LinkedIn Ads: The B2B Lead Generation Playbook

So you're looking to setup LinkedIn ads. Most people who try this end up concluding it's "too expensive" after burning through a few grand with nothing to show for it. Tbh, they're not wrong, but it's expensive because they're using it completely wrong. They treat it like a B2B version of Facebook, plastering their logo everywhere with a 'Brand Awareness' campaign and wondering why no C-level executives are hammering down their door.

The truth is, LinkedIn can be an incredibly powerful channel for acquiring high-value B2B customers, but only if you approach it with the right strategy. It's not a platform for cheap clicks or vague brand building. It's a surgical tool for reaching specific decision-makers with a message that speaks directly to their most urgent problems. Get it right, and the cost becomes irrelevant compared to the value of the customers you acquire. Get it wrong, and you're just making a very expensive donation to Microsoft's bottom line. Over the years, I've seen the same mistakes made time and time again. This guide is about doing it right from the start.

So, why are my LinkedIn ads failing?

Let's be brutally honest. If your LinkedIn ads aren't working, it's almost definately down to one of three things: your objective, your targeting, or your offer. It's a chain, and if one link is weak, the whole thing snaps and your budget disappears.

First, the objective. I see this constantly. Someone selects "Brand Awareness" or "Reach" because it sounds sensible. You want people to be aware of your brand, right? Wrong. When you tell the LinkedIn algorithm to get you 'Reach', you're giving it a very clear instruction: "Find me the largest number of people for the lowest possible price." The algorithm, being very good at its job, goes out and finds all the users in your target demographic who are least likely to click, engage, or buy anything. Why? Because their attention is cheap. No one else is bidding for them. You are literally paying to reach the worst possible audience. You might as well just run an ad targeting your own employees. The only way to find actual customers is to stop wasting money and optimise for conversions—leads, sales, signups. Awareness is a byproduct of success, not a prerequisite for it.

Second, your targeting is probably far too broad and based on useless demographics. "Marketing Managers in the UK" is not a target audience. It's a guess. It tells you nothing about their needs, their challenges, or whether they have any budget. This lazy approach leads to generic ads that get ignored because they speak to no one. I remember one B2B software client who came to us after spending a fortune trying to target "IT Directors". We shifted their focus to target people based on the specific software they used (which we found by targeting members of certain software user groups on LinkedIn) and their CPL dropped to just $22. That's the difference between demographic guessing and pain-point targeting.

And that brings us to the final, and often biggest, failure point: your offer.

Before I even open Ads Manager, what do I need?

This is the part everyone wants to skip, and it's why most B2B advertising fails. Before you spend a single pound, you need two things crystal clear: your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) defined by their nightmare, and an offer that solves a piece of that nightmare for free.

Forget the demographic ICP your last marketing intern put together. "SMEs in the tech sector" is a fantasy. It doesn't help you write a single word of ad copy. You need to get under their skin. Your ICP isn't a persona; it's a problem state. It's a specific, urgent, and expensive nightmare that keeps a specific person awake at night.

For a data enrichment SaaS, for instance, their ICP isn't a "CMO at a 100-person company". It's a Head of Sales who is terrified of missing their quarterly target because their sales team is wasting half their day researching dead-end leads with outdated contact info. Their nightmare is the board meeting where they have to explain the pipeline miss. That's a specific pain. That's a nightmare. Once you know that, you know what podcasts they listen to (probably something like 'SaaS Growth Hacks'), what newsletters they read, and what to say in your ad to make them stop scrolling. Defining your ICP this way is the first, non-negotiable step in building an ad strategy that actually works.

Once you have the nightmare, you need to craft your offer. And I have news for you: you need to delete the "Request a Demo" button from your brain. It is the most arrogant, high-friction Call to Action in marketing. It presumes a busy executive has nothing better to do than schedule a meeting to be sold to. It's an instant turn-off.

Your offer's only job is to provide a moment of undeniable value. An "aha!" moment that makes them sell themselves on your solution. If you're a SaaS company, this is your unfair advantage. A frictionless free trial or a freemium plan is the gold standard. Let them use the product and feel the transformation. For one of our B2B SaaS clients, switching from a 'Demo' offer to a 'Start Free Trial' offer was the key that unlocked their growth.

If you're not a SaaS business, you're not off the hook. You must bottle your expertise into a tool or resource. A marketing agency could offer a free SEO audit. A corporate training company could offer a free 15-minute video module. For our own consultancy, we offer a free 20-minute strategy session where we audit failing ad campaigns. You have to solve a small, real problem for free to earn the right to solve the whole thing. Without this foundational work, you're just guessing, and that's a very expensive hobby.

