Linkedin B2B Retargeting & Lookalike Audiences

Small-budget B2B marketers often struggle with ad tracking, attribution, and conversion. The solution is simple: remarketing. Displaying ads to past visitors increases CTR, lower CPL, improves ROI and builds brand awareness. These benefits make it a required tool for B2B marketers. Using retargeting and lookalike audiences amplifies campaign effectiveness and budget efficiency, supporting multichannel strategies during downturns.

This guide addresses LinkedIn’s current retargeting capabilities and its lookalike audience function. Retargeting campaigns serve users who met specific interaction criteria on the advertiser’s website or specialised media (e.g., videos, whitepapers). Lookalike audiences require no interaction: advertisers feed LinkedIn a seed audience based on company lists or CRM data. The platform then amplifies organic reach and acquisition by exploring shared user characteristics and preferences within the selected location.

Introduction to LinkedIn B2B Retargeting & Lookalike Audiences

Retargeting and lookalike audiences are core advertising approaches that are now indispensable for B2B marketers delivering comprehensive and effective campaigns. Given the length of the B2B marketing funnel, retargeting these users in the moments that matter is paramount. In 2025, these campaigns will become even more central as more users opt not to share their personal information with brands offering no benefits in return. To counter the reduction in third-party data accessibility, brands will increasingly leverage first-party data from other users and CRM-create lookalike audiences optimally designed to convert. Building effective retargeting and lookalike audience campaigns also unlocks longer-term pipeline acceleration through word-of-mouth referrals.

Retargeting and lookalike audiences are essential tactical elements within LinkedIn’s B2B advertising ecosystem that exploit its rich audience database. When properly integrated with CRM systems, websites, and offline data, retargeting can deliver high CTRs, low CPLs, and excellent ROAS. Lookalike audiences also provide a highly effective B2B demand generation approach that scales efficiently when the hardware and software used to generate and deliver campaigns are connected seamlessly.

What Are Retargeting and Lookalike Audiences on LinkedIn?

Retargeting and lookalike audiences on LinkedIn core tools for precise B2B marketing group prospects by engagement and openness to conversion. Marketers then use the resulting audiences to deliver highly relevant ads. The key terms are defined, before explaining how they intersect with the opening overview.

LinkedIn’s ad platform enables marketers to build custom retargeting audiences and expand reach by finding new, relevant segments. Retargeting allows campaigns to re-engage people who have interacted with the brand in specific ways for example, visiting a website, completing a lead-gen form, or consuming video content. Lookalike audiences, by contrast, reach prospects similar to an established seed audience, based on advanced machine-learning models deployed to analyze unique data attributes. Both B2B capabilities offer marketers proven ways to boost ad recall, CTR, and conversion rates.

This growth is set against the shifting dynamics of B2B digital conversation, particularly at the top of the funnel. Social advertising platforms foster upper-funnel interest and initiate consideration journeys via audience networks that support brand awareness and reach campaigns. Optimizing bottom-funnel performance among a narrowly defined audience of known prospects and regular company visitors relies on Google and LinkedIn demand-generation campaigns. As scaling through retargeting, upselling, and audience reach becomes essential, these environments affect advertising decisions throughout the conversion funnel.

As retargeting effort scales, so do lookalike campaigns. Audience networks are invaluable for keeping brands top-of-mind and shortening purchase cycles among people likely to convert through other channels. For B2B marketers, however, the key lies in a first-party data ecosystem that links CRM, website, and marketing activity to audience-network reach.

Why Retargeting Is Essential for B2B Marketers in 2025

Retargeting is the B2B marketing tactic with the greatest scaling potential over the next two years. Any purchase-management funnel is no more than a selective filter for relevant leads at the right stage in the buying journey, so when 97% of visitors leave a website without converting, the brands that succeed are those that remarket to both earlier-stage prospects and lookalike audiences. Retargeting campaigns substantially improve CTR and CPL, while also lifting ROAS in paid search. Eclipsing even the power of first-party data, retargeting has consistently been ranked the best digital activation for performance media. In the B2B space, this activation will therefore become increasingly indispensable as the sales cycle shortens.

The reason is clear: the new purchase funnel is a combination of the traditional marketing funnel with 16 touchpoints across different platforms, including paid media, organic content, website, review platforms, and email. As LinkedIn’s sustained emphasis on conversion suggests, attribution models like last-click attribution cannot be relied on in a multi-touch environment. Therefore, to accelerate pipeline velocity and boost conversion rates, marketing departments should focus two-thirds of their digital activation budgets on retargeting on targeting users who have already interacted with the brand at least once. And a focal point for this strategy should be LinkedIn, because LinkedIn is now the only social network that collects first-party data relevant to B2B growth but also has built a comprehensive audience network that goes beyond its own platform.

Understanding LinkedIn’s Audience Network and Data Ecosystem

The growing complexity of attribution in a multi-touch world and the increased pains of privacy regulations have focused marketer attention on the power of first-party data. LinkedIn provides a wide array of first-party data, both from its own member ecosystem and augmented from trusted third-party partners. LinkedIn’s Audience Network helps marketers reach their target audiences at scale and with precision. Members may see relevant ads from brands that share their values, and brands can access a curated network of high-quality publishers. Third-party data from verified partners, such as Salesforce and ZoomInfo, adds a deeper layer of targeting information for B2B campaigns. LinkedIn uses its data ecosystem to help deliver the right messages to the right audiences in the right context, but retains member privacy as the foundation of everything it does.

At the core of LinkedIn’s Audience Network are members professionals who share their career data in order to make more relevant business connections. LinkedIn provides marketers the ability to reach this audience when they are consuming content, not only on the platform, but across a carefully curated network of partner websites and apps. Members continue to see relevant experiences aligned with their interests, and brands gain greater scale by being able to reach their audiences wherever they consume content.

How LinkedIn Collects and Uses Professional Data

LinkedIn collects a wealth of professional data from its members through account registration, content engagement, ad interactions, profiles, and third parties. The nature of the platform encourages accuracy in this data, as updates or inaccuracies may not align with their self-image or job opportunities. LinkedIn leverages this wealth of information to provide B2B marketers with the ability to collect, process, and use professional data in a privacy-compliant manner. Unlike other digital advertising platforms, LinkedIn does not use the browsing behavior of anonymous users to create a business data heatmap where impressions are offered to the lowest bidders. Instead, LinkedIn relies on the professional information of its users combined with business insights – 130 million from job postings and 84 million from company profiles – to create targetable professional segments directly connected with the buyers’ interests.

All these professional data points and signals empower the platform’s audience targeting capabilities. Marketers can target their ads based on company, industry, job function, job title, seniority level, member skills, country, state, city, and even interests. Beyond audience targeting capabilities, LinkedIn’s data ecosystem enables marketers to improve business performance by amplifying the value of their first-party data. With LinkedIn’s marketing capabilities, marketers can take website visitors, lead form engagers, video viewers, customer audiences, and other first-party data, and scale these audiences into thousands of potential buyers through retargeting and lookalike campaigns. Looking toward 2025, it is important to understand these two LinkedIn campaigning capabilities along with the specific benefits of targeting B2B buyers who are already familiar with the brand.

The Power of First-Party Data in B2B Campaigns

Based on LinkedIn’s audience data ecosystem, first-party data is especially valuable for B2B campaigns, helping to ensure the right advertising messages reach the right people at the right time. When teams incorporate first-party data sources CRM data, website retargeting lists, and LinkedIn lead gen audiences campaign performance improves. CTRs increase, CPLs decrease, and revenues rise. Follow these three steps to deploy retargeting campaigns with first-party data and improve performance, and visit the earlier section on retargeting to see the complete framework.

