5 LinkedIn Ads lead generation tips

Linkedin ads on a mobile screen
Paid Social
26th Nov 2025

5 LinkedIn Ads Best Practices to Improve Your B2B Lead Generation Performance

LinkedIn remains one of the most powerful channels for B2B lead generation. The challenge is that many companies still run campaigns with basic targeting, high friction offers and disconnected measurement. If you want reliable, scalable results, you need a more strategic and disciplined approach.

Below is a practical guide to the five best practices that will help you improve performance, reduce wasted spend and build stronger campaigns on LinkedIn.

1. Improve Your Audience Targeting and Budget Allocation

Effective targeting is the foundation of strong B2B performance. It shapes your CPCs, your conversion rates and the overall quality of inbound leads.

Build a smarter Cold Audience
Avoid depending on job titles alone, since they are often inaccurate or incomplete. Instead, create Cold Audiences using more stable data points such as:

  • Seniority Managers and above

  • Function Recruitment, HR, Admin, Business Operations, Finance

This gives you broader but still relevant reach while reducing wasted impressions.

Refine your retargeting
Focus retargeting on your highest intent pools, such as:

  • Website visitors

  • Company page visitors

  • Video viewers

Use a clear budget split
A simple and effective starting point is:

  • Cold Audience 75 percent of total budget

  • Retargeting 25 percent of total budget

If US retargeting is disproportionately expensive, redirect that spend towards UK Cold campaigns where CPCs are usually lower and conversion rates tend to be stronger.

2. Streamline Your Campaign Structure and Budgeting

A tidy account structure is easier to manage and usually performs better.

Consolidate your campaigns
Instead of launching many small retargeting campaigns, consolidate them into one strong campaign that includes around 15 ads. This gives LinkedIn more room to optimise and improves delivery.

Use a lifetime budget instead of daily budgets
LinkedIn optimises better when spending across a longer window. For example, a four week spend of £2300 set as a lifetime budget gives the algorithm more flexibility than a strict £50 daily limit.

Increase creative variety to control CPCs
Adding 4 to 5 ads per campaign, each with slight variations, gives you coverage across different angles and reduces cost. Including 5 videos per campaign is also a strong strategy. Aim for:

  • 40 to 60 percent penetration rate

  • 5 to 7 percent frequency

This balance helps you stay visible without overwhelming your audience.

3. Align Your Offers and Creatives With Buyer Intent

High friction offers, such as immediate demo requests, often underperform in push campaigns.

Reduce conversion friction
If your offer feels too demanding, test Lead Gen campaigns with a softer entry point.

For Lead Gen ads:

  • Use Single Image format

  • Only request Name, Email and Company Name

  • Avoid asking for phone numbers

  • Ensure all fields are pre filled

This keeps the process fast and friction free.

Serve full funnel content to Cold Audiences
B2B buyers rarely move in a straight line. This means your Cold Audiences should see a mixture of top, mid and bottom of funnel content. Keep testimonials and case studies specifically for retargeting.

A helpful framework is to create ads that cover the five stages of awareness:

  1. Unaware

  2. Problem Aware

  3. Solution Aware

  4. Product Aware

  5. Most Aware

This ensures you have content that speaks to buyers no matter where they are in their decision process.

4. Strengthen Your Tracking and Performance Data

Your campaigns are only as good as your data. If tracking is broken or incomplete, you cannot make informed decisions.

Verify your conversions frequently
Regularly check that your platform conversions are firing correctly and syncing with your CRM, such as HubSpot. This avoids gaps in reporting that can mislead you later.

5. Improve the Quality of Your Video Production

Good video increases engagement and makes your brand more memorable, but quality matters.

For best results:

  • Choose a presenter who is confident, natural and on brand

  • Wear company colours or branded clothing

  • Use a lavalier microphone for clear audio

  • Record all screenshares and footage in HD

  • Use a tripod to avoid shaky recordings

  • Use a teleprompter app for smoother delivery

These small touches can significantly improve watch time and signal quality.

Summary

A high performing LinkedIn Ads programme is built on smart targeting, efficient account structure, low friction offers, strong measurement and high quality creative. If you apply these five best practices consistently, you will create a more predictable and profitable lead generation engine.

If you want help refining your LinkedIn Ads strategy, let's talk.