Advertising on LinkedIn and YouTube

Landing Page Academy » Chapter 6: Landing Pages and Advertising » Lesson 3/4

Though for most marketers and business owners, Google Ads and Facebook Ads are more than enough, some of us expect more. But how to expect more than reaching out to almost anybody who has access to the Internet? It all depends on what we’re trying to advertise.

There are products or services made for the B2B kind of relationship, and they can bring far better results by being advertised on LinkedIn rather than on Facebook. On the other hand, YouTube provides an excellent opportunity to show people a short video that is a much better way to explain something than a static ad and then redirect them to a corresponding landing page. Let’s address these needs!

LinkedIn is not a typical social media platform, at least at first sight. However, the more time you spend on it, the more Facebook-ish it gets. But the thing that makes it different is the user profile. LinkedIn is made for and used by professionals, recruiters, CEOs, managers, and corp workers, who seek career development.

Even if there aren’t as many work-related posts as you’d expect, it’s the audience that fits the image of LinkedIn and makes it a valuable advertising space.

LinkedIn Ads and landing pages

• Native ads or Sponsored Content is what LinkedIn users see on their feed, between the posts written by their contacts. They are marked as sponsored to distinguish them from organic posts, just like on Facebook.
• Sponsored Messaging – if you’ve been a LinkedIn user for a while, you’ve probably grown to… slightly dislike the “InMail” messages you’re likely receiving. Constantly. While they trigger similar feelings as pop-ups, they (also similarly) are a handy marketing tool for contacting people directly, especially in terms of recruiting.
• Dynamic Ads – when scrolling through your desktop feed on LinkedIn, you’ll eventually stumble upon this kind of ad on the right side of the screen. What’s more, it’ll follow you down the feed and change as you scroll. That’s what makes it dynamic, after all.
• Top text ad – at the upper edge of your screen, there should be a simple text ad. It’s non-invasive but also easy to miss, as it’s not pinned down to the menu. Still, it’s something to think about.

That’s not everything LinkedIn has to offer, but it reflects what you should expect from advertising on this platform.

What kinds of ads are there on LinkedIn?

So, where are the landing pages in all this?

Each advertisement on LinkedIn should take users to a dedicated page. Are you recruiting for the Project Manager position? Redirect to the landing page. Are you running a webinar for Financial Analysts? Create a sign-up landing page. Are you advertising your brand new online course for managers? You get the picture.

Of course, all this will work for conversion-oriented ads. If your goal is to get more awareness about your brand, you may choose the suitable option while creating the ad and gain followers and views in return.

There are also consideration ads on LinkedIn, which may be used to get more views on landing pages (not homepages!) or videos and invoke more engagement with your brand’s posts (reactions, comments, shares, mentions, and so on).

While LinkedIn offers similar advertising options like Facebook, YouTube works a bit differently. First things first – you’ll probably be running video ads on YouTube.

Since YouTube is a part of Google (and a big one), you’ll be advertising on YouTube using the Google Ads tool.

Advertising on YouTube

TrueView Ads

It’s the most popular advertising option on YouTube – an ad that will play before the actual video people intend to watch. What’s best about TrueView for users? They can skip this ad after 5 seconds. What’s crucial for you? It would help if you made these 5 seconds count. If you can’t get the user’s attention in 5 seconds, you’ll probably lose them – they’ll skip the ad and won’t think about it twice.

A TrueView ad comes with a CTA box that can redirect users to a dedicated landing page. Keep in mind that you will pay for the ad only if the user watches no less than 30 seconds (or views the whole video, if it’s shorter) or if they somehow interact with an ad.

Pre-roll In-Stream ads

YouTube user’s nightmare – non-skippable ads are in the same league as pop-ups or aforementioned InMail ads. They can get annoying, but they also work. People don’t like getting interrupted while they’re in the middle of watching, but they also can’t help but watch the ad – not many users would switch to another tab to do something else while the ad is playing.

They don’t want to miss the end of commercials (just like the old TV times), so they are – harsh words – forced to watch an ad.

If you decide to buy an unskippable ad, make it worth their while – use it for brand awareness rather than for selling the product (though, if done wisely, that might just work, too). Breaking the fourth wall may be an exciting idea (it’s been done a few times but still isn’t as popular as it should be).

Use the non-skippability to your advantage – end the ad with a strong call to action and take engaged users to a carefully-prepared landing page.

Bumper Ads

If you’re eager to advertise on YouTube but don’t have enough time or resources to create a long video ad, you may make a bumper ad, which is a 6-second video played before an actual video. You can complement the advertisement with the banner or CTA. Paradoxically, 6 seconds can be more than enough to say something that will encourage viewers to click.

What’s next? A landing page. But that’s a whole different story that you already know well.

Now, what ads can you run on YouTube?

How to advertise on YouTube?

There are a few things you need to take care of before your YouTube ad launches:

• Choose your goal (e.g., conversion or awareness)
• Set up your budget – you may want to start small, with a limited budget, to see how viewers would react to your ads
• Select a proper target audience for your ad
• Choose the objective of a campaign and its format
• Select where your ad will be displayed (you can exclude sensitive content, for example)
• Don’t forget to add keywords – they’ll help YouTube algorithms to display your ads to interested people.

After following those few steps, you should be all set up.

Takeaways

1. LinkedIn ads are a great way to advertise your solutions directed to B2B clients.

2. You can use LinkedIn ads to develop your brand’s LinkedIn profile, for recruitment purposes, or to sell your products or services outside LinkedIn.

3. YouTube Ads are based on the Google Ads platform, which means you have access to all of Google’s targeting options while setting up your ad.

What's next?

In the last lesson of the Landing Page Academy, we’ll be talking about remarketing and how to make your landing pages suitable for it. After this lesson, you’ll be ready to go out there and make the most out of your landing pages.

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