First-party data from CRM systems, website visitors, and users who have interacted with lead forms allow marketers to serve ads to warm audiences so that ad spend is allocated to the audience segments that are most likely to convert. Using first-party data from these sources also makes LinkedIn’s Audience Network, where advertisers can reach users on third-party sites and apps, much more effective. Because users in these audiences often have higher intent, the conversion rates tend to be better than for general audience targeting. First-party data helps to capitalize on moments of higher intent, leading to more clicks for less money.

Integration with CRM, Website, and Offline Data

Realizing the full potential of LinkedIn’s retargeting and lookalike audiences hinges on integrating first-party data from CRM systems, company websites, and offline sources. Each data segment provides highly relevant profiles, accurately tagged and categorized, thus enabling Facebook’s predictive algorithms to optimally deliver ads to lookalike segments. This section draws on “How to Build Retargeting Campaigns That Convert” for bidirectional synergy.

For CRM data integration, a Data Connector (suitable for Salesforce, Dynamics, and HubSpot) dictates data collection and sharing settings. Once configured, retargeting audiences are automatically updated with new leads, while the offline match process identifies matched LinkedIn profiles. For website data, adding LinkedIn’s Insight Tag establishes a direct flow of visitors into retargeting audiences. A pixel-based mechanism tracks visitor behavior and automatically syncs the data to LinkedIn. Finally, for offline data sources (e.g., physical stores, events), exported customer lists must include fields whose values can match LinkedIn accounts, email addresses, and phone numbers being the most widespread.

What Is LinkedIn Retargeting?

LinkedIn retargeting is a highly effective form of online advertising that enables marketers to hone in on users who have previously interacted with their company. These users may have visited the company website, viewed a specific product or service, engaged with video content, downloaded a lead generation form, or taken another significant action. Objectives typically include converting interested users who are often in the middle of the purchase funnel advancing users who may not be ready to buy but have expressed interest, or pursuing users who have dropped out of the sales funnel. Retargeting can also be applied to video content to convert or advance users who have watched a video ad without taking additional steps.

Retargeting enables greater engagement with an audience that has already shown interest, converting or advancing users at a lower cost than traditional advertising. Marketers looking to implement retargeting must define the audience, select a flow to convert or advance users, create suitable ad content, and choose a bidding strategy.

Types of Retargeting Available on LinkedIn

The main retargeting options on LinkedIn are website, video, lead form, and engagement retargeting using sponsored content. Strategic implementation is enriched by integration with the LinkedIn Audience Network and execution through the LinkedIn brand account SDK.

Retargeting is available for Website Visitors, Video Views, Lead Form Opens, as well as Engagement on videos and Sponsored Content ads. Website Visitors retargeting is the most common type, allowing marketers to show ads to users who have previously visited defined pages on their company website. Video retargeting displays ads to users who have watched specific content and is often combined with Website Visitors retargeting to acknowledge video engagement before narrowing focus.

Sequential retargeting using multiple types of ads enables B2B marketers to tell a story across the funnel, starting with broad objectives before driving users down funnel stages with Lead Ads. Integrating other retargeting types into these campaigns enhances performance.

B2B marketers using LinkedIn frequently install the LinkedIn brand account SDK for Audience Network inventory. Budgets are combined so that ads running on the Audience Network receive impressions from retargeting audiences without additional steps.

Benefits of Retargeting in B2B Marketing

The reasons to retarget in B2B marketing are familiar: improved metrics, especially click-through rates (CTR); lower costs, including cost per lead (CPL); and greater overall return on ad spend (ROAS). But beyond the numbers, the real power of retargeting lies in the way that it facilitates more meaningful connections and interactions with prospects, customers, and other audiences. Tracking data from Google and LinkedIn confirm that these qualitative benefits matter, as well. Retargeting on LinkedIn leads to a higher share of approvals from key decision makers as well as increased purchase volume over time.

Measuring performance is essential for inbound marketers. Clearly defined goals and KPIs not only instill discipline but also help marketers identify and implement the optimizations that generate the ideal results. In retargeting campaigns for LinkedIn Marketing Solutions, key performance indicators (KPIs) should include CTR, CPL, and ROAS. Information from LinkedIn Campaign Manager and site analytics in Google Analytics provide insight into performance and efficiency. Integrating LinkedIn data with Google Analytics or CRM systems expands the analysis further, enabling A/B testing and impact on revenue or pipeline contributions to be tracked. Properly applied, these metrics help marketers understand if retargeting is truly paying off.

How to Build Retargeting Campaigns That Convert

In the early stages of any B2B sales funnel, many users who land on the website do not convert. Therefore, it is essential to maintain a connection with these individuals for future campaigns focused on, whether it be through LinkedIn lead ads or extensive free content. Setting up standard retargeting campaigns should have a logical structure for optimal results. This section outlines the sequence of steps to follow when creating retargeting campaigns that convert.

Step 1: Select the Audience Source Based on Funnel Position

A useful tip when planning a retargeting campaign is to consider the segment source and funnel position. The source allows the audience and funnels to be defined correctly. For example, for users in the top-of-the-funnel stage who only visited the home page, a retargeting campaign can be set up with industry or solution posts. Alternatively, for users in the middle of the funnel stage who landed on service pages but did not convert, case studies can be used to accelerate the decision-making process. Users who submitted a lead form in previous campaigns can be retargeted with a you-cannot-miss final offer.

Step 2: Map the Funnel Strategy

Once the audience source is defined, the next step is to set up the funnel strategy. The funnel structure visually summarizes the segments and shared content. This can be diagramed in a tool like Miro or Excel, similar to a Google Ads remarketing funnel with an indicator for the segment size. Often, the creative pieces in LinkedIn will include new industry posts and solutions aligned with the audience’s interests.

What Are LinkedIn Lookalike Audiences?

LinkedIn Lookalike Audiences are a way to reach new, relevant prospects who closely resemble an existing group of people on LinkedIn. Lookalike Audiences are fed from your LinkedIn Campaign Manager account using two types of audience sources: Retargeting Audiences (e.g., Website visitors in the last 30 days) or a Custom List (e.g., your LinkedIn Connection List). The goal of a Lookalike Audience is to reach new prospects who are likely to be interested in your business, based on how closely they resemble the audience source.

Lookalike Audiences exist at scale, measured in the tens of millions, and become increasingly relevant to your business as the size of your seed audience increases. Your Lookalike Audience reaches potential customers much higher in the marketing funnel than the audience source, with a broader interest in your product category rather than the company’s offering or brand.

How Lookalike Audiences Work

Modeling lookalike audiences relies on machine learning techniques to detect common patterns and definable categories within existing first-party audiences, using these as benchmarks to find new targets. Some machine learning models use known data points such as previous purchases, app interactions, or customer attributes to create segments that can be targeted via paid media. Other machine learning models that don’t require known or first-party data simply find new audiences with similar online behavior patterns. Lookalike campaigns rely on machine learning algorithms that apply these concepts to discover new audiences, based on known audiences that can be used for audience targeting, either for paid media or other automated channels.

For LinkedIn Lookalike Audiences modeling, the modeling data sources are: website visitors, contact lists, LinkedIn Lead Gen Forms or Video views, and/or LinkedIn Page Followers. The size and quality of those audiences directly affect the scale of the Lookalike Audience that’s created. Higher model performance generally leads to greater predicted reach. Good data with enough members increases Reach, while lower performance means the Reach of the Lookalike will be smaller. Additionally, the predictive power of the model also determines relevance.

Benefits of Using Lookalike Audiences for B2B Growth

As a prospecting strategy, the looking-glass audience is a funnel positioned in the upper funnel area, helping customers with a top-of-mind approach to active demand without hitting that too early or arriving at the wrong time for the product you offer. You are not trying to generate intent or happiness because you are still below the surface of the demand for your product. Still, by creating a match with a segment of your audience that is in the focus stage and that has an active demand, you help prospects to ideate the cutoff of their SOW, RFI, and RFP files by getting them to install the thinking cap before heading to the market. Therefore, the timely message needs to inform customers of why they should consider your products without being either too much or too little threatening. The idea is to get the words “I’ll consider this” nailed on core cognitive branding P2U P2W on drug.

