B2B teams often ask which paid platform works better: LinkedIn Ads or Google Ads. The honest answer is that they do different jobs. Google captures demand that already exists. LinkedIn reaches specific people before they start searching. Most strong paid media programs use both, for different reasons.
How Google Ads works for B2B
Google search ads show when someone types a query. That makes them a demand capture channel: you reach people who are already looking for a solution, a provider or a comparison.
- Strength: high intent, because the searcher chose to look
- Strength: easy to align with SEO keyword research
- Limit: you can only reach people who are already searching
- Limit: little control over company size, role or seniority
Google works best when there is clear search demand for your category and when your landing pages answer the search intent directly.
How LinkedIn Ads works for B2B
LinkedIn lets you target by company, industry, company size, job title, function and seniority. That makes it a demand creation channel: you can put your message in front of the exact people who match your ideal customer profile, even if they have not started looking.
- Strength: precise targeting by role and company
- Strength: you can target a named list of accounts
- Limit: costs per click are usually higher than search
- Limit: lower immediate intent, so offers must be relevant and useful
LinkedIn is especially useful for account-based marketing, where the goal is to warm up a defined list of accounts that sales or outbound will also contact.
Offers that work on each platform
The offer matters as much as the platform. Someone searching on Google has a problem and wants a solution, so a direct offer such as a demo, consultation or pricing page often works. Someone scrolling LinkedIn was not looking for you, so a demo request is a big ask.
- Google: demo or consultation, pricing, comparison page, free audit
- LinkedIn: useful guide, benchmark or checklist, short video, event or webinar, then retargeting with a direct offer
- Retargeting: case-led pages, comparison pages and direct offers for people who already know you
A common pattern is to use LinkedIn to introduce your brand and a useful resource to target accounts, then retarget engaged accounts with a direct offer on LinkedIn and Google.
Targeting on LinkedIn without wasting budget
LinkedIn targeting is precise, but it is easy to make audiences too broad. Start from your ICP and target a defined list of accounts or a tight combination of industry, company size and job function. Exclude existing customers, competitors and job seekers where possible.
Matched audiences, built from your own account and contact lists, are often the most efficient option because they align ads with the accounts sales and outbound are already working.
Splitting budget between platforms
There is no universal split, but a practical starting point is to fund search first if demand exists, because it captures people already looking. Then use LinkedIn for your highest-value target accounts and for promoting useful content to your ICP. Keep a smaller share for retargeting across both.
Review the split every month using cost per opportunity, not cost per lead. If LinkedIn produces fewer but better opportunities, it may deserve more budget even though its leads look expensive. If search volume is limited, adding budget to search will not create more demand; that money is better used elsewhere.
When to use which
- Use Google first if buyers already search for your category
- Use LinkedIn first if your category is new or your buyers are a small, defined group
- Use both when you want to capture existing demand and warm up target accounts at the same time
- Use Meta or Google display mostly for retargeting people who already know you
Measure both on pipeline, not leads
Platform dashboards report clicks, leads and cost per lead. Those numbers are easy to compare and often misleading. A cheap lead that never becomes an opportunity is expensive. A costly lead from a target account that becomes a deal is cheap.
Send CRM stages back to the ad platforms as offline conversions so they optimise for qualified opportunities, not form fills. Then compare channels on cost per opportunity and pipeline created, in the same report as your other channels. Our guide to building a pipeline report covers how to set that up.
Landing pages and follow-up
Most paid campaigns lose their value after the click. Send each campaign to a page that matches the ad and the intent, not to your homepage. Keep forms short, make the next step obvious and explain what happens after someone submits.
Then follow up fast. A lead from a target account that waits days for a reply is often lost to a competitor who replied first. Routing and alerts handled by marketing automation make a bigger difference to paid results than most bid changes.
Retargeting without annoying people
Retargeting is often the most efficient part of a B2B paid program, because it reaches people who already know you. It is also easy to overdo. Limit how often each person sees your ads, exclude people who have already converted or are in active sales conversations, and rotate creative so the same ad does not follow someone for months.
Segment retargeting by what people viewed. Someone who read a cold email deliverability guide should see an ad related to outbound, not a generic brand message. Matching the ad to their interest makes retargeting feel helpful rather than repetitive.
How to set a starting budget
Work backwards from what an opportunity is worth to you. Estimate your average deal value and how many opportunities you need, then decide how much you can afford to spend to create one. Start with a budget large enough to gather useful data on one or two campaigns, rather than spreading a small budget across many.
Set up tracking before you spend
Paid campaigns are only as good as the data they learn from. Before launching, check that:
- Every form captures the campaign source and stores it in your CRM
- Conversions are defined as qualified actions, not every page view
- Your CRM stages can be sent back to Google and LinkedIn as offline conversions
- UTM parameters are consistent across every campaign
- You can see leads, opportunities and revenue by campaign in one report
Without this, platforms optimise for whatever is easiest to count, which is usually the cheapest and least qualified lead.
Common paid media mistakes in B2B
- Broad match keywords that bring in students, job seekers and consumers
- LinkedIn audiences so wide that most impressions go to the wrong roles
- Sending every campaign to the homepage
- Judging campaigns after a few days, before any lead could become an opportunity
- Running paid alone, with no follow-up from sales or outbound
A simple testing plan
Test one variable at a time and give each test enough time to produce opportunities, not just clicks. A sensible order is audience first, then offer, then message, then creative. Audience and offer usually have the biggest effect on lead quality, while creative changes mostly affect click rates.
Keep a simple log of what you tested, when and what happened. Over a year, that log becomes one of your most valuable marketing assets.
Finally, share paid insights with the rest of the team. Search terms that convert, LinkedIn job titles that engage and ad messages that earn clicks all tell sales and outbound something useful about what buyers care about right now.
Make paid work with the rest of your system
Paid media is stronger when it is not working alone. Build audiences from the same account list your outbound team uses, which starts with a clear ICP built from closed-won data. Retarget visitors from your SEO and content pages. When an account engages with ads and outreach at the same time, sales sees one coordinated story rather than two disconnected ones.
If you are not sure where to start, a free growth audit can review your current campaigns, tracking and follow-up together.