I've seen a lot of buzz around LinkedIn's new "Thought Leader Ads" where you can sponsor a post from a personal profile instead of the company page. The CPMs seem incredibly high compared to standard sponsored content. For a small consulting firm, is the "human-to-human" trust factor worth the extra cost, or should we stick to traditional lead gen forms on our main company page?
3 answers
In my experience, the answer is a resounding yes. People follow people, not logos. We ran an A/B test where we promoted the same whitepaper: one from the Company Page and one as a Thought Leader Ad from our CEO’s profile. The CEO’s post had a 3x higher click-through rate and a 40% lower cost-per-lead, even though the CPM was higher. The "social proof" of seeing a real person’s face and their professional network engaging with the post makes the ad feel less like an interruption and more like a recommendation. It’s especially powerful for high-ticket consulting where trust is the primary currency.
Are you planning to run these ads from the founder's profile or from a subject matter expert? I’ve found that "expert" profiles often perform better for technical products than "CEO" profiles.
The only downside is the lack of "Direct Lead Gen Forms" on Thought Leader ads currently. You have to send them to a landing page, which can see some drop-off.
Very true, Deborah. We had to optimize our landing page speed significantly to make sure we didn't lose that expensive mobile traffic coming from the LinkedIn app.
Samuel, that's a great point. We actually have a Senior Consultant who is very active in the industry. We tried promoting her "Best Practices" post and the engagement was much more technical and high-intent than the CEO's "Visionary" posts. It seems like for mid-funnel content, the "Expert" is the way to go. We are definitely moving more budget into this format for Q3 because the lead quality is just superior.