The only way to accelerate the sales funnel organically without daily touches is through the use of wonderful lists of looking-glass audiences and customers very close to an MQL from where the data could be validated much better than through real dollars spent but nor using fourth-party information in any direction in the sense of hoping something will happen but enabling the opportunity for something to happen. Looking-glass audiences are great and should help fill the pipeline with potential deals. Nevertheless, by doing so, customers lose money as it makes no sense to pay for awareness for a service with so little final delivery volume that can’t even be expedited.

When to Use Lookalike vs. Retargeting Campaigns

Deciding when to use lookalike versus retargeting campaigns hinges on three guiding questions. At what stage of the funnel is the target audience? Is the goal to create new demand or accelerate existing opportunities? What is known about the audience? Use lookalike models to identify pre-qualified new prospects those in the early to mid-funnel who are fitting prospects, and for which sufficient information exists. Use retargeting for audiences in the late-funnel and those being nudged toward closure.

In the 2025 marketing landscape, retargeting options will naturally lend themselves to sequential strategies aimed at nurturing leads down the funnel. As the pipeline closes, decisions will focus on AI-enabled lookalike marketplace strategies on a more mainstream scale. The risk will shift accordingly; lookalike audience models will be ever larger and thus more prone to dilution or wider targeting. These will require high-precision creative and messaging aligned to accounts with proximity between company size and market segment.

How to Set Up LinkedIn B2B Retargeting Campaigns (Step-by-Step)

Step 1 – Build a Source Audience

Building retargeting campaigns requires having an audience source. Sources can be a website, videos, lead gen forms, or event pages. Keep in mind the time-sensitive nature of audiences. Website audiences–those who visited in the last 180 days–can depreciate quickly for mature marketers. Have a lead gen form video or event page about to go live? Use it. Not part of a broader multi-touch campaign? Sooner is better.

Step 2 – Select the Type of Retargeting Campaign

Once you have a relevant audience source that matches the intended offer, select the type of retargeting LinkedIn campaign you want to run: website, video view, lead gen form view, or event page view. These audience types are also available as exclusion segments.

Step 3 – Define a Customized Creative

LinkedIn Campaign Manager will automatically pull the name of the source audience into the audience definitions, making it easy to create customized creatives. Think about why visitors dropped at this stage of the journey and how to respond with a tailored message respecting their previous interactions.

Step 4 – Use Larger Audiences for Better Performance

Standard bidding dictates that LinkedIn serves ads to the least-expensive audience first. When a small audience begins to exhaust, CTR drops, affecting CPC and performance. A sequential retargeting strategy spreads the ads across Time being the custodian of the B2B funnel across the web while LinkedIn owns the demand.

Step 5 – Formalize a Retargeting Schedule

The above steps will position a retargeting campaign to capitalize early on its source audience. For retargeting campaigns without source audiences, formalize a schedule detailing frequency and next steps.

Step 1: Install the LinkedIn Insight Tag

Fulfilling the requirements for retargeting and lookalike campaigns is a multi-step process. Below is a concise overview of what’s needed at each stage, with a link to guide the reader through the associated tasks.

To get started, the LinkedIn Insight Tag must be installed on the website or landing pages to be retargeted. This allows tracking of visitors and building audiences based on the pages they viewed. The tag can be placed as a JavaScript snippet or via Tag Manager. If Tag Manager is not an option, the code snippet must be installed on every page of the site preceding the tag. Detailed instructions are provided on LinkedIn.

Step 2: Create a Matched Audience

Have a LinkedIn Ads Manager Account? Log in to get started. The first step toward building a LinkedIn retargeting or lookalike audience is creating a matched audience. A matched audience is built using firs-party data that is shared with LinkedIn to build a custom audience profile. You can use any of the following options to create a matched audience.

1. **CRM Data**: Securely upload a set of email addresses, company names, phone numbers, or job titles. LinkedIn creates a matched audience of those users if they have accounts on the platform.
2. **Website Traffic**: Install the LinkedIn Insight Tag on your website to track LinkedIn visitors. You can then retarget visitors who viewed specific pages or defined segments of pages within a set time window.
3. **Video Views**: Retarget users who have seen your video ads for at least a certain number of continuous seconds.
4. **Lead Gen Form Views**: Retarget users who have opened any of your lead gen forms, regardless of whether they submitted one.
5. **Account Lists**: Upload a CSV file that contains either a list of LinkedIn company names or LinkedIn company page IDs. LinkedIn will retarget all users who work for a matched company.

To create a matched audience, go to the “Account Assets” menu in LinkedIn Ads Manager. Select “Matched Audiences.” Click the “Create a Matched Audience” button. Choose from the options available and follow the provided prompts.

Step 3: Define the Retargeting Source (Website, Video, or Lead Form)

At this stage, the retargeting source for the campaign should be defined. Three options are available:

• Website visitors: Users who visited specific pages, any page, or pages with specific URL parameters (e.g., blog posts or white papers). For B2B pipelines, select a relevant section of the website, such as case studies.
• Video viewers: Users who viewed a video ad for a specified duration. For campaigns with strong creative concepts, consider creating campaigns based on whether users watched at least a specific percentage of the ad.
• Lead form submitters: Users who submitted a lead form in a previous campaign. Such source audiences work well for pitching higher-value offers that correspond to the next step in the user journey.

After defining the audience source, the retargeting campaign needs to deliver the right messaging for each audience segment based on its position in the user journey (Stage 4). For audiences that visited the website or viewed a video but did not convert, the messaging should provide an extra incentive to submit a lead form. For audiences that submitted a lead form but did not convert into customers, the creative should closely mirror the higher-value offering that seals the deal.

Step 4: Build a Personalized Retargeting Funnel

Once a suitable retargeting audience has been established and segmented according to standard funnel stages, the next logical step is to determine which retargeting campaigns to build and in which order these campaigns should be addressed.

Broadly speaking, to maximize impact, campaigns should be deployed in the same order as the customer journey, starting with users who generated top-funnel engagements (such as visiting the product landing page) and moving subsequently to users who have engaged deeper into the funnel (such as downloading gated content, requesting a demo, etc.). All opportunistic engagement usually fall into the ‘Connecting with the brand’ phase while activities such as requesting a demo, downloading white papers, etc. are part of the ‘Considering Specific Offers or Solutions’ stage.

This simple logic can be applied to each segment of the funnel or a retargeting funnel by adding form fills and second or third touchpoints (installing the app, sharing contact details, etc.) in the sales funnel.

Step 5: Launch and Monitor Performance

It’s time to launch the campaign and track its performance according to the KPIs set previously.

To measure the performance of each campaign in detail, it is advisable to link the campaign with Google Analytics and use both Google Analytics and LinkedIn Campaign Manager to get a comprehensive audience understanding. Marketers can analyze the CTR and CPC in LinkedIn Manager for the advertisement level. With the Google Analytics link, they can also see the conversion tracking from Google, as Google Analytics can be integrated easily using UTM links. If proper conversion tracking is done in Google Analytics, the CPL can be obtained from that, while monitoring which ad/creative is giving the lowest CPL.

How to Build Lookalike Audiences on LinkedIn (Step-by-Step)

Create LinkedIn lookalike audiences with five simple steps. First, set up first-party data integration so a seed audience is available. Second, open the LinkedIn Ads interface and select the Assets dropdown menu. Click on the Audiences menu. Next, click the button to create a new audience and choose the option to create a lookalike audience.Third, select a seed audience. Fourth, define the audience by selecting the desired location from the options provided. Finally, hit the Create Audience button to finish the process.

