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SOP 134: How to Create LinkedIn Lead Generation Ad Campaign

Goal
Successfully set up a LinkedIn lead generation Campaign.

Ideal Outcome
You have a LinkedIn lead generation campaign up and running.

Prerequisites or requirements

You need to first create a lead generation form on LinkedIn.

If you have not created a lead generation form, please refer to SOP 131 (web version): Set up a LinkedIn lead generation form.

Why this is important
LinkedIn is a powerful lead generation platform that allows you target its members based on demographic and professional data. You will be able to grow your business by driving quality leads on LinkedIn.

Where this is done
LinkedIn Campaign Manager.

When is this done
After you’ve created a LinkedIn lead generation form.

Who does this
The person responsible for media buying.

Set up a Lead Generation Campaign on LinkedIn

3. Select the campaign group that you want to create the lead generation campaign for and click “Create”, then “Campaign”.

Note: Campaign group is a setting in LinkedIn Ads Manager that groups related campaigns together to manage them at scale. Creating a campaign group is a prerequisite to create a campaign. If you have not created a campaign group please do so, otherwise, select a campaign group prior to creating the campaign.

4. Rename your campaign and click “Next”.

5. In the Objective selection panel, click “Lead Generation”.

6. Next is to set up Audience targeting.
Choose a location

Type a location/country/region in the search field and select from the drop down list.
Optionally, you can choose to target people who live or work in the selected area permanently. Choose this option if you want to exclude tourists or people just visiting.

You can also exclude people from a certain region if you’re certain your target audience is not from those countries.

Choose your audience profile language.

You can further narrow your target audience to people who meet a certain criteria.

Type in the search field and select a target audience based on their skills, field of study, company name, industry, job titles, company connections, and the groups they join.

Alternatively, you can also exclude the target audience based on the criteria mentioned above.

(Optional) Enable Audience Expansion. Audience Expansion is recommended if you’re targeting based on job titles, skills, and LinkedIn groups where there’s a possibility of missing some members. Otherwise, it’s better to disable it to keep your target audience focused.

When checked, LinkedIn may show your ads to people with similar attributes to your target audience. For example, if you target members with the skill “Online Advertising," Audience Expansion may expand your audience to members who list the skill "Interactive Marketing" on their profile. Click here to learn more about how Audience Expansion works.

Once you’re satisfied with your target audience setup, click “Save audience” and give this audience segment a name.

7. Select an ad format for your campaign. There are 5 ad format you can choose from:

Single Image Ad — Promote your message directly in the LinkedIn feed across desktop and mobile.
Carousel Image Ad — A swipeable series of cards in the LinkedIn feed. You can customize the content and landing URL for each Card.
Video Ad — Interactive video to engage the audience in the LinkedIn feed across desktop and mobile.
Message Ad — Send a direct text message ad (with a single call to action) to the user when they are active.
Conversation Ad — Send a direct text message ad (with multiple calls to action) to the user when they are active.

To learn more about LinkedIn Ad formats, check out the LinkedIn Ads Guide.

8. Set an ad budget, schedule, and bidding strategy for your campaign.

Budget — Set either a daily budget, a lifetime budget, or both.
Schedule — Set either to run the campaign indefinitely or with a start and end date.
Bidding Strategy — Since this is a lead generation campaign, the optimization goal should be “Leads”. The default bidding strategy (automated) tries to get the maximum delivery based on your full budget. Leave this checked unless you’re confident in manual bidding (get the most results based on your bid).
9. Once you’ve set the budget and bidding strategy, click “Next”, and “Save”.

10. Now you need to create an ad for the campaign. Click “Create new ad”.

Fill in the necessary fields:

  • Ad Name — Add a name for this ad for internal use.
  • Introductory text — This is the body text of your ad
  • Destination URL — The URL which the user lands on once they click on your ad
  • Ad Image — The ad image
  • Headline — The headline of the ad
  • Description — The description that accompanies your headline.
Once you’ve filled in all the fields, you should be able to preview your ad on the right column.

Next, expand the Form details sections.

Choose a Call-to-action button copy

Select the lead generation form that you created.

11. Once done, click “Save” in the bottom right corner.

12. You should see the ad you’ve created for the campaign. Click “Next”.

In the last step you need to review your Campaign. Be sure to double-check the following:
    • Objective
    • Audience targeting
    • Daily budget
    • Ad
    13. If everything checks out, click “Launch Campaign”.

You have successfully launched your lead generation campaign on LinkedIn!