LinkedIn Video Ads: Best Practices, Formats & Ad Specs

LinkedIn video ads have become a no-brainer in video marketing strategies for brands across industries. Thanks to the traction they create, video ads can help you cut through the constant noise of digital media and create significant traction for your brand.
Here, we’ll walk through the ins and outs of LinkedIn video ads, including what they are, how they help you reach your audience, and how you can make the most of them.
What Are LinkedIn Video Ads?
LinkedIn video ads are a native advertising format for the LinkedIn platform. Just like organic posts, they seamlessly integrate into the LinkedIn timeline, showing up on both desktop and mobile devices. Unlike organic posts, however, these videos are typically marked “Promoted” and can show up on anyone’s feed, even if they don’t follow your company page.
Video ads on LinkedIn can serve multiple purposes, depending on your company’s needs. One of their primary uses is to market brands and their offerings. You can create LinkedIn video ad campaigns to increase brand awareness, showcase your products or services, drive website traffic, generate leads, and, ultimately, boost sales. Because these ads target LinkedIn’s professional audience, they are highly effective for B2B and B2C marketing efforts alike.
You can also use LinkedIn video ads to enhance your brand’s reputation as an employer and highlight your workplace culture, values, benefits, and career opportunities. This way, you can spread the word about job openings and attract the top talent you need to thrive.
Importance of Video Ads on LinkedIn
Video ads on LinkedIn are essential in any comprehensive video marketing effort. Compared to text-based content, videos are inherently more captivating. They harness the power of visual storytelling and evoke emotions, often leading to higher engagement rates.
Moreover, LinkedIn Video Ads offer the advantage of measurable results. Through the platform’s analytics tools, you can track metrics like impressions, click-through rates, and more, to assess the performance of your campaigns, identify areas for improvement, and optimize your LinkedIn marketing strategy for future success.
Unlike other platforms with broader demographics, LinkedIn allows you to target professionals based on unique criteria, including but not limited to:
- Industry
- Job title
- Company size
- Skills
Using these demographics in your favor helps increase the chances that your video ad reaches the most relevant audience. As a result, it maximizes its effectiveness and optimizes your resources, too.
Best Practices for LinkedIn Video Ads
Making your video ad stand out depends on strategic storytelling and captivating visuals. Follow these key principles to craft LinkedIn video ads that resonate with your target audience and achieve your LinkedIn marketing goals.
Keep it Concise and Engaging
Short content is a prevalent trend across social media platforms, and LinkedIn is no exception. Bite-sized clips are more easily digestible and help convey your message more efficiently.
You only have a few seconds to grab attention and hook viewers before they scroll past your ad, so you should begin your video production with a captivating statement or question that piques the viewer’s curiosity. For maximum efficacy, use visuals, animations, or text overlays to keep the content dynamic and visually interesting.
Focus on Storytelling
Contrary to popular belief, B2B content doesn’t have to be boring. You can convey professionalism while still injecting personality into your message. When done right, both B2C advertising and B2B storytelling will let you show the human side of your business to resonate with viewers on a personal level.
You’ll need to make good use of your creative storytelling skills. Put together a compelling narrative that showcases your brand, product, or service in a relatable and engaging way. You can highlight customer testimonials, showcase the “why” behind your business, or address a common pain point your target audience faces regularly.
Since you’re working on an immersive platform, your social media videos need to include high-quality visuals, captivating music, and clear audio. These elements will help you generate a more impactful and memorable message that will keep your brand top of mind for your audience.
Mobile Optimization
According to recent video marketing statistics, most video content is consumed through mobile devices. This means that your video ad needs to be optimized for mobile viewing. In other words, you must incorporate responsive design principles to ensure your video ad automatically adjusts to different screen sizes and resolutions.
While traditional landscape video formats are usually a safe bet, try using vertical or square formats specifically designed for mobile viewing — like those you see on Instagram and TikTok. This consideration enables your viewers to watch the ad without needing to rotate their phones, enhancing their overall experience.
Include a Clear Call-to-Action (CTA)
Don’t leave your audience guessing. Always tell them exactly what you want them to do after watching your ad. Whether it’s visiting your website, downloading a white paper, or attending a webinar, make your CTA clear, concise, and easy to understand.
LinkedIn gives you options like:
- Apply
- Download
- Learn More
- Sign Up
- Subscribe
- Register
- Attend
- Request Demo
By providing a clear CTA, your audience will know exactly what to expect.
