LinkedIn Ads: formats, targeting and costs

LinkedIn Ads allow companies to distribute advertisements in a targeted manner to defined professional groups. Particularly in B2B marketing, advertising on LinkedIn makes it possible to reach, for example, people from certain sectors, companies or fields of activity. In LinkedIn’s Campaign Manager, you first define your marketing objective, then select the appropriate ad formats as well as targeting and budget settings.

What are LinkedIn Ads?

LinkedIn Ads are paid advertisements and a form of social media advertising that allows businesses to target audiences on the professional network LinkedIn. Particularly in B2B marketing, the platform allows targeting based on professional criteria such as sector, company, position or experience.

Campaign creation is done via the LinkedIn Campaign Manager and is based on the chosen marketing objective. According to this objective, different ad formats are available, including text ads, video ads, or event ads.

What objectives can you choose with LinkedIn Ads?

With LinkedIn Ads, the campaign objective is the first step in creating an ad. In the Campaign Manager, you first choose which result you want to achieve with your advertising. Objectives cover different phases of the marketing funnel, from brand awareness, website visits and interactions, to lead generation and website conversions.

The choice of objective directly influences the further creation of the campaign: LinkedIn then offers you the ad formats, bidding strategies and optimization options that correspond to the selected objective. You then define your audience, choose an available ad format and determine the budget and duration of the campaign.

What are the different formats of LinkedIn Ads?

LinkedIn offers different ad formats depending on the chosen campaign objective:

• Single Image Ads : Ads with a single image that appear directly in the LinkedIn feed
• Video Ads : video ads suitable, for example, for brand messages, product presentations or offers requiring an explanation
• Carousel Image Ads : ads made up of several cards that users can scroll through successively
• Document Ads : documents such as presentations or guides that can be viewed directly in the LinkedIn feed
• Event Ads : ads intended to promote events on LinkedIn
• Thought Leader Ads : publications from LinkedIn members which can, with their agreement, be sponsored in the form of ads in order to increase their reach
• Message Ads : advertising messages broadcast in LinkedIn Messaging with a main call to action
• Conversation Ads : interactive advertising messages offering several selection and action options
• Text Ads : compact ads including a title, description and optional image
• Dynamic Ads : personalized ads including Follower Ads, Spotlight Ads and Jobs Ads
• Article and Newsletter Ads : ads to promote articles and newsletters published on LinkedIn

One of the advantages of LinkedIn Ads is the ability to target audiences based on professional criteria. In the Campaign Manager, you can, for example, combine criteria such as location, sector, company, professional experience, field of activity or career level. Ads on LinkedIn can therefore be shown to the relevant people for each campaign objective.

In addition to these audience attributes, LinkedIn offers, with Matched Audiencesthe possibility of integrating your own data into targeting. This could include, for example, contact and company lists, as well as retargeting audiences. You can, among other things, retarget people who have already interacted with your company or your content.

With the Predictive AudiencesLinkedIn complements these possibilities with AI-based targeting. LinkedIn then combines an existing data source with its own AI models to identify people likely to perform similar actions to the original audience. As a data source, we can use, for example, Lead Gen Forms, contact or company lists, conversions or retargeting audiences.

After defining your campaign objective and the desired audience for your advertising on LinkedIn, you configure the others settings in Campaign Manager. These include ad format, location, budget, and bidding strategy.

You then create the announcement itself. The required content depends on the format chosen. For example, a Single Image Ad combines an image, advertising text and a destination URL, while a Document Ad allows you to offer a document directly in the ad.

Before going live, verify that the campaign objective, audience, ad format, and creative content are correct aligned. After launch, you can track performance in the Campaign Manager and optimize the campaign based on the results achieved with your LinkedIn Ads.

How much do LinkedIn Ads cost?

There is no fixed price for advertising on LinkedIn. Ads are served via an auction system, so actual costs depend on the campaign objective, audience, competition, and chosen bidding strategy, among other things. In the Campaign Manager, you define the budget available for your campaign. Rather than relying on general average CPC or CPM values, it is therefore better to evaluate the cost of your campaigns based on their actual results.

AI features now support both audience selection and LinkedIn Ads creation. Two areas of use can be distinguished: AI functions directly integrated into LinkedIn and external AI tools used to prepare advertising content.

AI features available in Campaign Manager

LinkedIn, for example, uses AI with Predictive Audiences. Existing data is then combined with LinkedIn’s AI models to create a new audience that can take similar actions to those seen in the original data. AI can also assist in ad creation. In the Campaign Manager, AI functions, such as “Draft with AI”, make it possible, for example, to generate draft ad texts.

Some of these features were initially offered as part of Accelerate. As of August 4, 2026, Accelerate is no longer offered as a standalone campaign type for new campaigns; its main creative functions are integrated into Classic campaigns. Accelerate campaigns that are already active can continue to be broadcast, but from January 5, 2027, it will no longer be possible to increase their budget or extend their duration.

Prepare LinkedIn Ads with external AI tools

External AI tools can be used even before the actual campaign is created. With the IONOS AI Marketing Manager, it is for example possible to prepare texts and visuals for social networks, particularly for LinkedIn. The tool creates publications which are put online after validation; for a LinkedIn Ads campaign, the content ideas must then be adapted and included in the Campaign Manager, where they can be compared with each other.

AI-generated content should always be verified before publication and adapted to your audience, your brand communication and the campaign objective concerned. This verification helps ensure consistent and effective use of AI for your LinkedIn Ads.

In the Campaign Manager, you can track the performance of your LinkedIn Ads using different indicators. Which ones are most relevant depends on the chosen campaign objective. Important indicators include, for example:

• Prints : how many times was the ad displayed?
• Click-Through Rate (CTR) : what is the proportion of clicks compared to impressions?
• CPC : what is the average cost per click?
• Conversions : How often was a desired action taken?
• Cost per result : how much does a result relevant to the campaign objective cost on average?

To optimize your ads in a targeted manner, the Campaign Manager also offers A/B testing. You then compare two ad groups that differ, for example, by creative, audience or location. This allows you to determine, based on the data, which variant best matches the respective campaign objective.