5. Submit your work, and it will be visible to the world once approved.

Step 1: Upload or Select Your Seed Audience

To begin building a lookalike audience on LinkedIn, you must first upload a seed audience or create one from a predefined source. The available options are:

– Website and App Visitor Audience Add an audience that has previously visited or used your website or application (these audiences must contain at least 300 users in order to exist).

– List Upload Audience Select a custom audience that has been created by uploading a list of homepage users, CRM contacts, leads from LinkedIn lead gen forms, or visitors to a custom audience landing page (these audiences must also contain at least 300 users).

– LinkedIn Lead Gen Tracking Audience These audiences have been automatically created by LinkedIn and are composed of lead gen form submitters within your desired time frame.

– Video Audience These audiences have been automatically created by LinkedIn and are composed of users that have viewed a specific video, videos in a specific campaign or videos in a specific video ad format.

– CRM Match Audience Users of your CRM system that are on LinkedIn and therefore may be matched to your LinkedIn ad audience via the Custom Audience feature.

– Lookalikes of all users in the Account These audiences are automatically created by LinkedIn in the background for use with the lookalike audience capabilities.

After selecting the seed audience, simply follow the step-by-step process for lookalike audience setup.

Step 2: Choose Target Market or Region

LinkedIn gives the option to choose a specific region or target market for the campaign. LinkedIn allows an individual to reach professionals in up to 31 different markets. It is recommended to make the audience as relevant as possible as the quality of the audience matters as much as the reach.

From LinkedIn’s Audience Network, B2B marketers can leverage LinkedIn’s pool of professional data about every audience’s behavioral intent. By getting their first-party data, such as the URL of the audience’s own website, LinkedIn can see what this audience is visiting on their website. Further, through identity connection, LinkedIn can also compare the people visiting the brand’s website or engaging with the brand’s target audience, and see how many of these people are engaged with the brand on LinkedIn. With the help of this first-party data and these other behavioral attributes, marketers can create an audience very similar to the people in the source audience. The accuracy of the lookalike audience is very high as Facebook is the demand-side platform; marketers are just displaying the ads on LinkedIn.

Step 3: Refine Your Targeting Criteria

Each audience providing campaign prerequisites are extremely useful, giving practical addresses and enhancing your creative approach. Nevertheless, advertisers frequently commit a crucial error: they fail to align their targeting strategy with Branched Coaching an approach that aims to become a part of their audience’s journey and slowly lead them toward desired actions. In spite of the understood importance of considering different stages of their audiences’ interest in the brand, solutions, if established at all, often remain overly simple: at most, dividing audiences in remarketing segments by those who were truly hot (“watched video 50%”) and considered cold (“visited the website”) although a lot needs to happen between final conversion in the website and just entering the funnel. The journey might not be linear from a video ad to the landing page and final conversion, it might be very different from one person to another, and interested people might jump from one phase to another. This is particularly true in B2B marketing, especially for products or services requiring larger investments.

Adding sequential retargeting for every main touchpoint in LinkedIn video/funnel stages instead of the common front-to-funnel-only approach can make a difference; however, it is hard to guess how different segments of people are getting closer to the final conversion. Sequential retargeting can help address this issue by using the common approach of Broad Coaching but analyzing the path in one phase of the funnel at a time. Addressing audiences in their particular path toward conversion can increase the chances of success, and LinkedIn can be a powerful ally in this process for example, by targeting video completions, remarketing sequences, or people who signed a lead form without completing the actual conversion in a much more precise way.

Step 4: Launch Your Lookalike Campaign

Whether LinkedIn is a new or well-established B2B channel, you’ve likely already invested in creating website traffic or lead generation through LinkedIn, either organically or via paid ads. Step 4 in building lookalike audiences is deploying a campaign that targets these users and just as importantly, is machine learning-optimized for conversion. New User acquisition may be a key focus for the business, but if your company is at scale there’s a good chance that the post-purchase customer experience is generally positive. Returning users on their frequent B2B purchasing journeys or journeys to deploy services often generate larger order values, quicker conversions and even better profitability. Testing allocating a higher percentage of the marketing budget towards retargeting will often pay off. Recently, companies are beginning to use AI Chatbots to support website retargeting.

There is no single right answer to growing a business not matter what channel is being investigated whether Email, OA, LinkedIn or even Direct Mail, Social Media , … The key is always to figure out the audience that is in the ideal target or the keywords that result in an audience that would easily convert and continuously pilling new traffic volume and sales velocity by scaling across paid channels and creating trigger points to expedite optimization for growth. Sometimes traffic signs will help the marketing team to understand where excitement for a product lies and help align messaging to drive conversion. The Numbers Never Lie!

Step 5: Analyze and Optimize Results

1.5. Analyze and Optimize Results: Monitor KPIs for each campaign and audience source, and apply findings to future campaigns.

Retargeting and lookalike audiences can have a dramatic impact on LinkedIn advertising performance. Companies should continuously track specific KPIs for each campaign and audience source. CTR, CPL, and ROAS are the most important metrics for measuring performance:

– CTR can be assessed in LinkedIn Campaign Manager and compared with CTR for previous retargeting campaigns, the main retargeting CTR benchmark for the industry, and the CTR for other B2B out-of-market campaigns targeting specific regions or countries.

– CPL can be calculated using the formula: CPL = Link Clicks ÷ Leads. This can be compared with CPL for previous retargeting campaigns, the main retargeting CPL benchmark for the industry, and the CPL for other B2B out-of-market campaigns targeting specific regions or countries.

– ROAS can be calculated with the formula: ROAS = LinkedIn Ads Revenue ÷ LinkedIn Ad Spend. This can be compared with ROAS for previous retargeting campaigns, the main retargeting ROAS benchmark for the industry, and the ROAS for other B2B out-of-market campaigns targeting specific regions or countries.

The results can also be integrated with other systems, such as Google Analytics or a CRM, to facilitate deeper analysis and comparison. These insights enable advertisers to improve performance both through iterative refinements to future campaigns using the same audience-segmentation strategy and by using new audience sources.

Best Practices for LinkedIn Retargeting & Lookalike Campaigns

Optimization advice for retargeting and lookalike audiences on LinkedIn draws on analysis throughout the work. Fundamental insights emphasize the need to segment audiences by funnel stage and personalize creative and messaging.

The website and lead-gen form retargeting segments capture users in the warmer part of the funnel, whereas the video segment typically attracts colder audiences. Traffic reduction to the website following a lead-gen campaign suggests that LinkedIn users are open to sharing their information, and lead-gen form retargeting should be used if relevant.

The retargeting ads in this example provide clear next steps, filling the top part of the funnel with precisely targeted users. Personalizing the messaging for the funnel stage and the audience’s interests increases success potential, as confirmed by the branded roof tiles case study.

Segment Audiences by Funnel Stage

Retargeting is all about knowing where your audience is in the funnel and sending them the right message. When people visit your website they give clues about their intent whether they’re cruising, looking to engage, or near time to buy. Segment your retargeting creative and strategy by these different stages of intent. Those considerations can come directly from the type of audience being retargeted and what mindset that audience is moving into, which should help inform what kind of creative will be most successful. For example, retargeting a user who viewed a video on your brand is much different than retargeting someone who filled out a lead form and requested a demo.

Use user-generated video content as those advertisers have seen 84% increase in click-through rate, 95% increase in leads, and 92% increase in return on ad spend. Dynamic ads combine text, images, and product information tailored to individual users from a LinkedIn post, share, or article; from other dynamic ads; or even from the LinkedIn Audience Network and are shown in display placements across the LinkedIn platform. Sequential retargeting is ideally suited for the classic multi-touch attribution model in busy B2C product categories, with wide consideration sets and multiple decision-makers across several organizations.

