97% of B2B marketers say account-based marketing (ABM) outperforms all other marketing investments. With over a billion users, LinkedIn has become the go-to platform for effective account-based strategies.
It’s not just about the mere presence of professional leads and the decision-makers who call the shots. LinkedIn, as a marketing platform, provides just the right combination of tools to execute a perfect ABM strategy, one that delivers results.
This article breaks down 10 proven ABM tactics tailored for LinkedIn to help you move from intent to impact with the right accounts.
TL;DR
Account-Based Marketing (ABM) is a focused B2B strategy that targets high-value accounts with personalized outreach, and LinkedIn is the ideal platform to execute it.
With tools like Sales Navigator, Campaign Manager, and Matched Audiences, marketers can pinpoint decision-makers, serve tailored content, and coordinate sales efforts for maximum impact.
The 10 proven LinkedIn ABM tactics include:
- Using influencers (including employees) to gain trust and reach
- Running warm-up and wake-up ads to increase engagement before direct outreach
- Leveraging dynamic and conversation ads for personalized interactions
- Employing a bottom-up outreach strategy to build internal champions
- Using LinkedIn’s Website Demographics and first-party data to optimize targeting
- Combining Sales Navigator triggers with retargeting to capitalize on buying signals
- Targeting across the full funnel from awareness to conversion
What Is Account-Based Marketing?
Account-Based Marketing (ABM) is a strategic approach in B2B marketing that typically involves collaboration between marketing and sales teams to focus their efforts on specific high-value accounts. In ABM, you treat each potential account as a unique market in its own right.
Unlike traditional marketing strategies that aim to reach a broad audience, ABM concentrates on a select group of potential customers. So, you pivot all the marketing resources to engage the most promising prospects. This targeted approach results in higher engagement rates and better alignment between marketing efforts and sales objectives.
That brings us to the next point.
Account-Based Marketing Strategy on LinkedIn: Why Use It?
According to a report by ITSMA, 80% of marketers acknowledge that ABM outperforms other marketing initiatives in terms of ROI. LinkedIn is the perfect platform for executing ABM tactics.
The platform offers a blend of professional data, advanced targeting capabilities, and advertising options that make it ideal for targeting and reaching decision-makers. And once you’ve targeted the right lead, you have a better chance of converting. B2B companies implementing ABM on LinkedIn report 91% higher conversion rates compared to traditional approaches.
Moreover, LinkedIn's tools facilitate precise audience targeting, which is the very first step of any ABM strategy. For instance, with LinkedIn Sales Navigator, you can use advanced search filters to identify and engage key decision-makers within their target accounts. You need this precision to make sure that your marketing efforts are directed toward individuals who have the final say.
LinkedIn, by design, gives you the ideal environment for professional engagement, personalized messaging, and content syndication. By delivering relevant content tailored to the specific needs of each account, you can enhance the customer journey from the outset and encourage long-term customer loyalty.
10 Tactics for Account-Based Marketing on LinkedIn
Here are 10 tried and tested measures to achieve success with ABM on LinkedIn:
1. Use Influencers
Influencer marketing on LinkedIn can be a powerful tactic within your ABM strategy. Instead of broad outreach, you’ll identify influencers and thought leaders on LinkedIn who have genuine connections or authority within your target accounts or the specific industry those accounts belong to.
Collaborate with these influencers to tap into their established credibility and reach the target personnel within those desired companies. This can involve influencers sharing or co-creating content that speaks directly to the pain points of your target accounts. For example, invite them to participate in webinars or virtual events aimed at decision-makers within target accounts.
85% of B2B marketers are already using influencers. And the return on investment (ROI) is exceptional. According to a report by Zen Media, companies made over $5 for every $1 spent on influencer B2B marketing.
At inBeat, we help businesses connect with the right LinkedIn influencers who have a strong, authoritative presence on the platform. Half the work is identifying relevant and potentially profitable thought leaders, which is where our expertise comes in. For instance, we helped Miro, a digital collaboration platform, tap into product leaders on LinkedIn to share valuable templates they created.
