Quick Summary
Summarize this article instantly with your preferred AI model.
LinkedIn Campaign Manager: What It Is and How to Use It
LinkedIn Campaign Manager: What It Is and How to Use It
LinkedIn Campaign Manager is LinkedIn’s free, self-serve platform for building, running, and measuring ads. It is free to use: you pay only for the ads you run. You reach it at linkedin.com/campaignmanager, and you need a LinkedIn Company Page to create an ad account. Inside, everything is organized into a simple hierarchy of accounts, campaign groups, campaigns, and ads. This guide explains what Campaign Manager is, whether it costs anything, how to access it, how the structure works, how to add team members, and how to use it to run your campaigns.
Key takeaways
- Campaign Manager is LinkedIn’s free self-serve ad platform; you pay only for the ads, not the tool.
- You access it at linkedin.com/campaignmanager and need a LinkedIn Company Page to create an ad account.
- It is organized as a hierarchy: ad account, then campaign groups, then campaigns, then ads.
- You can add team members with specific roles, from full account manager to view-only.
- The Analyze section holds your reporting, audience insights, and the Insight Tag for conversion tracking and retargeting.
What is LinkedIn Campaign Manager?
LinkedIn Campaign Manager is the dashboard where all LinkedIn advertising happens. It is a self-serve platform, meaning you build and manage campaigns yourself, and it covers the whole process: choosing an objective, targeting an audience, uploading creative, setting a budget, and reviewing results. If you have used Google Ads or Meta Ads Manager, it plays the same role for LinkedIn.
It is separate from your personal LinkedIn account and from your Company Page, though it connects to the Page. Think of the Page as your brand’s presence and Campaign Manager as the advertising control panel behind it.
Is Campaign Manager free, and how do you access it?
Campaign Manager is free. There is no fee to create an account or use the platform; you are only charged for the ads you choose to run, and you set those budgets yourself. To get in, go to linkedin.com/campaignmanager and sign in with your LinkedIn account, then create an ad account. You will need a LinkedIn Company Page to associate with the ad account, and a billing method before ads can run. Creating the account and exploring the tool costs nothing.
The Campaign Manager account structure
Campaign Manager uses a four-level hierarchy, and understanding it makes everything else easier.
| Level | What it is |
|---|---|
| Ad account | The top level, tied to your Company Page and billing |
| Campaign group | A container to organize campaigns, for example by funnel stage |
| Campaign | Where the objective, audience, budget, and schedule are set |
| Ad | The individual creative shown to your audience |
The important level is the campaign: that is where you set the objective, the audience, the budget, and the bid. Campaign groups just help you organize and, optionally, cap spend across a set of campaigns.
What you can do in Campaign Manager
Everything you need to run ads lives here. You choose a campaign objective that tells LinkedIn what to optimize for (the objective guide helps you pick). You build an audience by job title, seniority, company, company size, and industry. You pick an ad format, set your budget, bid, and schedule, and upload creative. And under the Analyze section, you manage conversion tracking and the Insight Tag, review audience demographics, and see reporting on how campaigns perform (see the reporting framework).
How to add users and manage access
Campaign Manager is built for teams, so you can add colleagues or an agency with specific permission levels rather than sharing one login. In the account settings, under Manage access, you invite people by name and assign a role. The main roles are account manager (full control, including billing and user management), campaign manager (create and edit campaigns but not billing), creative manager (build draft ads only), and viewer (read-only access to reporting), plus a billing admin role for finance. Give each person the least access they need, and use roles rather than a shared password so you can see who changed what.
How to use Campaign Manager to run a campaign
The flow is straightforward once the account exists.
- Create or open your ad account and, if needed, a campaign group to organize the work.
- Create a campaign and choose its objective.
- Build the audience by professional attributes, kept tight to your ICP.
- Pick a format, then set the budget, bid, and schedule.
- Create the ads with clear copy and one call to action.
- Launch, then use the Analyze section to track conversions and judge performance on pipeline.
Keep the campaign funded enough to gather data, and judge it on cost per qualified lead rather than clicks. If you want help setting up and running Campaign Manager around pipeline, you can book a demo.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q1. What is LinkedIn Campaign Manager?
LinkedIn Campaign Manager is LinkedIn’s free, self-serve platform for building, running, and measuring ads. It is where you set objectives, target audiences, upload creative, manage budgets, and review results. It connects to your Company Page and plays the same role for LinkedIn that Ads Manager plays for Meta or Google Ads.
Q2. Is LinkedIn Campaign Manager free?
Yes. Creating and using Campaign Manager is free; you are only charged for the ads you run, and you set those budgets yourself. You can create an ad account, explore targeting, and build draft campaigns without spending anything. Costs begin only when you launch ads with a budget.
Q3. How do you access LinkedIn Campaign Manager?
Go to linkedin.com/campaignmanager and sign in with your LinkedIn account, then create an ad account. You need a LinkedIn Company Page to associate with the account and a billing method before ads can run. Accessing the tool and setting up the account costs nothing.
Q4. Do you need a Company Page to use Campaign Manager?
Yes. An ad account in Campaign Manager must be connected to a LinkedIn Company Page, because ads run from the Page rather than a personal profile. If you do not have one, create a Company Page first, then set up your ad account and connect the two.
Q5. What is the structure of a LinkedIn Campaign Manager account?
It is a four-level hierarchy: the ad account at the top, then campaign groups to organize work, then campaigns where you set the objective, audience, budget, and schedule, and finally the ads. The campaign level holds the key decisions; campaign groups mainly help with organization and spend caps.
Q6. How do you add a user to LinkedIn Campaign Manager?
In the account settings, under Manage access, invite the person by name and assign a role: account manager (full control), campaign manager (create and edit campaigns), creative manager (draft ads only), viewer (read-only), or billing admin. Using roles instead of a shared login lets you control access and see who changed what.
Q7. What can you do in LinkedIn Campaign Manager?
You can choose a campaign objective, build an audience by job title and company, pick an ad format, set budgets and bids, upload creative, and launch campaigns. Under the Analyze section you manage the Insight Tag and conversion tracking, review audience demographics, and see reporting. It covers the entire advertising workflow.
Q8. How much does it cost to run ads in Campaign Manager?
The platform is free, but ads have a minimum of 10 dollars a day per campaign. A realistic B2B budget is about 3,000 to 5,000 dollars a month per campaign, since LinkedIn needs roughly 50 conversions a month to optimize. Expect a cost per click of around 6 to 10 dollars.
More Featured Blogs
View All Blogs
How to Advertise on LinkedIn: A Step-by-Step Guide
LinkedIn Ads vs Google Ads for B2B: Which Should You Use?
LinkedIn Ads Mistakes: The 8 That Waste the Most Budget