Okay, I'm ready. Which campaign objective should I actually choose?

Right, let's get into the Ads Manager. The first thing it asks you is to choose an objective. This is the single most important setting in your campaign, as it tells the algorithm what you want it to do. As we've established, you're going to ignore Awareness, Consideration (mostly), and go straight for the Conversions block.

Your main choices here for B2B lead generation are going to be 'Lead generation' and 'Website conversions'.

-> Lead Generation: This uses LinkedIn's native Lead Gen Forms. When a user clicks your ad, a form pops up pre-filled with their profile information (name, email, job title, etc.). They just have to hit 'Submit'.

• Pros: It's incredibly low friction. Because it's so easy for the user, you will almost always get a lower Cost Per Lead (CPL) with this objective. It's great for top-of-funnel offers like downloading a whitepaper, registering for a webinar, or getting a checklist.
• Cons: The lead quality can be lower. Because it's so easy, you'll get people who are only casually interested. You need a solid follow-up process to qualify these leads and weed out the time-wasters. It's a numbers game.

-> Website Conversions: This objective sends users to a landing page on your own website, where you'll have a form for them to fill out. You'll need the LinkedIn Insight Tag (their version of the Facebook Pixel) installed on your site to track these conversions.

• Pros: The lead quality is almost always higher. Someone who has taken the time to leave LinkedIn, visit your page, read your copy, and manually fill out your form has much higher intent. These are often the leads that turn into actual sales. This is the objective for your high-value, bottom-of-funnel offers like a free trial, a consultation, or a strategy call.
• Cons: The CPL will be higher. Every extra step you add causes some drop-off, so you're paying more for each conversion. But what you lose in volume, you should make up for in quality.

Which one to choose? My advice is usually to test both. Run two separate campaigns, one for each objective, with the same ads and targeting. Send the Lead Gen Form campaign to a top-of-funnel asset (like an ebook) and the Website Conversions campaign to a bottom-of-funnel offer (like a free trial or strategy call). After a couple of weeks, you'll see which one is generating not just leads, but leads that actually turn into pipeline.

And what about ad formats? Image, Video, Carousel?

Once you've picked your objective, you need to decide what your ad will actually look like. LinkedIn offers a few options, but for most B2B advertisers running Sponsored Content, it boils down to three main formats. There isn't a single "best" one; it depends on your message and what you want the user to do.

-> Single Image Ad: This is your workhorse. It's a single static image, some text above it, and a headline below. It's the quickest way to get your core message across. If you have a powerful value proposition and a strong call to action, an image ad is perfect for driving traffic to a landing page. Don't use cheesy stock photos. A clean graphic with bold text stating the main benefit often works much better. Think of it as a digital billboard—you have about two seconds to grab their attention.

-> Video Ad: Video is brilliant for qualification. If someone is willing to watch your 90-second explainer video and *then* clicks to get your offer, they are significantly more qualified than someone who just glanced at an image. It's your chance to tell a story, demonstrate your product, or build a personal connection. We've seen great results with simple "talking head" videos from a founder explaining the problem they solve. It feels authentic and builds trust. You can even create retargeting audiences of people who watched 50% or 75% of your video—a very powerful tactic.

-> Carousel Ad: A carousel lets you use between two and ten swipeable cards, each with its own image, headline, and link. This format is ideal when you have more information to convey than you can fit in a single image. You can use it to:

• Showcase multiple features of your software.
• Walk through a multi-step process.
• Display testimonials from different customers.
• Break down a complex service into digestible parts.

Again, the best approach is to test. I would typically start by running a Single Image Ad and a Video Ad against each other in the same campaign. Let them run for a week or two and see which one delivers a better CPL or Conversion Rate. Often, you'll find different formats work better for different stages of the funnel. For a detailed breakdown you could check our guide on how to pick the right LinkedIn ad format that actually works for your business.

How do I *actually* find these people on LinkedIn?

This is where LinkedIn's power really shines, and where most novices get it wrong. You have an incredible amount of data at your fingertips, but you need to combine it intelligently. Forgetting about your targeting nightmares is possible if you follow a layered approach.

Level 1: The Basics (Don't Stop Here)
Everyone starts here. You can target based on:

• Company Industries: e.g., 'Computer Software', 'Financial Services'.
• Company Size: e.g., '51-200 employees'.
• Job Titles: e.g., 'Chief Marketing Officer', 'Head of Sales'.
• Job Functions & Seniorities: e.g., Function: 'Marketing', Seniority: 'Director' or 'VP'.