Here’s one quick example:
Although this wasn't a part of a broader ABM strategy in this case, you can use it in your own ABM campaign to attract decision-makers from high-value accounts.
Pro Tip: Your employees can be great influencers, too. In fact, they’re better positioned to speak about your product or service. Employee-generated content (EGC) gets shared 24 times more and leads are 7 times more likely to convert. Don’t make generic, salesy content. Instead, have your sales development representatives speak directly to the prospects.
2. Run Warm-Up Ads Before Outreach
Warming up your audience with LinkedIn ads before initiating direct outreach is a strategic move that can significantly increase engagement and conversion rates. Thanks to LinkedIn's advertising tools, you can pinpoint the target audience. That way, the personnel in the accounts you're eyeing are highly likely to see the ads.
Here’s how you can target specific accounts with your LinkedIn ads:
- Use LinkedIn's Matched Audiences feature to upload your curated list of target accounts. This allows you to serve personalized ads directly to decision-makers within these organizations. Campaigns using Matched Audiences have a four times higher conversion rate.
- Incorporate Sponsored Content and Video Ads to deliver compelling narratives about your brand's value proposition. For instance, multi-image posts have the highest engagement on LinkedIn (6.60%). These formats are especially effective in showcasing case studies, product demonstrations, and thought leadership pieces.
- To capture leads, implement LinkedIn Lead Gen Forms within your ads. These forms are pre-filled with users' LinkedIn profile data. These forms can improve conversion rates by up to 5 times compared to traditional landing pages.
- Segment your audience based on their engagement levels. For instance, create separate campaigns for users who have viewed your videos versus those who have interacted with your Lead Gen Forms.
Strategically deploying warm-up ads increases brand awareness but also lays a solid foundation for subsequent outreach efforts. This way, when your sales team initiates contact, the prospects are already familiar with your brand and are more likely to continue the conversation.
3. Use Dynamic Ads to Stay Top of Mind
LinkedIn's Dynamic Ads offer an easy, personalized way to maintain visibility and engagement. These ads appear in the right rail of LinkedIn's desktop interface and are personalized for each viewer, incorporating their profile photo, name, and job title to create a tailored experience. That’s what they’ll see once they log in!
Dynamic Ads are particularly effective for brand awareness and lead generation. They leverage LinkedIn's rich member data, so they automatically populate with relevant content, increasing the likelihood of engagement. According to LinkedIn, Dynamic Ads can achieve click-through rates (CTR) up to twice as high as standard display ads.
To maximize the impact of Dynamic Ads, here are some tips:
- Personalization: Use LinkedIn's targeting options to tailor your ads based on job function, industry, and company size.
- Compelling creative: Incorporate strong calls-to-action (CTAs) and eye-catching visuals that align with your brand identity, for example, customer success stories or lead magnets like eBooks.
- A/B testing: Experiment with different headlines, images, and CTAs to determine what resonates best with your audience.
Incorporating Dynamic Ads into your LinkedIn ABM strategy makes sure that your brand remains visible to key decision-makers.
4. Wake-Up Ads for Cold or “Not Now” Leads
Re-engaging cold or "not now" leads is also a critical component of a successful LinkedIn ABM strategy. These leads, who may have previously shown interest but didn't convert, represent valuable opportunities when approached with tailored messaging.
We advise you to use LinkedIn's Matched Audiences to retarget these contacts. Upload your list of cold leads first so you can create customized ad campaigns that speak directly to their interests and past interactions. For instance, retargeted customers are 70% more likely to convert.
Remember to also segment your cold leads based on their previous engagement levels. For instance, leads who downloaded a whitepaper might be more receptive to a webinar invitation, while those who attended a webinar could be targeted with a case study. This segmentation leads to more precise messaging. And that’s how you can increase the likelihood of re-engagement.
Basically, all this helps you to effectively "wake up" dormant leads, reigniting their interest and guiding them further down the sales funnel.