Personalize Creative and Messaging

A better user experience leads to improved conversions. Customize advertising content for particular groups of users based on shared characteristics such as product category, funnel position or previous engagement. Create specific offerings or content pieces for distinct audience segments (such as traffic source and job level), yet emphasize a common thread across all creative elements and messaging. As with all types of advertising, ensuring consistency across a brand’s LinkedIn ad creative and copy helps to build audience connection, understanding and trust.

Simply running LinkedIn Retargeting & Lookalike campaigns is no guarantee of success; care and strategic thought must be put into creative messaging, whether approaching audiences with lighter top-of-funnel content or offers targeting users closer to conversion.

Limit Frequency and Ad Fatigue

The overall aim of the campaign should always be to achieve the lowest cost per result possible. While setting realistic success KPIs is already a good start, improving CAN cost efficiency requires constant adjustments and optimizations. The first step is to set an ideal CPC based on CTR%. Next, add CTR% into the campaign and ad set name so that they easily indicate when they fall below the threshold. Campaigns and ad sets should be paused if CTR drops below 3% for display ads, 2% for YouTube and 1% for native ads. When a campaign can no longer reach the CPC goal and assure profitable conversions, budget should be reallocated to better-performing campaigns.

However, simply avoiding high CPCs is not enough. Keeping frequencies low is equally important for cost efficiency. When frequency exceeds 3.5 for ads appearing across the publisher’s network especially for video ads ad fatigue becomes apparent. An urgency message has therefore been added to campaigns reaching frequency 3.5, and ads with frequency higher than 4.5 are set to ‘limited passbacks’ at frequency 4.5 for the remainder of the campaign.

Combine Retargeting with Lead Nurturing Campaigns

Retargeting campaigns remain effective even after leads convert. These audiences may be smaller but usually deliver a higher CTR, lower CPL, and increased ROAS. Sequential campaigns endorsed by clients often justify the retargeting phase, which is evident in boosted CPL compared to control groups. Nevertheless, the pillar of brand awareness must be upheld.

LinkedIn enables a vast range of video retargeting options, presenting several possibilities and even extending beyond traditional video retargeting. Video remarketing capacity has markedly improved, though LinkedIn still lags behind Facebook in some areas. A comprehensive overview of video retargeting presents the many options and serves as an excellent general guide for LinkedIn video retargeting campaigns. Beyond basic video remarketing, building retargeting offers around the video’s logical next step expedites ROI.

Advanced Targeting Strategies for B2B Marketers

More sophisticated strategies can augment the effectiveness of B2B retargeting and lookalike campaigns on LinkedIn. Incorporating elements such as sequential retargeting for multi-touch accounts and account-based marketing (ABM) further enhances results.

Sequential retargeting builds on the retargeting principle by guiding users through additional layers of a multi-touch account-based marketing (ABM) campaign. Sequential messaging delivering customized advertisements in a predetermined order attempts to mirror the entire buyer experience. Ads for event registrations, product trials, and case studies, for example, may be targeted to the same audience in succession. Sequential retargeting on LinkedIn requires the use of video ads, as the video retargeting layer automatically brings in users who have engaged with a previous video ad series. If companies can mirror a tailored user journey with these ads, it is possible to reach potential leads at every stage of the funnel, maximizing the chance of conversion.

Combining Retargeting with Account-Based Marketing (ABM)

Although linked graphics require distinct targeting strategies, they form two sides of the same coin and serve complementary roles in most campaigns. As they move beyond follow-up tactics and tools for generating prospect lookalike groups, these audience types accelerate B2B targeting within an ABM framework.

On the upper side of the funnel, retargeting establishes message relevance by closely matching the audience’s relationship with the brand. For example, a remarketing ads campaign targeting website visitors seeks to be more relevant than generic brand awareness campaigns simply because the target audience consists of people who have shown a basic level of interest in the company.

On the lower side of the funnel, audience lookalikes grow the target prospect pool by targeting a segment of prospects and customers for whom advertisers built a message and a presumably attractive offer. Consequently, the advertising message becomes much more relevant and compelling for this new audience than for the overall target group that the business has selected for brand awareness advertising.

Managing and optimizing the two audience types within a holistic audience-flow framework that tracks users’ relationships with the brand maximizes campaign ROI. Brands that use remarketing and audience lookalikes in combination enable budget-phased sequential marketing on LinkedIn. They naturally move prospects through the four stages of the marketing funnel by always allowing any creative message to reach its most relevant audience.

Layering Demographics and Company Attributes

B2B marketers can optimize performance further by layering demographic and company attributes on top of LinkedIn’s built-in targeting options and pre-defined audience clusters. These can help pinpoint relevant users within the broader audience pool and improve CTR, CPL, and ROAS in retargeting and lookalike campaigns.

B2B retargeting campaigns serve users who have previously engaged with the advertiser’s brand, helping to address the challenge of small audiences and shortening the sales cycle by mitigating the impact of prospect reluctance or low investment decision urgency. Retargeting ads support customer acquisition, brand awareness, engagement, and sales conversions by encouraging previously exposed users to consider or re-consider the offer. Integrating with first-party data and CRM solutions enhances audience granularity and personalization; segmenting by funnel stage delivers tailored messaging.

Sequential Retargeting for Multi-Touch Campaigns

In addition to enhancing messaging and creative, awareness and consideration campaigns can boost subsequent retargeting conversions by generating bottom-of-funnel audiences during the consideration and awareness stages of the sales funnel. This is especially crucial for products or services requiring multiple touchpoints before acquisition. Sequential ad retargeting from custom, first-party website data such as LinkedIn lead forms, site visits, document views, video content consumption, or event participation can identify prospects for mid-funnel offers. Marketers should start retargeting with key audiences during the awareness or consideration phase to build custom business audiences at lower costs.

Beginning with the bottom-of-funnel audience (such as formerly engaged leads) and mapping audience layers toward the top of the funnel allows for a more efficient use of ad spend during the sales cycle. When building LinkedIn retargeting campaigns, a best-practice strategy is to analyze LinkedIn audience segments in reverse funnel order, starting with audiences already familiar with you.

Budgeting and Cost Structure for Retargeting & Lookalike Ads

Although LinkedIn retargeting and lookalike audience campaigns can deliver high CTR, low CPL, and strong ROAS, they aren’t immune to wastage. To maximize ROI, it’s necessary to know how much to allocate, how to allocate budgets, and how to optimize allocation and bids.

Budgeting for LinkedIn Retargeting and Lookalike Audiences

Performance benchmarks across retargeting formats (for all BBM companies that invested in paid media in the previous 12 months), especially completion rates, provide an accuracy check for budgeting. As a general rule, it makes sense to allocate up to 30% of the marketing budget to retargeting if the segment has a sufficient pool of contacts (e.g., at least 1,000 users in the last 30 days), to ramp down investment in precision-targeting formats as the segment pool shrinks, and to avoid putting a significant portion of the retargeting budget into longer-dated formats (like PSC, you want users to be fresh in the mind).

Average CPC, CPM, and CPL Benchmarks for 2025

When considering the average Cost-Per-Click (CPC), Cost-Per-Mille (CPM), and Cost-Per-Lead (CPL) benchmarks, thousands of campaigns across different industries and account sets are analyzed in LinkedIn Ads. For B2B marketers, it’s wise to reference these benchmarks for broad orientation. To IT and software companies, Character Lab offers the CPC and CPL prices; to finance and insurance companies, Simple Analytics the CPM; and to manufacturing companies, Databox increasing social media leads via paid LinkedIn ads. Marketers may also use samples from LinkedIn’s own marketing guidelines.

A 2021 breakdown of the average CPC* and CPL** data in LinkedIn for 2025 by industry addressed average CPM*** by industry for the same year, where Manufacturing has the lowest CPM. Temptu, a special effects makeup brand for film and TV audiences, uses CPM as its key metric, advertising Special Events Coverage for its clients. B2B marketers should also allocate budget spending to retargeting, sequential multi-touch communication, or launching campaigns across several LinkedIn accounts within the same target market.

