Bing Ads is expanding to reach LinkedIn users for searches on Bing, MSN and Yahoo with their sponsored ads. Targeting for Search on the Bing Network and owned/operated sites will start in January 2019 to all accounts serving the United States. There are many segments on LinkedIn that are available for targeting. The latest figures for LinkedIn include 145 industries, 80,000 companies and 26 job functions. Microsoft bought LinkedIn for $26 billion in 2016, so this is not surprising that the two ad networks would share resources at some point. LinkedIn currently has over 575 million users, and Microsoft wants to take advantage of user insights and profile data to increase revenue for Bing Ads.
The ability to target LinkedIn audiences for search engines will only be available for Bing Ads, not Google’s Ad Network. Since Microsoft and Google are competitors, it’s unlikely that Google will ever be able to target LinkedIn users. This gives the Bing Ads Network a new advantage over Google Ads, who currently controls about two thirds of the search engine market. The new targeting will allow bid modifiers that can be set for the specific LinkedIn profile targeting, for example, increase bids by 15 percent to reach United Health Care employees when searching on Bing, MSN or Yahoo. This is going to be an excellent tactic to utilize for advertising to B2B audiences, a group that can be very difficult to target directly online. This will not only help B2B campaigns but B2C as well, especially if the campaign can benefit from targeting people who work for a specific company or in a specific industry. After all, the campaign will be primary targeting people who search for a specific keyword term. LinkedIn’s targeting will allow campaigns to reduce wasted clicks on irrelevant searches and help narrow the audience to specific targets. These capabilities can be combined with targeting by age group, gender, location and device to put ads in front of the most relevant audience to achieve the campaign goals. Campaigns and ad groups can have unique messages for LinkedIn targeting only, compared to a traditional search campaign targeted only by keyword.
AdEdge Digital Marketing was the first company in Connecticut to earn advanced certifications in both Google Ads and Bing Advertising. If you have any questions about this new tactic, or questions or concerns about your current digital marketing strategy in general, please feel free to reach out to us for a free consultation or digital marketing evaluation.
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