LinkedIn Dynamic Ads

This guide is built from LinkedIn's Marketing Solutions Help, starting with its Dynamic ads overview and the pages linked in each section below. Campaign Manager's structure, objectives and conversion tracking are in our LinkedIn ads basics guide, and how each bidding strategy works is in our LinkedIn ads bidding guide. LinkedIn's help pages call the level where you choose an objective, audience and budget an "ad set", so this guide does too.

What Dynamic ads are and where they show

LinkedIn's overview defines them as "personalized ads served in the right rail tailored to each member based on their own LinkedIn profile data, such as profile photo, company name, or job title." Its ad placement page says Dynamic ads appear:

• in the right rail of LinkedIn pages on desktop, and
• only when members are logged in to their LinkedIn accounts.

The one exception is jobs ads, which "can also appear on People search results pages on both desktop and mobile," beneath the search result for one of your employees. Everything else in the family is a desktop format, so it reaches people at their work computers and not in the mobile feed where Sponsored Content runs. LinkedIn's other right-rail format, without the personalisation, is the text ad.

Each person sees only their own details: "member profile information is not displayed to other members." Members can also switch off the use of their profile data for ad personalisation in their LinkedIn ads settings. LinkedIn says such changes typically take around 72 hours to become effective. They still see ads, just less personalised ones.

The three formats and their objectives

The objective you pick for the ad set decides which formats you can use (our LinkedIn ad objectives guide has the full table). For Dynamic ads LinkedIn's pages give these combinations:

Sources: follower ads ("You must select brand awareness or engagement objectives to use follower ads"), create spotlight ads (brand awareness, website visits or job applicants), website conversions objective (which also lists Spotlight among its formats) and jobs ads overview. Two bidding points matter here. LinkedIn's follower ads page says they "are only available with manual bidding," and maximum delivery is not offered for ad sets using Dynamic formats (see our bidding guide). On the job applicants objective, ad sets automatically use landing page clicks as the optimisation goal.

Personalisation and macros

The personal touch comes from macros, placeholders that LinkedIn swaps for the viewer's profile data when the ad is served. LinkedIn's macros for Dynamic ads page lists which fields take which macros:

Note that %COMPANYNAME% "is replaced with the company name you enter in the Company name box," so it is your company, not the viewer's. When personalisation is off for a member, the name macros show "LinkedIn Member" and %COMPANYNAME% shows "your company". Write the line so it still reads well with those fallbacks. LinkedIn's personalisation options page adds that macros "must be in all capital letters," aren't translated, and that you should use personalisation "sparingly and strategically" and A/B test it.

The profile photo is separate from the macros. Follower ads show the member's photo next to your logo, and in spotlight and jobs ads you choose it with the Use profile image checkbox.

Dynamic ad specs

From LinkedIn's spec pages for follower, spotlight and jobs ads (all counts include spaces):

Larger logos are reduced to 100 x 100 px and non-square logos are shrunk so the longest side fits, so a square logo with some padding works best. Pre-set headlines, descriptions and CTAs are auto-translated to the member's profile language; custom text is not.

Creating a Dynamic ad

On all three formats you need super admin, content admin or Sponsored Content poster access on the Page, and creative manager access or higher on the ad account (see our Campaign Manager roles guide). The steps from LinkedIn's create pages for follower, spotlight and jobs ads are much the same:

1. Create an ad set with an objective that supports the format (table above).
2. On the Ads in this ad set page, click Create new ad.
3. Choose a preset headline or write a custom one, and confirm or change the company name and image.
4. Set the format-specific parts: description and follower CTA, spotlight background, URL and CTA, or the jobs CTA and profile image option.
5. Check the preview (the follower preview shows both the follower and non-follower versions) and save.

One rule to know before you start: "After you've added an ad to an ad set, it can't be deleted." If you don't want it there, LinkedIn's advice is to delete the draft ad set and create a new one. New ads are reviewed before they run.

