LinkedIn profile targeting in Microsoft Ads: search vs audience campaigns
How Microsoft's LinkedIn profile targeting works: company, industry and job function, why it is bid-only on search, how audience campaigns use it, limits and reporting.
LinkedIn profile targeting is a Microsoft Advertising feature that lets you use company, industry and job function in your campaigns. On search campaigns it works as a bid adjustment only: it raises or lowers bids but does not limit who sees the ad. On audience campaigns you can use it to target delivery. Microsoft reports results by company.
What the feature is
Microsoft owns LinkedIn, and Microsoft Advertising uses professional profile data to match its signed-in users to three attributes:
- Company, such as a named employer.
- Industry, such as financial services or manufacturing.
- Job function, such as finance, IT, sales or purchasing.
You choose these attributes in Microsoft Advertising. Microsoft does the matching on its side. You never see who individual people are, and you never upload names or emails. Microsoft describes itself as the only ad platform other than LinkedIn that offers this targeting (Microsoft Advertising help).
The ads don't run on LinkedIn. They run on Bing search, Microsoft's search partners and the Microsoft Audience Network.
Search vs audience campaigns: the key difference
This is the part most guides get wrong.
| Search campaigns | Audience campaigns | |
|---|---|---|
| How profile attributes work | Bid only: a bid adjustment for matching users | Can be used to target delivery |
| Does it narrow the audience? | No. Everyone who searches your keywords can still see the ad | Yes, when used as targeting |
| What decides who sees the ad | Keywords and other targeting | Profile attributes plus other audience settings |
| Typical use | Pay more for searches from target accounts and functions | Cold display reach to named accounts and roles |
| Main risk | Expecting it to filter out non-target searchers | Audiences too small to deliver |
Microsoft's documentation is explicit for search: LinkedIn profile targeting is "bid only". Targeting a company does not exclude people who work elsewhere. If you want only target-account searchers to see a search ad, this feature won't do that. What it does is raise your bid, and therefore your position and visibility, when the searcher matches.
On the Microsoft Audience Network, audience campaigns can use the same attributes to decide who receives the ad. That is where company targeting becomes true account-based reach.
Limits to know
According to Microsoft's documentation:
- Up to 1,000 companies per campaign or ad group.
- Company lists are added in the platform; importing lists from files or other platforms isn't supported.
- Not every company, industry or job function is available, and coverage expands over time.
- Availability depends on the market. Microsoft publishes a list of supported countries.
- Campaign types include Search, Dynamic Search Ads, Shopping, Audience and, for some advertisers, Performance Max as audience signals.
Very small combinations, such as one company with one narrow function, may not deliver on audience campaigns. Widen functions or add companies before raising bids.
How to use it on search
- Keep your keyword strategy. Profile targeting doesn't replace keywords. Build ad groups by intent as usual.
- Add target companies as bid adjustments, split by tier if you have more than one list.
- Add job functions that matter to the deal. Give the economic buyer's function a higher adjustment than functions that only influence.
- Exclude where it helps. You can exclude companies, for example current customers on acquisition campaigns or competitors.
- Start moderate. Begin with a modest positive adjustment and increase it once you see how much traffic matches.
- Review search terms as usual. Profile adjustments don't protect you from irrelevant queries.
The result is a search campaign that competes harder for the right people while still capturing demand from companies you haven't listed. Many good accounts are ones you didn't know about.
How to use it on audience campaigns
- One campaign per tier, with the companies for that tier.
- Two or three job functions per ad group, matching your buying committee.
- Creative written for the function, not the company. Never name the target company in the ad.
- Watch delivery in week one. If the campaign barely spends, the audience is too narrow.
- Measure reach and engagement by account, not leads alone.
See our ABM display ads playbook for creative and frequency guidance.
Reporting by company
Microsoft's professional demographics report shows impressions, clicks, spend and conversions by company, industry and job function. For ABM this answers questions most platforms can't:
- Which target companies saw our ads this month?
- How many impressions did each tier 1 account receive?
- Which job functions click, and which only see?
Pair it with company identification on your website to see which reached accounts then visited. That is the core of company engagement reporting and why impressions per account is a better ABM metric than cost per lead.
What Microsoft says about results
Microsoft has published its own figures for this feature, for example that ads targeted to LinkedIn audiences saw up to 16% higher click-through rates and up to 64% higher conversion rates than untargeted ads (Microsoft Advertising blog, 2022). These are vendor figures with "up to" wording, not benchmarks. Run your own test against a control campaign before relying on them.
Common mistakes
- Believing search profile targeting filters audiences. It doesn't. It's a bid adjustment.
- Huge bid adjustments on day one. You may pay far more per click without enough extra volume to judge.
- Narrowing audience campaigns too far. Company plus one function can produce an audience that never delivers.
- Treating job function as job title. Function is broader by design. "Finance" includes analysts and CFOs.
- Skipping the report. The professional demographics data is the reason to use this feature for ABM.
How IntentBid helps
IntentBid connects to your own Microsoft Advertising account with 0% fee on media spend. The TAL Generator builds a list of companies with counts of decision-maker positions per company, never people or emails. IntentBid adds those companies and job functions to search campaigns as bid adjustments and to audience campaigns as targeting. Everything is created paused with compliance checks. Reporting shows impressions per company next to website visits. Read more on Bing B2B ads.
FAQ
Is LinkedIn profile targeting the same as LinkedIn Ads?
No. It's a Microsoft Advertising feature. You buy and manage it in Microsoft Ads, and ads run on Microsoft's search and audience networks, not on LinkedIn.
Can I show search ads only to people at target companies?
No. On search, profile targeting is bid only: it adjusts bids for matching users but doesn't exclude others. To limit delivery to target companies, use audience campaigns.
How many companies can I add?
Microsoft's documentation states up to 1,000 companies per campaign or ad group. Split larger lists across campaigns.
Can I import a company list from a CSV?
Microsoft's documentation says company lists must be added in the platform and importing from external files isn't supported. Tools connected through the Microsoft Advertising API can add them for you.
Does Microsoft share who saw my ads?
No. Reporting is aggregated by company, industry and job function. You never see individual people.
Use company and job function targeting in your own Microsoft account. Start a 14-day trial, no card needed.