Level 2: Intelligent Layering
The real magic happens when you start combining these options. You don't just target one thing; you create an audience that must match multiple criteria. For example:

Show my ad to people who are in the 'Information Technology and Services' industry
AND work at a company with '51-200 employees'
AND have a Job Function of 'Engineering' with a Seniority of 'Manager' or higher.

Suddenly, you have a much more specific and relevant audience. You're weeding out the junior staff and those outside your key industries.

Level 3: The Expert Tactics (Where You Make Your Money)
This is where you move from generic targeting to surgically precise audience building. This is essential for anyone running B2B SaaS campaigns on LinkedIn.

• Group Targeting: Are there specific, niche LinkedIn Groups where your ICP hangs out? You can target members of these groups. If you sell a tool for HubSpot users, targeting members of the "HubSpot User Group" is a no-brainer.
• Competitor Follower Targeting: You can target the followers of your competitors' Company Pages. These are people who have actively shown an interest in a similar solution to yours. It's a direct line to a warm audience.
• Account Targeting (The Gold Standard): This is the most powerful tool in the arsenal. You can upload a list of specific companies you want to target (your ideal customer list). LinkedIn will match this to their company pages. You can then layer your job function and seniority targeting on top of this. This means your ads are only shown to the right people at the right companies. You can build these lists using tools like Apollo.io or ZoomInfo, or just create a spreadsheet of your top 100 dream clients. We used this exact strategy for an environmental controls company and reduced their cost per lead by 84%. It's that effective.

Don't be afraid to create multiple ad sets to test these different approaches. You might have one ad set for a layered demographic audience and another for a specific Account Targeting list. Let the data tell you which one works best.

My targeting is sorted. How do I write an ad that doesn't suck?

You can have the most perfectly targeted audience in the world, but if your ad copy is boring, generic corporate-speak, nobody will click. Your ad has one job: to stop the scroll and make your ideal customer think, "That's me. They understand my problem."

To do this, you need to ditch the feature list and focus on the pain. Don't sell the drill; sell the hole. I rely on a couple of simple, powerful copywriting frameworks that work consistently for B2B.

Framework 1: Problem-Agitate-Solve (PAS)
This is a classic for a reason. It taps directly into your customer's pain point.

• Problem: State the nightmare you identified in your ICP work. Use their language. "Another month, another AWS bill that's 30% higher than you expected?"
• Agitate: Poke the bruise. Remind them why this is so painful. "Your engineers are too busy fire-fighting to know where the waste is, and you're the one who has to explain the overspend to finance."
• Solve: Introduce your product as the clear, simple solution. "Get a clear view of your cloud spend in minutes. Our platform identifies and eliminates waste automatically. Start a free trial and find your first £1,000 in savings today."

Framework 2: Before-After-Bridge (BAB)
This framework paints a picture of a better future.

• Before: Describe their current, frustrating world. "Your sales team spends more time updating the CRM than they do selling. Deals are slipping through the cracks and your pipeline data is a mess."
• After: Paint a picture of the ideal state. "Imagine a CRM that updates itself. Every call, email, and meeting is logged automatically, giving you a real-time, 100% accurate view of your pipeline."
• Bridge: Position your product as the bridge to get them there. "Our software is the bridge. It connects to your existing tools and automates the admin, freeing up your team to do what they do best: sell. See how it works in a 2-minute video."

Notice how neither of these examples talks about "synergy" or "leveraging paradigms". It's simple, direct language that focuses on the result. When you combine this kind of copy with a clean, relevant visual (a screenshot of your dashboard, a simple graphic, a photo of your team), you'll have ad creative that's impossible to ignore.

What happens after they click? Is my website good enough?

This is where so many campaigns fall apart. You can have the best ad and the best targeting in the world, but if you send that expensive, hard-won click to a terrible landing page, you've just wasted your money. Your landing page isn't just a page; it's the second half of your ad.

When someone clicks your ad, they have a specific expectation. Your landing page's only job is to meet and exceed that expectation, and guide them to a single action. Most B2B websites are a disaster for this. They're cluttered with navigation links, competing messages, and vague corporate jargon. It's like inviting someone over for a focused chat and then leaving them in a room with five televisions on full volume.