Follower ads in practice

• Two versions of one ad. Members who don't follow you see a Follow button; members who already follow you see the CTA you picked, which opens the Page, Jobs or Life tab of your LinkedIn Page.
• No third-party tracking. The follower specs say it "is not available due to the one-click-to-follow functionality." Follower growth is tracked on your Page's Analytics tab (our LinkedIn company page guide covers the Page itself).
• Exclude current followers. LinkedIn's Dynamic ads best practices suggest excluding existing followers on the targeting page "to ensure you're gaining net new prospects" (targeting options are in our LinkedIn ads targeting guide).

Spotlight ads in practice

• The whole ad is a link. "Clicks anywhere on the ad (background, text, CTA, etc.) redirect to the designated URL."
• Background image trade-off. A custom 300 x 250 px background removes the ad description and the member's profile image; the white area left for text measures 276 x 148 px. LinkedIn's best practices still suggest trying one "to add more visuals to your ad."
• Tracking. Third-party click tracking on the destination URL is supported, and third-party impression tracking is supported for Google Marketing Platform. LinkedIn warns not to use quotation marks in URL parameters and to encode special characters in the query string (UTM rules are in our UTM tracking links guide).

Jobs ads in practice

You don't pick the jobs ad layout. LinkedIn chooses one of three for each member from their profile, per the jobs ads overview:

• Jobs You May Be Interested In: the member matches three or more of your open jobs and sees three of them.
• Picture Yourself: the member matches one or two jobs and sees one job suggestion.
• Jobs Page: no suitable match, so the ad points to your Page's jobs tab.

On People search results the ad shows under the profile of one of your employees, and "the advertiser will not be able to choose the placement of the ad." Only the Jobs You May Be Interested In layout lets you customise the CTA. LinkedIn also says it does not allow ads with discriminatory hiring practices, and that a flagged ad is taken down immediately. If you want a full job post in the feed on desktop and mobile, LinkedIn's single job ad (a Sponsored Content format) is the alternative.

Editing and reporting

LinkedIn's edit page lets you change the ad name, description, company logo, company name, headline and CTA text. Go to the ad set's Ads tab, click Edit, then Preview and Edit from the More menu, and Update. The new version "will be automatically submitted for ad review," and a paused ad that you edit becomes active once it is approved.

For results, LinkedIn points to engagement metrics such as impressions, clicks, CTR and conversions, plus professional demographics by job title, industry, company size, location and seniority. How those reports work, and their privacy thresholds, is in our LinkedIn ads reporting guide.

How we use Dynamic ads

This is our own practice, not LinkedIn's guidance:

• We treat Dynamic ads as a desktop add-on next to feed ads, not the main format, since they only show in the right rail for logged-in desktop users.
• We write every macro line twice in our draft, once with a real name and once with "LinkedIn Member", and keep it only if both read naturally.
• For follower ads we exclude current followers and judge the ad set by new followers on the Page's Analytics tab, since third-party tracking isn't available.
• Because an ad can't be removed from an ad set once added, we get sign-off on the preview before we add it.

If you want help planning LinkedIn campaigns, see our services.

Frequently asked questions

What are LinkedIn Dynamic ads?

They are personalised ads in the right rail of LinkedIn on desktop that use each viewer's own profile data, such as their name, photo or job title. There are three formats: follower, spotlight and jobs ads.

Do LinkedIn Dynamic ads show on mobile?

Mostly no. LinkedIn says they appear in the right rail on desktop for logged-in members. Only jobs ads can also appear on People search results pages on both desktop and mobile.

Which objectives can I use with Dynamic ads?

Follower ads need brand awareness or engagement. Spotlight ads work with brand awareness, website visits and job applicants, and LinkedIn's website conversions page lists them too. Jobs ads need the job applicants objective.

Can other people see my name in a LinkedIn Dynamic ad?

No. LinkedIn says each member sees only their own personalised information, and members can turn off the use of their profile data for ads in their LinkedIn ads settings.

What image size do LinkedIn Dynamic ads need?

The company logo needs at least 100 x 100 pixels as JPG or PNG. A spotlight ad can also have an optional background image of exactly 300 x 250 pixels and 2 MB or less.

For more on LinkedIn advertising, see our guides to LinkedIn carousel ads, LinkedIn event ads, LinkedIn matched audiences and LinkedIn ads bidding.