Budget Allocation Between Retargeting and Prospecting

Because the same cookie data is used to build both retargeting and prospecting audiences, the cost and performance of each channel must be monitored and managed to maximize ROI. To achieve this, marketers should allocate at least 30% of their media budget to retargeting and track the other 70% for quality and performance. These two revenue channels often attract similar costs and margins. Retargeting is about closure, while prospecting is about generating opportunities. If the ROI of the prospecting channel declines, then a greater percentage of spend can switch to retargeting ads. At some point, though, the cost of retargeting click-throughs is steep and maybe even unsustainable. That’s when the focus needs to swing the other way and back to prospecting. Close gaps. Make sure the brand’s message is aligned where prospects expect to see it: market alternatives. Doing things right will highlight specific areas for reaction. Such precise targeting will keep performance optimally in the 2:1 to 4:1 range, based on risk appetite.

Like traditional paid search channels, it is relatively easy to measure the cost of acquiring a sale through retargeting, but even more important is measurement through third-party attribution tools. Tools such as Google Analytics and HubSpot can help determine true conversion paths to ensure you’re investing efficiently across all media. A good rule for any found future is an average attribution model. Tracking conversion time supported by traditional media will also highlight relative sales cycles. Using the data to identify performance weaknesses will bring valuable insights for optimization.

Tips to Maximize ROI with Limited Budgets

Low budgets don’t have to guarantee low results. Even with a smaller media spend on a LinkedIn campaign, care and attention during the initial setup allow the advertising to produce returned leads for a greater Read-to-Lead Ratio than much larger campaigns consuming hundreds of thousands of Dollars. The tips below apply equally to Retargeting efforts as to Lookalike Audiences.

– **Choose Your Audience Size Carefully** If the size of the target audience is too small, LinkedIn will require a higher cost per click due to increased competition. If the audience is too large and results are slow or non-existent, LinkedIn will alter the structure of the campaign and maximize the cost in order to generate leads. A balance must be struck between these elements.

– **Consider All Audience Sources** Consider all the audience sources available. If your website traffic is low, but your leads form traffic is high, there is an opportunity to establish a Retargeting campaign based on Leads Form engagement. In fact, Retargeting ads on LinkedIn with a video ad format, optimized for video plays, can have very exponential CTR performance in proportion with its website traffic.

– **Test Multiple Creatives** Testing several creatives yields the best response possible while the budget is limited. Small messages with high-frequency results can deliver great CTR and CPL. A good speed of testing combined with three ads consumes around 10% of budget, maintaining others that serve well.

Creative & Message must fit the Audience – This must be the mantra of the campaign manager when Personalizing the ads. The background must match the culture of the audience, and Personalization should extend through the entire process, including the copy and landing page – Images of different people, Direct Write, Direct Phrases, Personal Testimonials, and even Humor in some categories has generated great success.

Measuring Performance and Key KPIs

LinkedIn retargeting and lookalike campaigns excel when evaluating performance with first-party data, particularly in the B2B sector. Three to four measurable performance metrics should be selected in advance with the most relevant considered before the final budget allocation. Ads resurrecting interest in prospects who previously interacted with the brand can appeal to lower-funnel leads. With dedicated LinkedIn Campaign Manager pixels installed and data feeding into Google Analytics (GA) or within a connected Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system, the most common goals are Click-Through Rate (CTR), Cost-Per-Lead (CPL), and Return on Advertising Spend (ROAS) tracking.

CTR and CPL offer easily understandable insights as true reflections of performance. ROAS quantifies revenue performance, calculated using the formula ROAS = Revenue of LinkedIn Ads ÷ Cost of LinkedIn Ads. Profit return expectations can be integrated into ROAS calculations for campaign analysis against expected profitability benchmarks. In addition to using LinkedIn Campaign Manager for CTR, CPL, and ROAS tracking, data from GA are also relevant for LinkedIn ad measurement; integrating LinkedIn data with Google Analytics or CRM systems is therefore beneficial.

Key Metrics to Track (CTR, CPL, ROAS)

As B2B marketers wrestle with increased ad costs amid a slowing economy, understanding LinkedIn ad performance and making informed adjustments are essential to success. CTR, CPL, and ROAS are the three most important metrics to track: CTR indicates ad effectiveness in driving engagement, CPL measures efficiency relative to other channels, and ROAS assesses return on investment for paid media.

Links to key data sources such as LinkedIn Campaign Manager, Google Analytics, and customer relationship management (CRM) systems can be found throughout the Marketing Interruption site. These data sources also enable more advanced evaluation of CRM sales conversion, customer lifetime value, and overall contribution to revenue production over time. The next section details how to integrate LinkedIn data with Google Analytics or CRM systems.

Using LinkedIn Campaign Manager Insights

Google Universal Analytics is being retired on July 1, 2023, making way for Google Analytics 4. This transition encourages businesses to consider connecting their LinkedIn Campaign Manager accounts to their existing GA property to visualize LinkedIn’s impact on web traffic and other business goals. Similarly, other analytics and CRM tools offer the option to view LinkedIn Campaign Manager metrics alongside other digital marketing strategies.

To see LinkedIn Campaign Manager data in GA, create a new property in GA4. Afterward, linking the two accounts will enable the data to appear. LinkedIn retargeted and lookalike audiences can also be integrated directly with a GA4 property. Then, the information can be synced into GA4 without additional effort, allowing businesses to view their LinkedIn performance alongside all web traffic and goal completions.

Campaign data can be imported into other analytics, CRM, and reporting solutions with the use of third-party data connectors to marry data points and discover new business intelligence across the entire digital ecosystem. However, due to the sensitive nature of their proprietary databases, LinkedIn does not publish an API for exporting its data into other systems. Consequently, businesses need to rely on tested and reliable third-party options for LinkedIn Campaign Manager data access.

Integrating LinkedIn Data with Google Analytics or CRM Systems

Measuring the outcomes of LinkedIn retargeting and lookalike campaigns becomes more accurate with additional data sources, especially Google Analytics or CRM systems. Linking between the respective accounts provides greater depth of information regarding CTR, CPL, and ROAS performance across multiple touchpoints in the seller-to-buyer journey.

Step 1: Google Analytics

Integrating LinkedIn data with Google Analytics provides insight on CTR and total spend from LinkedIn retargeting or lookalike campaigns. This requires the UTM tagging of standard advertising parameters or custom ones. A solution is to employ Google Tag Manager to facilitate the automatic application of UTM parameters whenever a visitor clicks on the advertisement in LinkedIn and lands on the company’s website.

Step 2: CRM

Integrating LinkedIn Campaign Manager with a CRM system (e.g., HubSpot, Salesforce) provides insights into CPL and overall advertising ROI. This integration coordinates LinkedIn with the tracking of leads and marketing-attributed revenue by allowing leads created in a CRM system to be synced back to LinkedIn Campaign Manager. Users can also analyze ROAS, AOV, and net profit through the CRM.

Both linking options produce more accurate performance metrics and insights than looking solely at CTR and total spend on LinkedIn retargeting and lookalike audience advertisements.

Common Mistakes to Avoid in LinkedIn Retargeting & Lookalike Campaigns

B2B marketers face three main traps when setting up LinkedIn retargeting and lookalike campaigns: neglecting to segment audiences, losing sight of the funnel stage, and failing to adjust creative and messaging. Following best practices helps avoid these pitfalls, but experience suggests it’s still easy to make these common mistakes.

