If you’ve run LinkedIn ads, you know company ads feel cold and people scroll past them.
Thought Leader Ads fix this by promoting posts from real people like your CEO or team member. This is because they feel like natural, not like an ad.
In this guide, you’ll learn what LinkedIn thought leader ads are and how to use them.
Before we go into deep dive we should know what are they.
What are LinkedIn Thought Leader Ads?
LinkedIn introduced this ad format in June 2023, and honestly, it’s really pretty simple.
Instead of running ads from your company page, you just promote a post that someone from your team has already shared it. It could be your CEO, from your sales team, or manager.
The post still looks the same having same name, same photo, same words. You’re just paying to show it to more people. The only hint which ensure that it’s an ad is a small “Promoted” label under the name.
You can even promote posts from partners or customers, as long as they give you permission. And it’s not limited to just text. You can add a video, an article, or newsletter too.
The reason of LinkedIn thought leader ads are that they work simple: people trust on these ads and companies also. When someone shares a real opinion or experience, it feels genuine. And that’s what makes these ads work better than typical branded ads.
Why they work better than regular ads
There are a some reasons that why LinkedIn Thought Leader Ads usually perform better than regular LinkedIn ads.
First, they feel natural. Because the post comes from a real person, it doesn’t look like an ad. People are more likely to stop and read instead of scrolling the post like ad post.
Second, people interact more with real person/profile which promoted these ads than with logos. So you’ll usually see more likes, comments, and shares. And when engagement goes up, your cost per click often goes down too.
Third, it helps your team build their personal brand. Even if someone doesn’t buy from you, they recognize the person behind the post. Over time, that makes trust and then conversations start.
“Thought Leader Ads did not only help us increase CTR and decrease CPC, but also created a non-stop content engine by enabling us to promote each of our employees’ posts.” Dylan Doyle, Assistant Director of Social Media, EY Canada
How to do set campaign of LinkedIn Thought Leader Ads
Setting up a Thought Leader Ads are very easy and straightforward when you follow these steps. Here framework how they work:
1. Go to LinkedIn Campaign Manager
2. Pick your campaign objective
3. Set your target audience
Choose your target audience who you want to see the post based on job title, industry, company size, or seniority.
4. Select the Thought Leader Ad format
Under ad format, you can pick single image, video, event, or article depending on the type of post you want to promote.
5. Find the post you want to use in ad
Use the Partnerships tool in Campaign Manager to search for the employee’s post by their name or by pasting the post URL.
6. Request permission from the author
LinkedIn will send a permission request to them for advertise a post to using it in ad. Once they approve it, you can move forward and launch the ad.
7. Set your budget and launch
Add your daily ad spend amount or total budget, pick your dates, and launch. You can track everything in Campaign Manager’s analytics dashboard.
Which content works best
Not every post converts people into leads. The posts that perform best tend to have a few things in common.
Here are some content types that work well in Thought Leader Ads:
- A real opinion on something happening in your industry
- A lesson learned from working with a customer
- A step-by-step guide of how to solve a common problem
- A clear answer to questions that your sales team hears all the time
- A behind-the-scenes look at how your team works or how your product was built
- Original data or insights from your own experience
A simple rule: only spend money on the posts which are getting good engagement organically. If a post is getting real engagement without any promotion, that is a sign the content is working. Paid distribution will just push it further. If a post barely got any likes when it was posted, boosting it will make worth it.
Targeting and budget for LinkedIn Thought Leader Ads
LinkedIn Thought Leader Ads are best for building awareness and trust rather than driving immediate conversions, your targeting should reflect that.
Target your ideal customer profile (ICP)
If you want to do account-based marketing, upload a list of the companies which you are targeting. Then layer on job title or seniority filters so the post reaches the actual decision makers at those companies which your targeting.
Retarget people who already know you
Show Thought Leader Ads to people who have visited your website, who watched one of your videos, or followed your company page. They already have some awareness about you, and seeing a post from a real person at your company can push them into conversion phase.
Budget required for LinkedIn Thought Leader Ads
LinkedIn is more expensive than other platforms, but Thought Leader Ads help offset the cost by driving real engagement. Starting with around $50 to $100 per day per campaign is reasonable. Run it for at least two weeks before making any big decision. Test a few different posts to see which one gets best results.
Don’t make these mistakes during LinkedIn Thought Leader Ads
These mistakes can affect the effectiveness of these ads:
- Sponsoring posts that sound too corporate or too promotional. The whole point of this format is that it feels human. If the post reads like a press release or not having a thoughtful content, skip it.
- Only promoting your CEO. Spreading Thought Leader Ads across different people at your company gives your brand more engagements and more reach.
- Forgetting to request permission early. If the author takes a few days to approve, your campaign launch gets delayed.
- Using this format to drive conversions. Thought Leader Ads are not the right tool for getting people to fill out a form or buy something right away. Use them to teach what you have and build trust.
- Ignoring the comments. When your ad starts getting engagement, make sure the author or someone from your team is responding. Leaving comments unanswered decrease your branding on LinkedIn.
Is it worth to run LinkedIn Thought Leader Ads
Yes, Running LinkedIn Thought Leader Ads are worth it. But especially when if your goal is to build trust and get quality leads. They work best because they feel real.
People are more likely to engage with a person sharing an experience than a company which pushing a message. If you already have team members who are creating good content on LinkedIn, this format can give you better engagement and often lower costs compared to regular ads. But it only works when content is strong.
If the post feels forced or too salesy, it won’t perform good. When you focus on real, valuable content and engagement these are worth it.
At LinkedIn Impact we turn your content into high-performing Thought Leader Ads. Book a free strategy call today.