5. Bottom-Up Outreach Strategy
A bottom-up outreach strategy on LinkedIn may just be a game-changer, especially in complex B2B scenarios. In this kind of outreach, instead of solely targeting top executives, you focus on engaging mid-level professionals and managers who influence purchasing decisions.
Start by using LinkedIn Sales Navigator to identify such individuals. You can use the advanced search filters to pinpoint professionals based on job functions, company size, and industry.
Then, engage with these contacts through personalized messaging and sharing relevant content. What this does is create internal advocates for your solution, who might make the final call but can influence the decision the higher-ups make.
A successful bottom-up outreach strategy requires coordination between marketing teams and the sales team, which is already the core element of ABM marketing. By aligning their efforts and sharing insights, these teams can develop a cohesive approach to ABM. Plus, you'll be encouraging strong relationships at all levels of the organization.
This type of outreach will go beyond immediate conversion. These influenced insider parties will ultimately show increased customer loyalty, and by extension, give you continuous revenue.
Pro Tip: LinkedIn's Smart Links is a great way to share customized content packages with your prospects. This tool not only has valuable resources but also tracks engagement, giving you insights into what resonates with your audience. Analyze this data to refine your messaging and identify the most engaged contacts for follow-up.
6. Use LinkedIn Conversation Ads to Spark Interactive Engagement
LinkedIn Conversation Ads are a powerful tool for B2B marketers wanting to engage their target audience in a personalized and interactive manner. These ads allow you to initiate direct conversations with decision-makers. But more importantly, they offer impressive engagement metrics.
"The clickthrough rate with Conversation Ads was almost five times higher than what we'd seen previously, which goes to show the level of engagement is pretty wild when you're able to provide multiple opportunities to click," says Chase Gladden, Growth Marketing Manager, Hired
To maximize the effectiveness of your Conversation Ads, consider the following strategies:
- Personalization: Take advantage of LinkedIn's targeting capabilities to adapt your messaging based on the specifics of the employees or leadership in the targeted accounts. You can even use the recipient's name and company.
- Clear CTAs: Conversation Ads can have multiple CTAs, so design your conversation flow with clear and useful CTAs for different paths based on their interests. This can also give you valuable insights into the recipient's preferences. For example, do they go for value-providing content or visit your company’s website? You’ll receive answers that help you gain a deeper understanding of your audience.
- Relevant content: Don’t jump directly to the point. That may come off as pushy. Instead, share content that speaks to the recipient's role and challenges. This could include case studies, whitepapers, or invitations to webinars that address specific pain points.
- Test senders for your Conversation Ads: Sending messages from a recognizable figure within your organization, such as a senior executive, can make you look more credible. However, these messages can also come from your employees or influencers you’ve hired.
7. Use the LinkedIn Website Demographics Tool
The LinkedIn Website Demographics Tool, part of the LinkedIn Campaign Manager, offers invaluable insights into the professional characteristics of your site visitors.
Use this tool to assess if your ABM strategy on LinkedIn is working, especially if the goal is to bring in target accounts and their members to your landing pages. You’ll get very granular data about the LinkedIn members who clicked and visited your website via your campaigns. You can see:
- Job title, seniority, and function
- Industry, company, and company size
- Location and country
Similarly, you can filter data by date, which is useful for long-running campaigns. You’ll now know which prospects have recently engaged with your business and are ready for outreach.
The tool also allows you to group pages to segment your target audience. For example, all those clicking and arriving on product pages may be considered in the early segment of the buyer’s journey, whereas those landing on contact pages are in the last stages of the funnel. These insights can help you further streamline your ABM efforts, so you hit the iron while it’s hot.
8. Orchestrate a One-Two Punch: Sales Navigator Triggers + Ad Retargeting
If you're running serious LinkedIn ABM campaigns, combine Sales Navigator trigger alerts with ad retargeting for a high-impact strategy for complex sales cycles.
This approach taps both human outreach and automated advertising to reach decision-makers when they’re most likely to respond.
Start with Sales Navigator, which lets your Sales team set alerts for trigger events like:
- A key decision-maker changing jobs
- A company expansion or funding announcement
- Job postings indicating business growth
These real-time triggers allow you to time outreach at high-relevance moments. For example, reaching out right after a company raises funding increases your chance of conversion, as budgets are more flexible and priorities are shifting.
