Sound familiar?
- LinkedIn clicks cost far more than Meta and you are not sure they are worth it
- Your audience is either 3 million people or 400, and neither works
- Leads from forms are students and job seekers, not buyers
- You post good content organically but it only reaches your own staff
- Sales says marketing leads are poor; marketing cannot prove otherwise
- The Insight Tag was never installed, so there is no retargeting audience
Key facts
- LinkedIn ads management from £150 a month + VAT, plus ad spend paid directly to LinkedIn
- LinkedIn's best-practice guide sets a minimum daily budget of $10 and a minimum lifetime budget of $100 for new campaigns
- LinkedIn requires an audience of at least 300 members and suggests 50,000 or more for results
- Lead Gen Forms allow up to 12 fields and 3 custom questions, pre-filled from members' profiles (LinkedIn Ads Guide)
- Document ads accept PDF, DOCX or PPTX up to 100 MB and 300 pages (LinkedIn Ads Guide)
- DataReportal's Digital 2026 UK report counts 48.0 million registered LinkedIn members in the UK
- Monthly, cancel with notice
When LinkedIn ads make sense
LinkedIn is expensive per click compared with Meta, so it earns its place only when the value of a customer is high and the buyer is identifiable by job. That fits B2B services, software, manufacturing, recruitment, professional services, training and commercial property. It rarely fits consumer products or low-ticket local services.
The strength is targeting by work identity: job title, job function, seniority, company name, company size, industry and skills. DataReportal's Digital 2026 UK report counts 48.0 million registered LinkedIn members in the UK, though that is registered members, not active users, so real reach is smaller. LinkedIn's help documentation sets the minimum audience at 300 members and suggests at least 50,000 for campaigns to deliver well. For most UK niches we aim between those two numbers. For the wider B2B picture, see marketing for B2B and manufacturers.
Ad formats we use
LinkedIn's Ads Guide lists the current formats and specifications:
- Single Image: 1200 x 627 px, PNG or JPG under 5 MB. The workhorse for lead generation.
- Document ads: PDF, DOCX or PPTX up to 100 MB and 300 pages. Good for guides and checklists, and you can gate the full document behind a Lead Gen Form.
- Video: MP4 under 500 MB, up to 30 minutes, though short works best.
- Thought Leader ads: promote a post from a named person, such as your managing director, rather than the company page. LinkedIn allows posts from verified employees and from connections.
- Conversation ads: a message in the member's inbox with up to 5 call-to-action buttons.
Thought Leader ads often get cheaper engagement because people respond to people. They suit firms where the founder or partners are the product.
Lead Gen Forms and lead quality
LinkedIn Lead Gen Forms open inside LinkedIn, pre-filled from the member's profile. The Ads Guide allows up to 12 fields and 3 custom questions. Pre-filling makes them easy to complete, which is good for volume and bad for quality if you ask nothing. We add one qualifying question, such as company size or project timescale, and connect the form to your CRM so sales sees the lead within minutes.
We also exclude obvious waste: students, job seekers, your own staff, existing customers and competitors. Where your CRM records which leads became opportunities, we feed that back so you can judge LinkedIn on pipeline, not cost per lead. CRM connections beyond the standard integrations can be built by dijitul developments.
Matched Audiences and the Insight Tag
The LinkedIn Insight Tag is a script on your website that builds retargeting audiences and records conversions. LinkedIn also offers a Conversions API for sending conversions from your server or CRM. Like the Meta Pixel, the Insight Tag needs cookie consent in the UK.
Matched Audiences let you upload a list of target companies (account-based marketing), a customer list for exclusion or lookalike-style expansion, or retarget people who visited your site or opened a Document ad. LinkedIn's guidance notes that location targeting is always applied, so a list that looks big enough can shrink below 300 once you limit it to the UK.
Budgets and pricing
Our management fee is from £150 a month + VAT. Ad spend goes directly to LinkedIn. LinkedIn's own best-practice guide sets a minimum daily budget of $10 per campaign and a minimum lifetime budget of $100 for a new campaign; your account is billed in your chosen currency. In practice, a test that only spends the minimum rarely produces enough leads to judge, so we plan a budget that can buy a meaningful number of conversions over a month or two, and we tell you plainly if LinkedIn looks too expensive for your margins.
Many B2B firms combine LinkedIn with Google Ads for people actively searching, and LinkedIn for reaching the right job titles before they search.
What you get
- Ideal customer profile turned into LinkedIn targeting facets
- Matched Audiences from your customer list, target account list and website visitors
- Campaigns using Single Image, Document, Video, Thought Leader or Conversation ads
- Lead Gen Forms connected to your CRM, with a qualifying question
- Insight Tag and conversion tracking set-up
- Monthly report on cost per lead, lead quality and pipeline where available
How it works and what it costs
Google Ads management from £150 a month, social media management from £125 a month and email marketing from £95 a month, all + VAT. Ad spend is separate and paid to the platform. No long contracts.
Free review
We look at your current ads, social, email and analytics, or your plans if you are starting out, and tell you plainly what we would change.
Plan and price
You get a written plan with targets, budgets and a fixed monthly fee before anything starts.
Set up properly
Tracking and consent first, then campaigns, audiences, content calendars or email flows, all in accounts you own.
Run and improve
We manage it every week: search terms, bids, creative, posts and tests, cutting what does not pay and doing more of what does.
Report in plain English
A monthly report on leads, sales and cost per result, not vanity numbers, with what we will do next.
Frequently asked questions
How much do LinkedIn ads cost?
dijitul marketing manages LinkedIn ads from £150 a month + VAT, with ad spend paid directly to LinkedIn. LinkedIn's best-practice guide sets a minimum daily budget of $10 per campaign. Clicks usually cost more than on Meta, so LinkedIn suits higher-value B2B sales.
What is the minimum audience size on LinkedIn?
LinkedIn's help centre says an ad set needs at least 300 members and suggests 50,000 or more for good delivery. Location targeting always applies, so uploaded company lists can shrink once limited to the UK.
Are LinkedIn Lead Gen Forms any good?
They convert well because fields are pre-filled from profiles, with up to 12 fields and 3 custom questions. Quality depends on asking one qualifying question, excluding job seekers and competitors, and following up quickly through your CRM.
What are Thought Leader ads?
Ads that promote a post from a named person rather than your company page, such as your managing director. LinkedIn allows posts from verified employees and connections. They often get more engagement because people respond to people.
Can you target specific companies on LinkedIn?
Yes. Matched Audiences let us upload a list of target companies for account-based campaigns, then narrow by job function or seniority within those companies. The combined audience still needs at least 300 members to run.
Is LinkedIn right for a consumer business?
Usually not. Costs per click are high and targeting is built around jobs and companies. Consumer brands normally get better value from Meta or TikTok. We will tell you if LinkedIn does not fit.
Related
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