action, not just become more aware of your brand.
When your audience understands what you do, how it might benefit them, and—ideally—becomes actively engaged with your brand, your Consideration campaign has been successful.
Tip: Using Consideration campaigns to "bridge" the gap between Awareness and Conversion is one of the most successful uses of this type of campaign. Build on an awareness campaign by elaborating on the brand differentiator, then follow up with a conversion campaign that specifically targets the audience's needs and pain points.
Conversions
Conversion campaigns are the most targeted in terms of audience and content. Your goal with conversion marketing is to get people to take one of three actions: buy, call, or apply.
Your conversion ads need to be much more targeted than others. Include a call to action, and use the ad to present the strongest case you can for that CTA and your target audience. 
Advice: The audience who sees your conversion advertisement should be aware of what you do before they see the advertisement. Show them why they need it. Focus on their audience and work on convincing them.
Step 2: Choose your target audience
In Step 1, we answered the question, “What do you want your campaign to do?” Step 2 asks an equally important question, “Whom do you want to see your ad?” 
The effectiveness of your targeting is without a doubt the most important factor in determining the success of your campaign. It is unquestionably an art form that requires practice to master. Here are a few of our top strategies:
Do Not Hyper-Target
It’s logical to want to target as narrowly as possible, but doing so also makes it simple to dismiss important audience segments.
Avoid using too many targeting parameters that are too specific in your ads. Instead…
Concentrate on the Right Parameters
What distinguishes this group of people from other LinkedIn members in the most significant way? Age, perhaps? Industry? job title Skills? Interest?
To find your audience with fewer and fewer parameters, focus on where they are actually located. This will allow you to reach more people without compromising on precise targeting.
Always be A/B Testing
The best way to test your advertising and learn what works and what doesn't is to use A/B testing.
Create two identical campaigns, then alter just one variable in each of them. If one performs better than the other, then you’ll know why.
Step 3: Choose the format for your LinkedIn ad.
LinkedIn allows you to create four different types of ad campaigns, which you can utilize in any combination.  Here are our top suggestions for using each:
Sponsored Content
Sponsored Content is directly displayed in the feeds of your audience. Using sponsored content, you can create image, video, or carousel ads.
Tip: The best way to make Sponsored Content effective is to make it attention-grabbing and timely because it will jump to the top of your audience's feeds. Your strongest, most concise, and boldest messaging should go here. Bonus points of you can include something current that applies to your particular audience.
Message Ads
You can send your prospects personalized messages via message ads that prompt them to take immediate action. This is the most direct you can get, which makes targeting crucial.
Tip: Personalize everything you do! Take advantage of the opportunity to address your target prospect directly provided by message ads.
Dynamic Ads
You can automatically customize your creative for each member of your target audience based on their profile data with Dynamic Ads, which make use of the most powerful personalization technology available to LinkedIn.
Keep your arguments brief and straightforward because Dynamic Ads won't give you much room to do so. Try to develop single-sentence callouts to specific audience members that will get them interested enough that they click to learn more.
Tip: In your Dynamic Ads, there won't be much room for text, but this also makes them the ideal candidate for A/B testing. To find out what resonates with audiences, experiment with a wide range of different messages.
Text Ads
Text Ads are straightforward but incredibly dependable ads that show up in the LinkedIn sidebar of your target audience.
Text advertisements are typically only as good as their text. Check out LinkedIn's introduction, best practices, and optimization guides to learn how to write effective text ads.
Tip: Writing ads that are compelling, eye-catching, and direct will help your Text Ad stand out from the competition. Put your headline-writing skills to the test and create something that will persuade readers to click.
Step 4: Set your budget and schedule
Once you have determined what you want to achieve, who you want to target, and how you want to reach them, the only thing left to do is decide on campaign spending and scheduling. You have three choices for bid types on LinkedIn:
•    Cost per send: For Message ads, this option charges you for each message that is delivered successfully.
•    Cost per click: This is used for campaigns that encourage users to take action, like consideration and conversion campaigns.
•    Cost per impression: This technique is typically used to raise brand awareness.
If your campaign isn’t working it may not necessarily be because you’re not spending enough. A/B testing and experimentation are always advised before deciding to increase the budget for a specific campaign.
Tip: Determine your initial budget based on how long you would like to run the campaign. You should immediately establish a total budget if you don't mind blowing your entire allotment in a single day, week, or month. Setting a daily budget for even spending is advisable if you prefer to spread out your campaign.
Step 5: Measure and optimize
Congratulations! Your campaign goes live once Step 4 is finished. The actual work now starts. The key to distinguishing between good and great marketing is constant measurement and campaign optimization. It is simple with LinkedIn.
Here are some of our top recommendations for improving your campaign's performance over time:
Continue beyond A/B
Even though it's known as "A/B testing," you shouldn't limit yourself to just two versions. If "B" performs better than "A," then come up with a "C" that builds on the factors you believe made "B" successful.
Follow What Works, Cut What Doesn’t
Digital advertising is a fast-paced game.  Cut something out if it's not working for you. There is always room for improvement with your messaging, and there are always other campaigns to try. Your best route to repeatable success will become clearer as you evaluate, cut, and improve more.
Frontload
Don't be afraid to spend more money on a new advertising campaign. By doing this, you'll be able to gather data more quickly, which you can use to update and improve your campaign.
Examine the Data
You have access to a ton of analytical data on LinkedIn. You knew the science, and now you’ve got a strong understanding of the corresponding art of LinkedIn advertising. If you can incorporate all of these tips and best practices into your LinkedIn ad campaigns, you’ll see a tremendous improvement in coverage, target response, and, ultimately, conversions.