Advertising on LinkedIn

by Kathy Bernard

Advertising on LinkedIn can be a highly effective way to reach your business customers. To get started, take these steps:

1) Create a company page. It’s easy and free to do. Log on to LinkedIn. Click the Work icon, select “Create a Company Page” and follow the prompts to add your logo, company overview and specialties. Starting from “Manage page,” post a few articles, quotes or tips to establish your presence.

2) Sign in to LinkedIn’s Campaign Manager at https://www.linkedin.com/ad-beta/new-advertiser. This is your advertising dashboard, where you will select and pay for advertising.

Next, choose your preferred advertising method. Choose from:

• Sponsored content. These are “native” ads in your prospects’ LinkedIn home page news feeds. Native ads look like other content in the feed so as not to disrupt the news flow.

• Sponsored InMail. These are personalized, targeted LinkedIn InMail messages (like email messages but sent through LinkedIn).

• Text ads. These are ads at the top or side of your prospects’ LinkedIn pages that feature a simple, clickable headline, description and small image. You can buy these ads as pay-per-click so you pay only when someone clicks your ad or cost-per-impression, where you pay for every ad view.

Establish your Campaign Manager dashboard to get familiar with LinkedIn advertising options. Next time, we’ll talk about making the most of your sponsored content.

Kathy Bernard (kathy@wiseru.com), CEO of WiserU.com, is a St. Louis-based LinkedIn expert/trainer who equips businesses to maximize LinkedIn for sales, marketing or fundraising.