The second punch comes from ad retargeting. Using LinkedIn’s Matched Audiences and the Insight Tag, you can deliver hyper-relevant advertising campaigns to the same accounts and individuals your team is monitoring. Target ads that align with the trigger, for example, promote a scaling solution when a company is hiring or a case study from a similar-sized company after a leadership change.
Remarketing leads to higher and lower cost per conversion. Here’s what TOPdesk, a Dutch service management software company, experienced, according to its former Marketing Campaign Manager, Marit van der Louw:
“Since using the new remarketing capabilities for Lead Gen Forms and videos our conversion rate has gone up by 20%, while our cost per conversion went down by 24%.”
Pro Tip: Establish shared Slack or CRM workflows between marketing and sales teams. When a trigger is detected, marketing can instantly launch a custom ad sequence, while the Sales team follows up with personalized content. This multi-touch strategy lets you turn passive interest into active conversations, converting targeted lists into real revenue.
9. Use LinkedIn’s First-Party Data
One of LinkedIn’s most powerful assets for ABM is its access to unmatched first-party data. After all, it has over 1 billion members globally and real-time updates from users. So, you get dibs on accurate data regarding job titles, industries, and company sizes.
Unlike third-party data, which can become outdated or aggregated, LinkedIn’s first-party data is pulled directly from users’ profiles and interactions on the professional network. This includes verified insights into job functions, seniority levels, company growth, and even interest.
All this data can help you fine-tune your campaigns and interactions with your targets. You can even target the considerations for purchasing decisions, according to the role. For instance, a CTO might have different priorities for an AI automation tool than a CFO. The former may prioritize features, while the latter wants to know the potential return on investment (ROI) or cost savings.
First-party data from LinkedIn basically helps you understand the preferences and behavior of the different decision-makers in the accounts.
Even better, according to Forrester Consulting’s research, leveraging first-party behavioral data can lead to improvements in customer acquisition, conversion, brand awareness, and ROI. That’s what 72-83% of marketers noticed.
10. Target the Full Funnel
A full-funnel approach to LinkedIn ABM ensures that your marketing efforts engage targeted accounts at every stage of the customer journey, starting from initial awareness to final conversion and beyond. This strategy is crucial for B2B organizations seeking to convert high-value accounts into long-term, loyal customers.
Here’s what that looks like:
- Top-of-Funnel (Awareness): Begin by capturing attention through LinkedIn Ads that highlight industry insights or thought leadership. Utilize Matched Audiences to target specific job titles and industries, so your messaging reaches the right audience type.
- Middle-of-Funnel (Consideration): At this stage, nurture interest with personalized content such as case studies or product demos. You need a data-driven approach to make sure that your marketing materials resonate with the specific needs of your target audience.
- Bottom-of-Funnel (Decision): When prospects are ready to make a purchase decision, reinforce your value proposition with targeted offers or testimonials that support their decision-making process.
Concentrating all your efforts and resources on a single component of the funnel isn’t the most fruitful. Instead, you want to segment your campaigns and interactions across the entire funnel. That’s all the more relevant for complex B2B sales that can often have long cycles.
Pro Tip: Integrate your CRM with LinkedIn to create dynamic audience lists based on engagement levels. For example, if a prospect has interacted with your content multiple times but hasn't converted, trigger a personalized direct mail campaign to re-engage them. This multi-channel approach keeps your sales team focused on the most promising leads, optimizing the sales pipeline.
How to Use Account-Based Marketing on LinkedIn Step-by-Step
Here’s a step-by-step guide to using ABM on LinkedIn:
1. Prepare your Campaign
- Align sales, marketing, and leadership on ABM goals.
- Assign roles and responsibilities clearly.
- Purchase and assign LinkedIn Sales Navigator licenses to relevant team members.
2. Define Your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP)
- Select industries, company sizes, and locations that fit your product or service.
- Use LinkedIn filters, such as job seniority, department, and company headcount.
