LinkedIn Ads vs Facebook Ads: Which is better for B2B Marketing

As a marketing specialist or a business owner, you will probably face LinkedIn ads vs Facebook ads choice. Even having all digital marketing analytics at hand, it is hard to know which platform is the right one for your particular purpose. Without proper analysis and supportive data, this choice is deemed to be nothing more than mere luck.

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Facebook has over 2 billion active users and outperforms LinkedIn four times. It seems that the right choice is obvious because Facebook ads will reach a greater audience. Moreover, Facebook now owns Instagram with over 1 billion active users, which is also an advantage. However, think whether the size of the audience determines the success of your venture’s advertising campaign? Perhaps, in your case, quality comes over quantity.

Therefore, before making a choice which social media to use in order to run your B2B advertising campaign, analyze what you expect to receive in the end. There is no universal answer to the question LinkedIn vs Facebook for business: what is better? It depends on your product, your brand, your content and your target audience among many other variables.

There are at least five things to consider before making a choice. They are the following:

• Purpose of Social Media

Many specialists say that LinkedIn is better for B2B advertising because of the user intent. People register in this social network to gain particular career or business related outcomes. Facebook, instead, is for fun. LinkedIn promotes professional networking, collaboration, and business communication. It unites like-minded people and helps them find each other. If it was for B2C advertising, Facebook is the best tool to boost your sales. But if you seek for a business partner to order from you, Facebook may let you down. However, the fact that there are still business profiles in Facebook proves that work still happens there.

• Whom Do You Target?

LinkedIn is great for targeting people based on their positions or companies. However, Facebook can help you reach your audience more precisely. There are much more targeting options embedded in it. You can choose combinations of filters to target a particular segment of the right audience. Facebook also offers a “lookalike audience.” It will find users similar to your seed audience. LinkedIn has a similar mechanism, but it does not work that good in a smaller audience.

• Cost per Lead

The fact is that Facebook is cheaper than LinkedIn. However, many people lie on their profile on Facebook so your advertisement may reach the wrong people. LinkedIn offers better quality leads at a higher price. Costs make Facebook look more favorable but think what social media platform will be more efficient in terms of reaching the goal of your advertising campaign.

• Types of Ads

Facebook has plenty of types of ads to choose from. They include canvas, carousel, video, lead ads, etc. LinkedIn offers only basic types such as text, lead ads, sponsored content, and sponsored inMail. However, you should think about what is better for your business exactly. Simple is better sometimes. But if you are looking for something more visual, Facebook should be your choice.

• Advertising Technology

Facebook beats LinkedIn in terms of technology. It is larger and keeps tons of data. You do not need to tell anything about your interests, Facebook will form its judgment about you based on your clicks. Therefore, it is an advertisement that seeks people based on their search for similar ideas, groups, etc. This is a powerful tool for connecting prospective B2B partners. Probably, LinkedIn will employ these technologies in the future, but for the time being, matched audience targeting launched on this platform does not make it up for the mechanisms offered by Facebook.

There comes a conclusion that there is no clear answer about what platform is better. Facebook and LinkedIn use different tools and techniques, while some of them are unique and form a competitive advantage of each platform. You should leverage the knowledge you have about these social media and the goals you intend to reach by your advertising campaign in order to make the right choice.

Bryan Davis is a professional writer at custom writing who has been successfully providing content writing services to businesses and independent customers for several years in line. He finds inspiration in writing and promoting education services for international students in the U.S., Canada, and Australia. In this article, he studied the problem of B2B social media advertising and presented several criteria that could help businesses in making their investment choices.

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