A high-converting landing page is brutally simple and focused. Here's your checklist:

• Message Match: The headline on your landing page must match, or be a direct continuation of, the headline in your ad. If your ad promises a "Free Cloud Cost Audit", your landing page headline should be "Get Your Free Cloud Cost Audit". Anything else creates confusion and kills conversions.
• One Goal, One Button: What is the single most important action you want the user to take? That's your Call to Action (CTA). Your page should have one primary CTA button, and it should be repeated. Remove all other distractions. Ditch the main navigation menu, the footer links, the social media icons. Give them one choice.
• Benefit-Driven Copy: Like your ad, the copy should focus on the outcome, not the process. Don't list features. List what those features will do for them. Use bullet points to make it scannable.
• Social Proof: Why should they trust you? Show them. Include logos of companies you've worked with, a short testimonial from a happy customer (with their headshot and title), or any awards you've won. This is a massive trust signal.
• Frictionless Form: If you're asking them to fill out a form, keep it as short as humanly possible. For a top-of-funnel offer, just ask for a work email. You can enrich the data later. Every extra field you add will lower your conversion rate.

Optimising your landing page is often the cheapest and fastest way to improve your campaign results. Doubling your landing page conversion rate from 2% to 4% has the same effect as doubling your entire ad budget, but it doesn't cost you an extra penny in clicks. If you're struggling with this, our guide to high-converting landing pages is a good place to start.

How much should I spend and how do I know if it's working?

This is the million-dollar—or, more likely, the few-thousand-pound—question. Let's tackle the budget first. LinkedIn's auction is more expensive than Facebook's or Google's. You can't dip your toe in with £10 a day and expect meaningful results. You won't get enough data to make any real decisions. As a general rule, I'd say you need to be prepared to spend at least £50-£100 per day per campaign you are testing to get statistically significant data within a reasonable timeframe (like a week or two). Any less than that and the algorithm will struggle to optimise.

But the budget itself isn't the real question. The real question is: how do you know if that money is being spent well? Most people get bogged down in vanity metrics: impressions, click-through rate (CTR), even cost-per-click (CPC). Tbh, these are mostly distractions. A high CTR is useless if none of those clicks convert into leads.

The only metrics that truly matter are the ones that connect to revenue. You need to focus on:

• Cost per Lead (CPL): How much does it cost you to get one person to fill out your form? This is your primary top-level metric.
• Cost per Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL) / Sales Qualified Lead (SQL): Not all leads are created equal. How much does it cost to get a lead that your sales team actually accepts as viable?
• Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC): The big one. How much ad spend does it take to get one new paying customer?

To really understand what you can afford, you need to know the other side of the equation: your Customer Lifetime Value (LTV). If you don't know this number, you're flying blind. It's the key that unlocks aggressive, intelligent growth. Let's do some simple maths.

Once you know a customer is worth £10,000 to you, suddenly paying £250 for a highly qualified lead from a target account doesn't seem so expensive anymore. It looks like a bargain. This is the maths that separates the businesses that scale with paid ads from those that give up after a month. It also informs your decisions on which channels to use, a critical decision for any B2B business looking to choose between Google and LinkedIn ads for their lead generation.

This is a lot. What's the main advice I should implement now?

I know this is a tonne of information, and it can feel overwhelming. If you take nothing else away from this, focus on these core principles. This is the blueprint we use, and it's what separates successful campaigns from the ones that just burn cash.

The entire process is a system. It starts with a deep understanding of the customer's pain and ends with a relentless focus on the commercial metrics that actually matter. Every step logically follows the last. If you skip a step, especially the foundational work on your ICP and offer, the whole structure becomes unstable.

Here is the main advice I have for you, broken down into a clear, actionable plan. Work through this step-by-step, and you'll be ahead of 90% of the advertisers on LinkedIn.

Following this blueprint is the path to turning LinkedIn from a money pit into a predictable engine for customer acquisition. It's not easy, and it requires discipline. It means doing the strategic work up front before you get to the fun part of launching ads. But it's the only way to get consistent, profitable results, particularly in challenging markets like those where standard tactics often fail.

The reality is that implementing this, testing variables, analysing the data, and optimising week after week is a full-time job. It's a specialist skill. While this guide gives you the strategy, the execution is where many businesses falter, simply because they don't have the time or in-house expertise to manage it effectively.

This is where expert help can make a huge difference. An experienced consultant or agency can accelerate this entire process, help you avoid the common and costly mistakes, and bring years of cross-industry knowledge to your campaigns. We can help you build this entire system, from defining your ICP's nightmare to calculating your LTV and scaling your campaigns profitably.

If you've read this far and feel like you've got a better handle on the strategy but are concerned about the implementation, it might be worth a conversation. We offer a free, no-obligation initial consultation where we can look at your specific situation and give you some actionable advice on how to move forward.