The simplest type of ad placement on LinkedIn is the sponsoring of company updates (sponsored content). As the content is created for the followers of the company profile anyway, sponsored content only requires a small amount of additional effort.
What is sponsored content?
First of all: Sponsored content (also known as branded content) in marketing on LinkedIn mainly refers to paid contributions or posts. Accordingly, sponsored content describes editorial content that is emphasised by the deposit of an advertising budget and is distributed beyond your own followers. This type of advert is also referred to as a native ad, as it is naturally embedded in the user’s newsfeed and resembles normal posts. On LinkedIn, these native ads are labelled ‘Sponsored’ or ‘Promoted’ so that the user can distinguish them from normal posts.
Now that we have clarified what is meant by sponsored content on LinkedIn, let’s look at the implementation of these advertising measures:
What are the advantages of Sponsored Content Ads?
Compared to traditional digital adverts, such as banners or pop-up ads, native ads have the advantage that they do not disrupt the user’s current activity and the ads are trusted more.
On LinkedIn, sponsored content is displayed to the user in the newsfeed and therefore merges with the posts of the networked people and the company updates of followed companies. As a result, there is a much higher probability that a user will read the advert and only then realise that it is sponsored content. This makes a click on the link, the company profile or other post interaction more likely.
What marketing goals can be achieved with sponsored content?
LinkedIn Sponsored Content can be used in many different ways and can therefore pursue a wide variety of marketing objectives. A basic goal that can be achieved by any promotion is increased reach and interaction with the post. Along with this, the promotion of posts actually always contributes to an increase in brand awareness. Another side effect is the increase in company followers, which always increases with interesting posts and correctly defined target groups. In short, the following goals can be achieved through sponsored content on LinkedIn:
Increase in
- followers
- Brand awareness
- Downloads of a PDF
- Participation in events
- High-quality leads
- video views
- Post interactions
What kind of contributions can be advertised?
The following post types can currently be sponsored:
- Single Image Posts
- videos
- Carousel posts
In the course of 2021, it will also be possible to sponsor posts with a document. This was communicated to us at the ‘LinkedIn Marketing Solutions Product Roadmap’ webinar in February. As soon as this is possible, all currently available post types will be sponsorable.
How is a post advertised on LinkedIn?
There are basically two options for this:
1. the classic way of creating an advert
Start in the LinkedIn Campaign Manager. An overview of the active advertising accounts is listed here. If you do not yet have any accounts, we will show you in our article ‘Advertising on LinkedIn Ads: How to create your first ad’ on how to create an advertising account and place ads on LinkedIn.
First of all, select the account of the page on which the post to be advertised was published in the LinkedIn Campaign Manager. As a next step, we recommend creating a ‘Post push’ or ‘Sponsored content’ campaign group in which the advertised posts are collected. Above all, this helps to keep an overview of various marketing measures. A new campaign is then created in the ad group.
It should be noted at this point that a new campaign should/must be created for all sponsored updates on LinkedIn Ads. This makes it easier to keep an overview of the sponsored content and ensures complete cost control.
2. the way out of your own LinkedIn feed
After a post has been published, the ‘Sponsor now’ option is displayed above the post. Clicking on this button takes you to the LinkedIn Campaign Manager. Here you can finalise the creation of the ad as described in the previous point. We have provided a description of the rest of the process in our article ‘Advertising on LinkedIn Ads: How to create your first advert’.
Which method is chosen is not important here. What is important, however, is the selection of a suitable target group for targeting. Without specific targeting, the sponsored post will be played out to profiles that are not interested in the content of the post. This burns budget unnecessarily and leads to poorer results. Intensive consideration should therefore be given to the interests, industries or job titles of the people to be targeted. This target group can vary from post to post. Therefore, if necessary, adjustments should always be made based on the last sponsored posts.
Tip: If you primarily want to address new customers or generate followers, we recommend excluding the current followers of the company page from the targeting in the target group settings. This is best achieved by creating a matched audience, which is then excluded in the campaign settings.
Conclusion
Sponsoring a company update is a good option (not only) on LinkedIn to increase follower numbers, post interactions or video views. In addition to increasing the number of company followers, this can also attract new customers and spread the latest news from the company across the profiles that are usually reached.
Even if the perfect target group has been found, it is always the quality of the post that ultimately determines the success of the push. Therefore, only posts that could arouse the interest of potential customers or contribute to the positive image of the company should be sponsored. We therefore recommend sponsoring a few, selected posts with a higher budget.
If you need help with LinkedIn Ads or other areas of online marketing, contact us now without obligation and arrange a free initial consultation!
