LinkedIn and LinkedIn Ad Library: overview of the platform and its advertising capabilities

In this article, we'll delve into how to run campaigns on LinkedIn: we'll introduce the platform to those who are unfamiliar with it, get to know its audience up close and personal, learn about their interests and activities, and find out what the LinkedIn Ad Library is and how to use it. Let's get started!

 

 

What is this LinkedIn?

LinkedIn is an international social network for networking. Here, you can find and establish valuable business connections. Users typically utilize the platform in the following ways:

 

• They publish their resumes;
• Look for jobs/new employees;
• Recommend known experts to partners and act as these experts;
• Post current job openings;
• Create interest groups.

 

As of November 2023, the social network's audience reached 1 billion registered users. Who are these people?

 

 

Audience and covered GEOs

As we mentioned, LinkedIn is a professional social network that brings together business people from around the world. However, the working population of the planet includes several generations, so now let's talk about the age demographics of the platform.

 

Age demographics. According to Statista, as of January 2024:

 

• 51.6% of LinkedIn users worldwide are aged 25–34.
• Users aged 18–24 make up the second-largest age group on the platform at 24.7%.
• The third-largest group consists of users aged 35–54, accounting for 20% of LinkedIn's audience.
• Users aged 55 and older comprise only 3.7% of the social network's audience.

 

Gender demographics. Who do you think dominates LinkedIn: men or women? It turns out it's men. This is supported by data from Statista as of January 2024. This is interesting and somewhat logical, considering the nature of the social network. We should keep in mind that education and employment opportunities aren’t equally accessible to women in all parts of the world, at least not to the same extent as they are to men.

 

• Men — 56.4%;
• Women — 43.6%.

 

Education level. When working on ad campaigns, a media buyer should segment their audience and create a profile for each segment. If you also engage in this practice (good for you), you'll need information on the education level of the platform's audience.

 

 

According to a study of users on various online platforms in the United States:

 

• 10% of LinkedIn's audience have only completed high school (or even less);
• 28% have completed some college;
• 50% have attained higher levels of education.

 

Of course, it’s not ideal to generalize, but these data seem quite representative for the platform's audience overall. So, LinkedIn is a social network for educated individuals? Actually, this is indeed important information because an educated audience requires a special approach — loud and flashy creatives won't work here; you'll need to thoroughly develop your strategy.

 

 

GEOs and their coverage. One can say that LinkedIn's GEO is worldwide, as the social network has users from approximately 200 countries. Ending the paragraph here would be odd, so let's also discuss LinkedIn advertising reach across different GEOs. It's clear that users engage with the platform's content differently in various regions: access to the platform is restricted in some places while internet access varies.

 

For example, in the USA, LinkedIn's coverage is 82.2%, while in Malta it's 70.8%. Below are more detailed statistics from Statista as of January 2024, though unfortunately not all GEOs represented on LinkedIn are included here.

 

 

To view GEOs and other useful advertising data, we don't necessarily need to search through Statista reports, because LinkedIn has its own cool feature.

 

LinkedIn Ad Library

If you've ever used AdHeart, here's a quick explanation for you: LinkedIn Ad Library is essentially the same thing, but for LinkedIn and it's free.

 

What is LinkedIn Ad Library? LinkedIn Ad Library is a collection of ads displayed on the platform. Essentially, anyone can view their content and the advertiser who published the ad, as well as some advertising metrics without SMS or registration.

 

How to use LinkedIn Ad Library? It's all straightforward. To start searching, you can configure one, several, or all of the parameters at once:

 

• You can set up search by specific company or advertiser if you know your competitors by name;
• You can search ads by keyword;
• You can select targeted GEO and publication date.

 

Let's, for example, see who has been advertising with the keyword "gambling" in Belarus this month.

 

 

The filter returned 13 ads, and it's pleasing that it also shows removed content — we can see what triggers moderation.

 

Let's see what information we can gather from the ads. Clicking on "View detailed information" opens a separate tab with the ad.

 

Initially, only information about the ad's content and advertiser is accessible.

 

 

And the second one is very informative. In addition to the advertiser and the placement period, we have access to the following information:

 

• Ad impressions: the number of impressions and the percentage breakdown of impressions across different GEOs;
• Ad targeting: language and region. Since LinkedIn is also used as an HR platform, there is also a job vacancy parameter, which seems to be omitted if the ad isn’t related to hiring in any way.

 

Of course, and how could we forget about the creatives! By peeking through the library at competitors, you can see which creatives they are using on the platform:

 

 

Using the LinkedIn Ad Library is actually quite straightforward — all that's left is to engage your analytical skills, compare all the information, and develop your own strategy for launching campaigns on LinkedIn:

 

• Which format is best to choose?
• What targeting should you set?
• How to avoid falling into moderation traps?

 

The LinkedIn Ad Library is an excellent tool for finding answers to these questions. It promotes transparency in advertising on the platform and enables marketers to make informed decisions when launching campaigns.

 

Instead of a conclusion

We searched for ads using the keyword "gambling" and found that out of the 13 ads returned, only two (one of which was removed by moderation) actually advertised a casino.

 

The rest were promoting various tools for buyers and arbitrage conferences. This shows that LinkedIn is a niche social network where people primarily engage in professional conversations, making it more suitable for B2B marketing. Every type of advertisement has its place, and while LinkedIn is a great and evolving platform, it may not fit every niche.