Target the Right Audience
You should never underestimate the importance of targeting a specific audience. Addressing the right crowd is crucial for the success of your video ad campaign. Otherwise, you risk viewers not engaging with your content or not taking the desired action. Although LinkedIn has built-in tools that allow you to get in front of the right eyes, it can’t hurt to go beyond user demographics and target interests, behaviors, and company attributes to further refine your audience.
Pro tip: LinkedIn’s “Lookalike Audiences” feature targets individuals with similar characteristics to your existing customer base.
LinkedIn Video Ad Specs & Formats
LinkedIn offers various video ad formats and specifications to make sure your content looks polished and professional on the platform. Here’s your cheat sheet to get the hang of the LinkedIn video ad specs:
- Aspect ratio: LinkedIn supports different aspect ratios, including 4:5, 9:16, 16:9, and 1:1. The most common for desktop is 16:9. However, if you want to keep things mobile-friendly, consider 9:16.
- File format and size: To play smoothly on LinkedIn, your video ad file should be in MP4 format and be between 75 KB and 200 MB.
- Resolution: Aim for a minimum resolution of 360 pixels, but make sure not to exceed 1080 pixels for optimal viewing quality. Higher resolutions offer better clarity but may result in larger file sizes that are hard to upload and don’t run on certain devices. The standard definition for an acceptable viewing experience is at least 720 x 480 pixels. However, LinkedIn recommends different resolutions for different aspect ratios, so make sure you have the most effective resolution possible before posting.
- Duration: While LinkedIn allows video ads to be up to 30 minutes long, shorter videos tend to perform better. The minimum duration is 3 seconds, but many brands find 15 to 30-second videos hold attention. To find what works best for your brand, you’ll need to test different video lengths and styles.
- Frame rate: A frame rate of less than 30 FPS will help you avoid choppy visuals.
Adding captions is not mandatory, but you should always include them. This allows your message to be understood by folks who can’t hear the audio or choose not to listen to it.
Pro Tip: Choose an eye-catching and relevant thumbnail that reflects your video content. LinkedIn requires it to be JPG or PNG and to not exceed 2 MB in size. Make sure the dimensions match your video’s aspect ratio.
Understanding the LinkedIn Algorithm
The LinkedIn algorithm analyzes user behavior and preferences to curate content they’re likely to find relevant and engaging. The primary factors of the algorithm include:
- Relevance: Align your video content with the interests, skills, and industry of your target audience.
- Keywords: Use hashtags to help the algorithm understand your video’s theme and connect it with the right viewers.
- Engagement: Encourage viewers to like, comment, and share your video to signal its value and increase its visibility.
- Completion rates: Keep your videos concise, engaging, and useful within the first few seconds to encourage them to stick around until the end.
- Creator profile and activity: Build a strong profile with consistent activity to demonstrate your expertise and increase the algorithm’s trust in your content.
Pro Tip: Don’t just post — engage! Actively participate in relevant discussions, comment on other videos, and build relationships within your network.
Best Time To Post on LinkedIn
As with all social media platforms, timing matters when posting ads on LinkedIn. However, identifying the best time to post is not a one-size-fits-all endeavor. In fact, it’s often a matter of trial and error.
Because LinkedIn is more professionally geared, many users might just keep tabs on their app during office hours. This doesn’t mean you should overlook the weekends and holidays, but you will need to run tests to figure out when your audience is the most active.
During the week, studies have found these times work best for posting on LinkedIn:
- Monday: 4 p.m.
- Tuesday: 4 p.m
- Wednesday: between 12 p.m. and 4 p.m
- Thursday: 11 a.m. or 4 p.m.
- Friday: 1 p.m.
Weekends may get a little tricky, but with testing strategies, you’ll be able to find the times that work best for your audience.
Creating Video Ads on LinkedIn at Scale
Understanding the nuts and bolts of platforms like LinkedIn is one thing, but having the bandwidth to create compelling, high-quality ads that keep your audiences hooked is another. LinkedIn video production can be demanding, but that doesn’t mean effective video marketing is out of reach for smaller teams or limited budgets.
If you’re looking for top-tier video content for your social media video strategies, QuickFrame’s marketplace can connect you with the right video makers and production teams to provide you with exactly what you need to succeed.
Contact us today to see how QuickFrame can help your brand succeed with LinkedIn video ads.
LinkedIn Video Ads: Final Thoughts
LinkedIn video ads can help you place your offering in front of the right people and meet your business’s specific goals. Whether you’re searching for new talent or a professional client base, the platform is a powerful tool to expand your reach. By leveraging video ads efficiently and effectively, you achieve the results you want for your company on the world’s largest professional network.
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