Hi there,
Thanks for reaching out! Really appreciate you getting in touch about your LinkedIn ads. It's good you're already on there, as it's definitely the right place to be for finding marketing teams. Managing it yourself is a decent start, but you're right, a specialist can often squeeze a lot more out of the budget.
I'm happy to give you some of my initial thoughts and a bit of guidance based on what you've said. I've run a fair few B2B campaigns, including on LinkedIn, so hopefully this will be helpful for you. It's a tricky platform to get right, and a lot of people waste money by not having the right strategy in place from the begining.
We'll need to look at your targeting...
First things first, the absolute foundation of any good LinkedIn campaign is the targeting. Get this wrong and it doesn't matter how good your ads are, they just wont perform. Your budget is decent for starting out, but it's not huge, so we can't afford to waste any of it on the wrong people. With B2B, and especially on LinkedIn, you have to be super specific.
You mentioned you sell to marketing teams. That's a great start, but we need to go deeper. Who exactly in that team makes the decision to use a service like yours? Is it the Head of Marketing? The CMO? Or maybe it's a senior Marketing Manager who's overwhelmed and needs to delegate design tasks. My guess is it's probably a mix, but you'll likely have a 'sweet spot'. This is your ideal customer persona (ICP).
Once you've defined the person, you then think about the company. Are you targeting start-ups, SMEs, or big enterprise clients? Your price point of £699-£1500 a month suggests you're probably aiming for SMEs, maybe in the 50-250 employee range. They're big enough to have a marketing budget but often too small to have a big in-house design team.
So, on LinkedIn, we wouldn't just target 'Marketing'. That's way too broad. We'd build audiences that look something like this:
| Audience Component | Example Targeting Selections |
|---|---|
| Job Seniority | Manager, Director, VP, CXO |
| Job Function | Marketing |
| Company Size | 51-200 employees, 201-500 employees |
| Industry (Optional) | e.g., Computer Software, IT Services, Financial Services, Professional Training & Coaching (if you have specific niches that work well) |
| Geography | United Kingdom |
The key is to create a few of these narrow audiences and test them against each other. You could have one for 'Marketing Directors in Tech' and another for 'Marketing Managers in Professional Services'. By keeping them separate, we can see which audience responds best and then double down on the winner. Another powerful approach is to use company list targeting. You could build a list of, say, 500 UK companies you'd love to work with, upload that to LinkedIn, and then show ads only to the marketing decision-makers at those specific firms. It's a very direct aproach.
Getting this bit right is probably 50% of the battle won on LinkedIn. It makes everything else downstream so much easier.
I'd say you need to nail your ad creative and format...
Once you're confident you're reaching the right people, the next job is to grab their attention with a compelling ad. On LinkedIn, people are in a professional mindset. They're scrolling through their feed looking at industry news and connections, not cat videos. So your ad needs to respect that context but also stand out.
You're a design company, so your ads have to look fantastic. It's a direct reflection of your work. But it's not just about looking pretty; it has to have the right message and use the right format.
A few thoughts on ad formats:
-> Single Image Ads: These are the bread and butter. A strong, striking graphic with a clear headline can work wonders. The goal is to stop the scroll. The copy needs to be direct and benefit-driven. Don't just say "Graphic Design Services". Say something like "Tired of slow, off-brand design? Get unlimited graphic design support for your marketing team. Fast turnarounds. Fixed monthly price."
-> Carousel Ads: These could be brilliant for you. Each card in the carousel could showcase a different piece of your work – a logo you designed, a brochure, a set of social media graphics. It's like a mini-portfolio right in their feed. You could also use it to break down your service features or show a step-by-step process of how you work with clients.
-> Video Ads: Video can be very powerful for building trust. You don't need a huge Hollywood production. A simple, well-edited video could feature a client testimonial, a quick screen recording showing how easy your briefing process is, or even a 'day in the life' of one of your designers. I've seen some SaaS clients get great results with simple User-Generated Content (UGC) style videos. It feels more authentic and less like a slick corporate ad, which can realy help.
The other big decision is where you send people when they click. You have two main options on LinkedIn:
- Lead Gen Forms: These are pop-up forms that are pre-filled with the user's LinkedIn profile data (name, email, company, job title). They're super easy for the user to complete, so they usually give you a lower Cost Per Lead (CPL). The downside is that because it's so easy, the leads can sometimes be lower quality. They haven't had to put much effort in, so they might be less invested.
- Landing Page on your Website: This means sending them to a dedicated page on your site. This requires more effort from the user – they have to leave LinkedIn, wait for your page to load, and then fill out a form. Because of this extra friction, your CPL will almost certainly be higher. However, the leads you get are generally much better qualified. Anyone who goes through all that is probably genuinely interested.
For your kind of service and price point, I'd probably recomend testing both but leaning towards the landing page approach. You want people who are properly considering your service, not just tyre-kickers. A well-crafted landing page also gives you more space to sell your service, show your portfolio, and build trust with testimonials and case studies.
Here's a quick example of some ad copy we could test, just to give you an idea:
| Ad Copy Angle: The 'Pain Point' |
|---|
|
Headline: Your marketing team's secret weapon. Primary Text: Is your marketing team bogged down with endless design requests? Free up their time to focus on strategy and let us handle the day-to-day creative. We provide fast, reliable graphic design support on a simple monthly subscription. From social posts to sales decks, get everything you need, when you need it. See our work and find out how it works 👇 |
You probably should rethink your funnel and offer...