- Document key characteristics to guide targeting and content.
3. Build a Tiered Account List
- Group accounts into Tier 1 (high-touch), Tier 2 (one-to-few), and Tier 3 (one-to-many).
- Prioritize based on deal size, strategic value, or intent data.
- Upload and organize the account list in your CRM and LinkedIn Campaign Manager.
4. Find Key Decision-Makers
- Use LinkedIn Sales Navigator to search for stakeholders within your target accounts.
- Filter by job title, department, seniority, and years of experience.
- Save key contacts to lists for outreach and engagement.
5. Create Your ABM Campaign Infrastructure
- Set up a new campaign in LinkedIn Campaign Manager.
- Upload your target company list via CSV.
- Add demographic and role-based filters (e.g., VP of Sales, Head of IT).
- Build custom matched audiences for precise ad targeting.
6. Warm Up with Awareness Ads
- Launch brand awareness or thought leadership campaigns before outreach.
- Use image and video ads to build familiarity.
- Leverage the Mere Exposure Effect—repeat visibility increases trust.
7. Outreach
- Have SDRs send LinkedIn DMs or emails mentioning the ads seen.
- Personalize outreach based on role or account-level insights.
- Integrate Sales Navigator with your CRM to track engagement and streamline follow-ups.
8. Retarget and Re-Engage
- Create retargeting audiences from video views, ad clicks, or website visits.
- Launch “wake-up” ads for accounts that went cold.
- Adjust messaging based on stage in the funnel.
9. Measure and Optimize
- Track ad and outreach engagement by account.
- Sync CRM data with LinkedIn to monitor influence on pipeline and revenue.
- Reallocate budget to top-performing messages, formats, and segments.
Account-Based Marketing on LinkedIn Examples
Here are a few case studies that showcase the extent of LinkedIn’s impact on ABM marketing:
1. Adobe
Adobe, the software maker famous for its Creative Suite, also provides a digital marketing suite. This is called Adobe Experience Cloud. B2B and B2C enterprises use it to deliver great customer experiences. With this specific product, Adobe faced the challenge of siloed marketing strategies. In turn, this led to lots of inefficiencies in their campaigns.
Adobe turned to ABM with LinkedIn to fine-tune its targeted marketing and overcome the challenges. By leveraging LinkedIn's data and advertising tools, Adobe was able to target key decision-makers and influencers precisely.
“In order to reduce waste, we turned to LinkedIn to help us connect relationship-based sales activity with our broader marketing efforts,” says Matt Rozen, Director of Enterprise Editorial and Social Media.
The results were significant: in 2018, 42% of closed-won deals were influenced by marketing on LinkedIn. Additionally, deals influenced by LinkedIn were 161% larger on average.
The collaboration between Adobe's marketing and sales teams on LinkedIn facilitated consistent and relevant customer experiences. Ultimately , that's how they targeted and influenced all voices in the B2B buying decisions.
2. IFS
IFS is a Swedish company that develops and delivers enterprise software to businesses across various industries. The company faced long sales cycles (12+ months), which made things difficult for its digital marketing team. It also needed to target high-quality leads in the specific industries it caters to.
IFS used LinkedIn Marketing Solutions to implement its ABM strategy. It targeted niche sectors with industry-specific products and used LinkedIn to deliver precise messages to well-defined audiences. Here’s what the company did:
- Introduced a lead scoring and attribution system and launched an ABM strategy on LinkedIn, working closely with LinkedIn Marketing Solutions to design an always-on approach.
- Ran brand awareness campaigns for top-of-mind recall and highly-targeted lead generation campaigns to drive bottom-funnel results.
Their campaign performance on LinkedIn exceeded internal benchmarks, with a cost per lead one-third lower than targeted.
Additionally, it was able to trace and track impact through LinkedIn Campaign Manager and its granular metrics, and ultimately engage with the whole buying committee at targeted accounts.
