LinkedIn Ads Audience Penetration: Hacks to Optimize Your Reach

By AJ Wilcox

What Is Audience Penetration in LinkedIn Ads?

Audience penetration measures the percentage of your target audience that has seen at least one impression of your ad. It’s calculated by dividing the unique reach of your campaign by the total audience size. This metric provides a clear view of how well your ads are reaching the people you care about.

Hack #1: Calculate Your Total Audience Size

LinkedIn only gives an estimated audience size when you’re setting up a campaign. By using the audience penetration metric together with your unique reach data, you can reverse-engineer the actual size of your audience. For example, if your campaign has reached 5,000 unique people and your penetration rate is 5%, you know your true audience size is around 100,000 people.

Hack #2: Understand How Bids Affect Reach

Audience penetration also helps you test the effect of your bid on reach. Start with a baseline bid, then gradually raise or lower your bid while tracking the penetration rate. If increasing your bid results in more reach, you’ll see penetration rise; if not, you might be hitting a ceiling or encountering diminishing returns. This hack helps you allocate budget more efficiently.

Hack #3: Measure Audience Overlap

You can use audience penetration to see whether two campaigns are hitting the same people. By comparing the penetration rates for different audience segments, you can estimate how much overlap exists between them. This insight lets you refine your targeting, avoid wasting budget on duplicate impressions, and ensure you’re reaching unique segments.

Get Expert Help From B2Linked

Want to make sure you’re leveraging audience penetration and other advanced metrics correctly? Reach out to the B2Linked LinkedIn ads specialists. Their team has managed over $150 million in spend and can help you set up campaigns, interpret metrics and scale results. They’ll also introduce you to our LinkedIn Ads Fanatics community for ongoing support.

Watch the Full Episode & Join the Conversation

Watch the full episode below, then share your thoughts. Have you tried using the audience penetration metric yet?

Blog Posting Guidelines for Repurposing Long-Form Videos – learn our process for repurposing long-form videos into articles.What insights have you gained? Drop your experiences or questions in the comments—we might feature them on a future show.

How to Build a Unique Personal Brand in 2024 – strategies for building your brand and using vertical or horizontal videos.

Related Articles: How to Build a Unique Personal Brand in 2024 – strategies for building your brand with vertical or horizontal videos. Blog Posting Guidelines for Repurposing Long-Form Videos – learn our process for repurposing long-form videos into articles.

LinkedIn’s Highest-Performing Lead Magnets: Deep Dive with Ian Nelson

By AJ Wilcox

Identify the Viral Lead Magnet Trend

Think lead magnets are outdated? Think again. On this episode of The LinkedIn Ads Show, I sit down with lead‑magnet expert Ian Nelson to uncover the secret sauce behind the viral “comment‑to‑get” lead magnet trend taking over LinkedIn. We explain why this strategy is exploding right now and how top creators are building irresistible lead magnets every week using AI (www.youtube.com). If you want to fill your calendar with qualified leads, you’ll love the insights we share.

Unlock the AI‑Powered Lead Magnet Strategy

We break down how to design lead magnets that deliver real value and how to repurpose them across your marketing channels. Ian shares his process for leveraging AI tools to draft, iterate and scale new offers at speed. Most importantly, we show you how to turn all that engagement into real sales opportunities (www.youtube.com).

Get Expert Help From B2Linked and Ian Nelson

If you’d like expert help creating or promoting lead magnets on LinkedIn, reach out to the B2Linked LinkedIn ads specialists. We’ve spent over $150 million on LinkedIn Ads and can help you build a campaign strategy that works. You can also connect with our guest Ian Nelson on his website to learn more about his approach. We’re here to help you generate leads that convert.

Watch the Full Episode & Join the Conversation

Watch the full episode below, then join the conversation in the comments. What types of lead magnets have worked best for you on LinkedIn? Share your experiences or questions—we’d love to feature them on a future episode.

Related Articles: How to Build a Unique Personal Brand in 2024 – strategies for building your brand with vertical or horizontal videos. Blog Posting Guidelines for Repurposing Long-Form Videos – learn our process for repurposing long-form videos into articles.

What Video Format Performs Best on LinkedIn Ads? Horizontal vs Vertical vs Square

By AJ Wilcox

Why Horizontal Video Wins on LinkedIn

There’s a common belief that vertical video performs best on social platforms because it takes up more screen space on mobile. But after analyzing over $140,000 in LinkedIn ad spend across multiple campaigns, we discovered that horizontal (16:9) video dramatically outperformed vertical (9:16) and square (1:1) formats. Horizontal videos achieved two to four times better view rates, completion rates and cost efficiency than their vertical and square counterparts. In other words, horizontal videos delivered a better return on spend.

Key Learnings from the Experiment

Horizontal video likely wins because LinkedIn’s feed is largely consumed on desktop screens and because the format allows for more context and on-screen text. Our experiments showed that horizontal videos kept viewers engaged longer and drove more conversions. The results underline that advertisers should prioritize horizontal creatives on LinkedIn, even though vertical video dominates other social platforms. The key takeaway: always test creative formats rather than blindly following trends.

What Should Advertisers Do?

For your next LinkedIn campaign, test horizontal creative alongside vertical or square variations to see what resonates with your audience. Focus on strong opening hooks, clear messaging and captions to capture attention. And don't assume vertical is better just because it's trendy—our data shows the opposite. Use data-driven experiments to guide your video strategy.

Get Expert Help from B2Linked and Chandler Quinton

If you'd like help maximizing your LinkedIn video campaigns, reach out to the B2Linked LinkedIn ads specialists. They’ve spent over $150 million on LinkedIn Ads and know how to create high-performing creative. You can also connect with Chandler Quinton on LinkedIn or his site funb2bads.com for more video insights. We're here to help you build ads that stand out and convert.

Watch the Full Episode & Join the Conversation

Watch the full episode below, then share your thoughts. Have you tested different video aspect ratios on LinkedIn? What results have you seen? Comment with your experiences or questions—we might feature them on a future show.

Related Articles: How to Build a Unique Personal Brand in 2024 – strategies for building your brand with vertical or horizontal videos. Blog Posting Guidelines for Repurposing Long-Form Videos – learn our process for repurposing long-form videos into articles.