This is a big one, and it goes beyond just the ads themselves. The journey a potential customer takes from seeing your ad to becoming a paying client is your 'funnel'. Right now, you're asking someone who's never heard of you to sign up for a service that costs £700+ a month. That's quite a big ask from a single ad click.
B2B sales cycles are almost always longer than B2C. A business won't switch its design process on a whim. They need to trust you first. Tbh, a lot of businesses fail with ads not because the ads are bad, but because their offer isn't suited to a cold audience.
So, instead of going straight for the monthly subscription, we should test a lower-commitment offer to get your foot in the door. The goal here is to de-risk the decision for the client and give them a chance to experience how great your service is. We call this a "tripwire" or an "introductory offer".
Some ideas we could test as the main Call-to-Action for your ad campaigns:
- A Free Design Audit: Offer to review a company's current marketing materials (e.g., their last 5 social posts or a landing page) and provide a short report with actionable feedback. This costs you a bit of time, but it immediately demonstrates your expertise and builds goodwill. From there, you can have a conversation about how your service can solve the problems you identified.
- A One-Off Project: Create a small, fixed-price introductory package. Something like "Get 5 custom social media graphics for your brand for £149". This is a low-risk way for them to try you out. If they love the graphics and the experience, the upsell to a monthly plan becomes a much, much easier conversation. You've already proven your value.
- Book a Demo/Strategy Call: This is more standard, but it can still work well. The key is to frame it not as a "sales call" but as a "free strategy session" where you'll discuss their design challenges and map out a potential workflow.
By using ads to generate these initial conversations and smaller projects, you build a pipeline of warm leads. You can then nurture them towards the higher-ticket monthly plans. It's a more patient aproach, but for B2B, it's almost always more effective and sustainable in the long run.
You'll need to have realistic expectations on costs...
Okay, let's talk numbers. Your £3k monthly budget is a solid starting point for a targeted LinkedIn campaign. The question is, what can you expect for that spend? The cost of advertising on LinkedIn is higher than on platforms like Meta (Facebook/Instagram), but the quality of the audience is generally much higher for B2B.
I remember one B2B software client we worked with. We targeted decision makers and managed to get them a Cost Per Lead (CPL) of $22. As mentioned, this was on LinkedIn.
Let's run a quick, conservative projection to see what might be possible.
| Metric | Projection | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly Ad Spend | £3,000 | Your stated budget. |
| Target Cost Per Lead (CPL) | £50 | A conservative estimate. We'd aim to beat this. |
| Projected Monthly Leads | 60 | (£3,000 spend / £50 CPL) |
| Lead-to-Customer Conversion Rate | 10% | A fairly typical rate. If you close 1 in 10 qualified leads. |
| Projected New Customers / Month | 6 | (60 leads * 10%) |
| Average Revenue / Customer (Low End) | £699 / month | Your lowest package. |
| Projected New Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR) | £4,194 | (6 new customers * £699) |
| Return on Ad Spend (ROAS) | 140% | (£4,194 revenue / £3,000 spend). And this is recurring revenue. |
As you can see, even with some quite conservative numbers, the potential is there to generate a positive return. The whole game is about optimising each of those steps: lowering the CPL through better targeting and ads, and increasing the conversion rate through a better offer and sales process. If we could get the CPL down to £30 and you improved your sales process to close 15% of leads, the numbers would look even better. Its this constant process of testing and refinement that makes the difference.
I've detailed my main recommendations for you below:
| Area of Focus | Recommendation | Why it Matters |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Targeting | Go narrow. Build specific audiences based on job title, seniority, and company size. Test different industries separately. Consider account-based marketing with a company list. | Prevents wasting budget on irrelevant people. Ensures your message reaches actual decision-makers, leading to a lower CPL and higher quality leads. |
| 2. Ad Creative | Test multiple formats, especially Single Image and Carousel Ads to showcase your portfolio. Use direct, benefit-led copy that solves a pain point for marketing managers. | Your ads are your shop window. Professional, relevant creative builds trust and drives clicks. Testing is the only way to find out what resonates. |
| 3. Offer & Funnel | Stop selling the high-ticket subscription directly from the ad. Instead, promote a low-risk introductory offer like a 'Free Design Audit' or a small, paid 'Taster Project'. | This lowers the barrier to entry for new clients. It lets you prove your value first, which makes upselling to a monthly plan much easier and more effective. |
| 4. Tracking & KPIs | Focus on Cost Per Lead (CPL) and number of qualified leads as your primary ad metrics. Track the full journey to see your ultimate Cost Per Acquisition (CPA) and Return on Ad Spend (ROAS). | You can't optimise what you don't measure. This tells us what's working and what's not, allowing us to make data-driven decisions to improve performance over time. |
Phew, that was a lot of information! But I hope it gives you a clearer picture of what a more structured approach to your LinkedIn advertising could look like. It's not just about turning ads on; it's about building a predictable system for generating customers.
This is where working with a specialist can make a huge difference. We've been through this process many times, we know the benchmarks, we know what to test first, and we can manage the whole implementation and optimisation process for you. It saves you the time and the costly trial-and-error phase.
If you'd like to chat through this in more detail and have a look at your current account together, we offer a free, no-obligation initial consultation. We could dive into your specific setup and give you some more tailored advice.
Let me know if that sounds good.
Regards,
Team @ Lukas Holschuh