“LinkedIn allows us to target companies and personas we want to reach with content we want them to see. No other platform offers us the same potential,” says, Danny Kuijpers, Regional Digital Marketing Manager, Western, Southern Europe & Latin America, IFS
3. Microsoft
Microsoft, one of the major global tech companies, aimed to expand its reach within its 2,000 target accounts by generating new leads and contacts in the UK. It also aimed to raise awareness of its broader innovation offerings and engage senior decision-makers across various business lines.
Microsoft achieved these goals by implementing a strategy that included sponsored content promoting eBooks on digital and AI applications in healthcare, retail, and banking, as well as content on skills development for enterprise-level businesses. They also used LinkedIn Lead Gen Forms and a persona-based targeting approach, combining job titles, functions, and skills.
The campaign yielded phenomenal results:
- 863 new leads from Microsoft's target accounts
- 43% leads held by director-level or higher positions
- Engagement from senior business decision-makers at 53 enterprise-level accounts (30% being new engagements)
- Cost per lead was 60% below the UK tech benchmark
- Penetration of key accounts grew by 26% quarter-on-quarter
- Share of Voice (SOV) increased from 30% to 40%
“LinkedIn is an ideal fit with our global engagement programme because of our ability to deliver in-depth, tailored content that can engage and nurture across different lines of business,” says Robin Taylor, Digital Marketing Lead, Microsoft UK
Account-Based Marketing on LinkedIn Template
Conclusion
Account-based marketing on LinkedIn is most effective when it's personalized, data-informed, and consistent.
Each of the 10 tactics outlined gives you a targeted approach to reaching high-value accounts where they are already engaged. Aligning your sales and marketing efforts on LinkedIn is great to increase relevance but also to increase conversion potential. Consistent execution and optimization across these tactics turn ABM from a strategy into a measurable growth engine.
inBeat helps you level up your ABM strategy. We connect you with LinkedIn thought leaders who bridge the gap between your marketing and sales teams. Together, you’ll reach the key accounts that matter most.
Learn more about inBeat’s work as a LinkedIn influencer marketing agency!
FAQs
Can you do marketing on LinkedIn?
Yes, LinkedIn is a powerful platform for B2B marketing, offering tools and features to build brand awareness, connect with professionals, generate leads, and run targeted advertising campaigns to reach specific audiences.
How many target accounts should I include in my LinkedIn ABM campaign?
The ideal number of target accounts depends on your resources and the value of each account. Since ABM is about quality over quantity, it's best to start with a manageable list of high-value accounts that align with your ideal customer profile.
This could range from a few accounts for a highly personalized "one-to-one" approach to a few hundred for a "one-to-few" or "one-to-many" strategy.
Can I do ABM on LinkedIn without Sales Navigator?
It's possible to do some basic ABM activities without Sales Navigator. However, using the Sales Navigator platform can empower your ABM capabilities. You'll get advanced search filters, lead and account organization features, and insights that are crucial for identifying, understanding, and engaging with key decision-makers within your target accounts.
What type of content works best for ABM campaigns on LinkedIn?
Highly personalized and relevant content works best for account-based marketing on LinkedIn. This may include content that addresses the specific pain points and interests of your target accounts or the individuals within them.
A good example of relevant content would be case studies relevant to their industry that show them how you helped other companies like theirs.
How long does it take to see results from ABM on LinkedIn?
ABM is a strategic, long-term approach, and results typically take time to materialize. You may start to see initial engagement and increased awareness within a few months, but significant results, such as closed deals and a measurable ROI, typically take six months to a year.
Who uses account-based marketing?
Account-based marketing is primarily used by B2B companies, especially those that sell high-value products or services and have complex sales cycles. It's particularly effective for businesses targeting enterprise-level clients or those with a well-defined set of ideal customer accounts.
What is the difference between account-based marketing and lead generation?
The main difference between ABM and lead generation lies in the focus and approach. Lead generation aims to attract a large volume of individual leads through various marketing activities, which are then qualified and refined. ABM, on the other hand, starts by identifying specific, high-value accounts and then creates highly personalized marketing and sales efforts to engage and convert those accounts into customers. ABM basically flips the conventional sales funnel.