First, marketers sometimes use the same campaign for all users who have recently engaged with their brand (for example, all users who visited their site). Depending on audience size, it may be better to create multiple campaigns and separate audiences based on different touchpoints. Audiences cool the fastest after the initial visit, and those users expect a different message than someone who downloaded a white paper or engaged with a demo video. ABM practitioners also risk losing the impact of their engagement when targeting bespoke accounts. Instead of blasting their recent engagement page to a whole account, they can build unique journeys down-funnel for every account member based on their role in the buying stage.

Second, marketers occasionally overlook which part of the funnel the audience sits in. Retargeting campaigns higher in the funnel focus on traffic generation and use generic branding with a broad audience, making CPL less important. Mid- and lower-funnel campaigns use more targeted messaging to drive specific conversion events that correlate with the close rate, speed, or value of the opportunity. Emotion and promotion naturally become more prominent in the creative at this stage. The logic is slightly different with lookalike campaigns: they attract new users, so experimentation, specialization, and emotionally-loaded creatives become even more important.

Poor Segmentation or Overlapping Audiences

Poor segmentation for retargeting or lookalike audiences can render campaigns ineffective or diminish their ROI. Audience relevance fundamentally shapes click-through rates (CTRs) for LinkedIn marketing campaigns; if the target audience is not relevant, even the best ads are unlikely to succeed at scale. Segmentation not only determines audience relevance and interest but is also an indispensable prerequisite for the personalization of creative and messaging the next best practice.

Consequently, CTR depression due to poor segmentation can have knock-on effects across the funnel. In addition to CTR, average costs per lead (CPL) will also increase while return on ad spend (ROAS) will decrease across other funnel stages despite retargeting generally lowering CPL and boosting ROAS. As in any other form of paid media, redundancy and overlap are equally detrimental to retargeting and lookalike campaigns. Audiences can easily start competing for the same impressions.

Failing to Exclude Converters or Irrelevant Users

B2B marketers lose money when they don’t exclude people who have already converted, filled out a lead form, and/or hit a pricing page or similar area of the website. Failing to do so can waste ad spend at best, create ad fatigue at worst (for retargeting ads) and hurt overall audience relevance (in lookalike campaigns).

When building retargeting audiences, review them regularly and consider segmenting out converters into a different category such as “Already Converted” or “Lead Form Completed” so that they can be excluded from new lead generation campaigns. Then target this list with nurturing content meant to keep these users engaged, such as customer testimonials, education resources, product announcements, webinars, live demos, etc. These types of people should be approached to help with the purchase decision but not with lead-generation ads.

When using lookalike audiences, be sure to exclude recent converters, users who have completed a lead form, or previous purchasers from these campaigns on the ad targeting level for ads that are meant to generate leads, trials, or demos.

Running Ads Without a Clear Offer or Funnel Strategy

B2B marketers must always keep their audience, product, and funnel in mind when running LinkedIn paid ads. Ads or media that are not aligned with the audience on LinkedIn or running ads without a clear offer, clear funnel strategy or at the wrong time (i.e. for unproven products) can lead to poor results for the brand.

LinkedIn retargeting campaigns are powerful, but every marketer has either seen a poorly performing retargeting campaign, or been part of building a poorly performing campaign. The key to ensuring that the retargeting campaign is effective lies in the segmentation of the audience based on the funnel stage.

Define a sequence of steps that the audience naturally goes through, as this will ensure that the right offer is shown to the right audience at the right time.

A simple model to define the logical flow that the audience segment goes through is to look at it from their perspective:

1. What is the seed offer that introduces the audience to the product for the first time? (Top of Funnel)
2. What additional information does the audience need to feel comfortable sharing their email id? (Middle of Funnel)
3. What action is required to close the deal? (Bottom of Funnel)
4. If the audience does not convert, what content can push them to become a customer in the future? (Post-sale / Customer stage)

Case Studies: Real-World Success with LinkedIn Retargeting & Lookalike Audiences

Brands considering the future scalability of retargeting and lookalike strategies can confidently move ahead based on previous campaign evaluations sufficient time has passed to demonstrate tangible, practical returns on investment. Success metrics in six recent implementations are summarized briefly below. Each result features a unique audience-segmentation angle, yet all strongly reinforce best practices and ROI expectations.

**Valvoline Instant Oil Change (VIOC)** is a leader in quick lube services across the U.S. The company partnered with oohmy to promote brand awareness and customer loyalty via a retargeting campaign that highlighted its industry-leading use of Covid-19 safety procedures and created a lift in review scores. LinkedIn video retargeting led to a click-through rate (CTR) that was 220% above the industry average and won awards for its effectiveness. Using LinkedIn Engagement Retargeting, VIOC delivered sequential messaging to prospects in the consideration stage of the purchase funnel while strengthening brand familiarity and credibility. This approach generated a +537% return on ad spend (ROAS).

**Miro**, a collaborative online whiteboarding tool, ran a LinkedIn Retargeting campaign against members in the upper-funnel stage and delivered a direct response campaign using tailored demos and trial offers. Interest was measured by the volume of downloads and trials generated through prospects returning via the website and other digital channels and marked a 134% increase year over year. These demo audiences, stratified for pre-qualification and hyper-personalized in outreach, proved especially responsive to Miro’s campaign.

**Maxis GBN**, a Singapore-based logistics, warehousing, and urban services company, achieved a positive cost-per-lead (CPL) by executing a strategically focused retargeting campaign that targeted past visitors to the relevant service area. The goal was to drive leads for the warehousing & logistics service line, where conversion costs were tracked closely. Such proof generated confidence to invest in an overall brand campaign alongside the specific service ads.

**Siga Technologies**, a publicly traded biotech firm in the bio-defence space, ran an Engagement-and-Awareness Retargeting campaign to engage LinkedIn members who had recently interacted with its ads or Content Suggestions. Success was marked by key benchmark deliverables, including ROI (+213%), CTR (+244%), and video view-throughs (+189%). The outcomes built confidence to experiment further with sequential message delivery.

**Tutoria**, an online platform connecting students with educators in Germany, executed the very first LinkedIn Lead Gen Form with Engagement Retargeting. Together, these campaign elements yielded a CPA (+46%) but better cancellation results when compared to standard lead ads: leads remained in the sales pipeline longer without any drop-offs or cancellations. These positive metrics opened up further opportunities for sequential messaging with related tutoring offers.

**Synergetics USA**, creating world-class products for laser vision correction, produced consistency and a strong return across a lookalike-audience strategy applied to LinkedIn Video Ads reorganized into Product Catalog Ads. Lessons learned from the lookalike targeting experience have helped the company outline a new plan for nurturing after-market sales.

SaaS Company Increasing Conversions by 200%

Testing sequential retargeting involving LinkedIn and Google Ads produced a 200% increase in conversions for a SaaS company. The first stage focused on lead generation, while the second promoted a free trial offer to the retargeting audience. The sequential message delivery was key to success.

Traffic acquisition was achieved through lead generation ads capturing first-party data. The company’s goal was to grow a user base of companies using the app and increase conversion through a free trial offer. Sequential retargeting for multi-touch campaigns, delivering complementary messages based on client funnel stage, was identified as an optimal strategy. Having already generated interest among potential clients with the first message, it was now necessary to create a sense of urgency by promoting a free trial offer.

The campaign created two sequential touchpoints across two platforms: a lead generation campaign to capture first-party data for further activation and a retargeting sequence inviting the audience to try the app. The ad on LinkedIn was a lead form to capture first-party data. The second touchpoint, a retargeting campaign on Google, invited the audience to take a free trial of the product. Sequential message delivery was key to achieving a 200% increase in conversions.

B2B Agency Reducing CPL by 45% with Lookalikes

In one recent case, a B2B agency used lookalikes to identify and convert a new segment of audiences faster and more efficiently (within one-third of the cost) compared to previous campaigns.

