Checklist for updating your LinkedIn Ads campaigns

There's a lot of talk about changes to LinkedIn's organic algorithm, but the advertising platform, too, has changed in recent months.

As I work on my advertising accounts, I often find that many campaigns are still running on old configurations. The problem is that what worked yesterday costs more today and brings in less.

To prepare your 2026 strategy, I've compiled a checklist based on our recent observations and LinkedIn data.

1. LinkedIn strategy: refer to the benchmark

Awareness is important, but it shouldn't be done blindly. To know whether your campaigns are really performing, you need to benchmark yourself against the realities of today's market.

Here are the benchmarks to aim for in a healthy campaign (Canadian technology and Internet sector):

• Click-through rate (CTR): On a single image, the average is between 0.35% and 0.45%. Your goal should be to exceed 0.45%.

• Cost per click (CPC): Expect to pay between $5 and $8.

• Conversion rate (Lead Gen): A high-performance form should convert between 6% and 10% of visitors.

• Cost per Lead (CPL): For a qualified lead, the target range is $100 to $200.

If you're nowhere near these figures, it's a sign that you need to review your creative or targeting.

• The right budget mix: To achieve these results, try to dedicate around 60% of your budget to generating qualified traffic (website visits), and reserve the remaining 40% for conversion (lead gen) and retargeting.

  Don't guess your budget: I always consult LinkedIn's bidding recommendations before setting a daily budget, to make sure I'm reaching my target audience.

2. Targeting: use your own data

The era of broad targeting by "job title" is really showing its limits. To reach decision-makers, precision is your best ally.

• Use Matched Audiences: this is a must. Import your lists of prospects or target accounts (ABM) directly into LinkedIn. It's the surest way to reach the right people.

Look at the % match. If the matching is too low, LinkedIn won't be able to find the right profiles, and you'll lose a good part of your target.

• Segment your Buyer Groups : Don't talk to a president the same way you talk to a project manager. Create separate campaigns for each type of decision-maker to tailor the message. Relevance is one of the first factors in cost reduction.

• The + of AI (Predictive Audiences): If you have enough volume, you can let the LinkedIn algorithm find profiles similar to your current customers. This is often more effective than trying to guess criteria manually.

• Get into the habit of excluding your own company, competitors and customers from your campaigns.
  

3. Creativity and formats: adapt to your market

The Quebec market has its own specificities, particularly in terms of language, which need to be technically managed.

• Managing bilingualism: Many French-speaking professionals in Quebec have their LinkedIn interface in English. If you've set up your campaign in English, make sure you have both French and English ads within your campaigns, or even better, separate them to better analyze results.

• Humanize your ads with Thought Leader Ads: Sponsoring the publications of your experts or leaders is an excellent way of building trust, often far more effective than advertising from a classic page, especially in terms of engagement!

4. Technique: qualify at source

Lead volume isn't much use if the leads aren't qualified. On Lead Gen campaigns, we agree that it's better to have 5 prospects who sign than 100 who never respond.

• Smarter forms: In your LinkedIn forms (Lead Gen Forms), don't hesitate to add qualifying questions (company size, project deadline, etc.). This adds a positive friction that will filter out the "merely curious".

• Be direct in your CTAs: This is basic, but I still see CTAs that are too vague. Replace buttons like "Learn more" with clear actions like "Book a demo", "Register", "Download". Users need to know exactly what they're getting.

• Check your Insight Tag: This is also basic, but make sure LinkedIn's Insight Tag is set up to track important actions on your site (form completion, clicking on a phone number). Without it, the algorithm navigates blindly.

5. The latest LinkedIn Ads features

LinkedIn is stepping up the pace and rolling out new solutions to offer advertisers more predictability and impact. If you want to stay ahead of the game, here are 3 key features to take advantage of:

• LinkedIn Reserved Ads: This is the platform's answer to the need for premium visibility. This format allows you to reserve strategic positions at the top of your News Feed. As a reminder, the most visible content will generate more memorability, and therefore more chances of being retained by your target. This is likely to be relevant for awareness campaigns, where consistency is as important as reach.
  
  Unlike traditional auctions, here you benefit from a fixed cost and a guaranteed volume of impressions. This could be the ideal lever for launching a new product or saturating a target audience without the volatility of auctions.

• Dynamic ultra-customization: LinkedIn now enables you to dynamically adapt the text of your ads according to user profile data (name, company, job title). This is an interesting way to capture attention by creating an immediate connection with the prospect. Worth a look!

• Generative AI for your creatives: As we all know, to avoid advertising fatigue, you need to vary your messages. LinkedIn's new AI tools make it easy to create text and visual variants with just a few clicks. You'll be able to test more combinations without overloading your creative teams.

In short, advertising on LinkedIn in 2026 seems to be not a question of "who spends the most", but of "who targets the best". The aim is to reduce waste and focus on audiences with real buying intent!