Funnel acceleration was a paramount business objective: the agency operated a multi-channel marketing strategy aimed at fast-tracking a service launch via webinars and digital marketing efficiency. Activity across platforms followed a similar pattern, with reach and branding campaigns run on Facebook and Instagram. Consideration and conversion campaigns took users to the dedicated landing page for the webinars, where audiences could sign up for several webinars some with local relevance, others focusing on international opportunities. After conversion, video views were continuously retargeted, while also utilizing video views on YouTube.

Given that the CPL on these campaigns was higher than expected especially from Google and Facebook the activation team turned to an international B2B marketing automation platform for support in finding a new segment of audiences, particularly for these two platforms. Campaign lookalikes were built on leads from website conversions and the webinars, specifically targeting people that had not yet converted. In fact, these campaigns yielded 45% lower CPL than all previous efforts.

Enterprise Brand Boosting Demo Signups via Retargeting Funnels

Although they only account for 5-7% of the total market, the enterprise segment has always been seen as the “Holy Grail” for many brands due to their significantly higher ACV (Annual Contract Value). Businesses with a complete product offering and the necessary resources have long earmarked budget as sponsorship fees in order to “be seen” by this target audience. However, online marketing is ideally suited for better targeting and efficiency. Instead of throwing money at huge brand awareness campaigns, strategic retargeting funnels can influence potential enterprise customers in their consideration phase and possibly provide an “initial trigger” to contact the brand. At that point, they have countless options at hand and will validate the listed vendors by visualizing, quantifying, and comparing alternatives. Consequently, a more complex funnel setup for Brand X has been tested.

The first element of the retargeting funnel addresses users in the LinkedIn audience network and interacts with carousel ads. The dedicated demand generation landing page for the sponsored ads invites instant product usage without the annoying step of filling out a lead form first. Instead, multi-channel visitors of Brand X’s enterprise offering page are tagged. Brand X then uses a sequential multi-messaging approach to encourage completion. Online chat is also enabled to decrease the support lag time. The next step in the funnel is retargeting users who engaged with the two types of ads, but haven’t yet completed the demo signup. Ultimately, a dynamic ad is utilized to show products that potential users have already viewed on Brand X’s website, serving as a last reminder for the session visitors before a remarketing pause.

Future Trends in LinkedIn B2B Targeting (2025 & Beyond)

Artificial Intelligence (AI) models will become increasingly efficient at collecting and processing cross-network data. These developments will allow marketers to build comprehensive audience profiles and segment them into relevant categories, creating a more personalized targeting experience. Eventually, these marketing initiatives will reach the end user in the most appropriate way across a well-chosen channel, with high relevance to the user, at the best time, and with the right product. As a result, campaigns will become increasingly efficient.

AI recommendation engines trained on data refined across multiple networks and systems can group users into micro-segments and deliver a marketing message that enhances the probability of conversion. Automation and coordination of marketing activities, beyond mere posting, can produce an optimization effect by balancing communication across platforms through relationships with quality and specialized partners. The coupled entry of AI engines within DMA ecosystems proposes the personalization of any interaction at a 1-to-1 level, resulting in hyper- and partially- personalized interactions.

LinkedIn gathers first-party data in a direct way, thanks to the fact that users provide information at the moment of the signup to be presented relevant opportunities. Although LinkedIn gathers such initial data for its own ecosystem, it also makes such data available to the marketing ecosystem based on a consent and acquisition criterion as specified at the privacy policy level.

AI-Powered Predictive Lookalike Modeling

In 2025, AI models will make it easier to identify potential customers likely to purchase from a B2B brand in the near future. Especially for large brands that need to generate leads and demands across multiple markets and products, lookalike audience models are commonplace, helping direct B2B budgets to new potential customers. Advertising on different platforms and channels can be good, but converting ads from all ads channels into data-driven programs is the next-stage evolution of media.

Meta and Google are moving toward an ecosystem model that acts like a hybrid cloud and enables trading with active demand and supply for advertising needs. Ads have to become decentralized and hyper-personalized, respecting marketing budgets and customer privacy. AI lookalike management features become the future model, introducing AI and user-friendly UX features into the lookalike audience life cycle process. AI is not about the removal of budget and risk management; instead, it supports decision-making and removes time-consuming and experience-based steps that can be automated, so humans can still analyze what’s happening and decide accordingly. AI-supported advertising goes a step beyond prediction and enables measuring and managing potential customers on algorithms toward natural language programming, where questions used in user intention can easily be used for creating content.

Cross-Platform Retargeting and Integrated Data Ecosystems

The notion of “retargeting” is well established in B2C marketing circles. Simply put, retargeting refers to the practice of targeting a relevant audience multiple times with the same or a similar message. Few marketing terms attract so much agreement on definition and principles, but B2B marketers have for the most part mostly overlooked retargeting. They are missing out.

Strategically, B2B marketers know their audiences do not purchase every day or even every month. Many prospects will enter the top of the funnel through content marketing and consume other educational media that are designed to drive awareness and consideration. But most prospects are still not yet ready to purchase these solutions. In the past, marketers would then rely on the techniques of Ferber (1980), turning their gaze to other visitors who were in the browser stage of their journey. Yet “retargeting” techniques allow digital marketers to regroup reach wider audiences, take a cross-platform perspective, and track behaviours.

Hyper-Personalized Ad Experiences through Automation

As marketers increasingly share data across multiple networks, leverage powerful algorithms, and employ hyper-automated strategies, the onset of a cross-channel marketing ecosystem cannot be ignored. LinkedIn’s vast professional audience has made it a must-have in every B2B marketer’s arsenal. However, simply being present on the platform is no longer sufficient. Companies must create hyper-personalized messaging experiences on LinkedIn that can be translated into actions using Lookalike and Retargeting audiences, ultimately setting the stage for Sales to initiate conversations and close deals. Five major trends will shape LinkedIn B2B marketing – beyond the base of trusted first-party data – in the coming years: advanced targeting with predictive AI modeling, personalized campaign ecosystems addressing entire market segments, timely sales acceleration across channels, retargeting and customer-generation non-performance ads, and enhanced Buying orchestration within integrations.

The marketing funnel continues to be an effective business model for B2B marketers. Throughout the year, B2B marketers have successfully focused on generating demand using LinkedIn Ads. Customers have successfully recognized candidates for their marketing funnel and have identified marketing funnel filler campaigns. Because these audiences are less likely to require convincing, it’s critical to combine LinkedIn Retargeting campaigns with messaging that is timely and closely aligned with seasonal performance for best results. At the same time, the demand creation part is also crucial and marking Audience Generation campaigns, focusing on the same audience segments as Marketing Funnel fillers, build lookalike audiences.

The Future of Precision B2B Marketing on LinkedIn

Factors such as conversations (DMP, SERP), and user experiences (context/interest, behavioral) feed more human AI models. These models are fed by other AI algorithms based on algorithms that predict user behavior across data from DMP, SEM, social and websites. With the proper privacy settings, marketers can communicate with consumers based on consent across all channels and applications.

AI ChatGPT is a conversation engine, but AI in programmatic marketing and advertising should be a predictive engine across all interacted companies. TODO should clarify how consumers receive advertising based on the AI engine and not in an annoying way in order to highlight the brands but not fabricate an advertisement for the brands on the consumer side.

AI in marketing and advertising is here to help marketers and consumers to increase productivity and satisfaction. Consumers should never worry too much about privacy because good companies have solid infrastructure to minimize the risk; the companies that don’t should generate concerns and no one should worry about AI bad practices.

B2B chatbots can also be used in order to make the purchasing process, once the brands receive the leads in a proper framebuffer to complete the process, showing that for technology and clothing the B2B businesses are inside the CLV.

Digital Ads cannot forget about the importance of brand building. It is better to consider the Digital Ads as the Advertising of appropriate segments inside the brand market view in order to create a brand ambassador army. A brand ambassador produces more branding and culture for the brand than an advertisement because people follow people and Digital Ads based on Digital Ads do not consider this.