Subject to members’ preferences, Matched Audiences let you reach the right people by building audience segments from your contact lists, website visitors, company page followers, or people who’ve engaged with your ads. You can use these audiences to retarget or reach LinkedIn member accounts or contacts.
This guide walks you through how to set up and use Matched Audiences in Campaign Manager. You'll learn how to:
- Add source data to create Matched Audiences
- Create, manage, and view insights on your Audiences page
- Use a Matched Audience in your ad set
- Troubleshoot common issues
- Optimize performance
Add source data to create Matched Audiences
You can create Matched Audiences three ways: Uploading lists, retargeting, or connecting third-party data partners.
| Action | Source data | Learn more |
|---|---|---|
| Upload a list | Contact or company list | Upload company and contact targeting lists for LinkedIn Ads |
| Retargeting | Member accounts that: • Engaged with your Company Page • Connected through Conversions API • Responded to your LinkedIn Event • Engaged with your single image ad • Visited a page on your website • Opened a conversation or clicked on any conversation ad call-to-action (CTA) • Engaged with your document ad • Opened or submitted your Lead Gen Form • Viewed your video ad | Retargeting with Matched Audiences |
| Connect a marketing partner | Third-party data | Connect a marketing partner with Campaign Manager for Matched Audiences |
Create, manage, and view insights on your Audiences page
Use the Audiences page in Campaign Manager to manage your Matched Audiences. From this page, you can take actions like selecting your data source to create your Matched Audience, adding your Matched Audience to an ad set, and generating insights about your audience.
Here's a tip
To get to your Audiences page, click Plan on the left menu in Campaign Manager, then select Audiences. Once on your Audiences page, confirm that Matched is selected at the top.
Learn more about what you can do with Matched Audiences on your Audiences page.
| Action | Learn more |
|---|---|
| Create a Matched Audience | Create a Matched Audience from your Audiences page in Campaign Manager |
| See the status of your Matched Audience (for example, Building, Ready, Updating) | Matched Audiences status definitions |
| Review a list of your Matched Audiences | Review your Matched Audiences in Campaign Manager |
| Edit or delete Matched Audiences | Edit or delete Matched Audiences |
| View insights about your Matched Audiences | Access insights about your audiences in Campaign Manager |
| Learn more about your Audiences page | Audiences page in Campaign Manager |
Use a Matched Audience in your ad set
Once you’ve created a Matched Audience from your source data, you need to confirm that your source data status is Ready for best results. Then you can use your Matched Audience in your ad set.
Here's a tip
To check the status of your data source, go to your Audiences page in Campaign Manager and review the Status column. Learn more about how to review your Matched Audiences in Campaign Manager.
Review the following ways you can use a Matched Audience in your ad set.
| Choose your ad set creation type | Get started | When to use | Learn more |
|---|---|---|---|
| Start with selecting your Matched Audiences, then create your ad set. | Go to your Audiences page and select your Matched Audiences, then create your ad set. Your Matched Audiences will automatically be added as a part of your audience. | You want to filter and identify your audiences before creating your ad set. You can also add signals to further refine your audience, such as specifying inclusions and exclusions based on company/contact lists, and retargeting segments. | Create a Classic ad set from your Audiences page in Campaign Manager |
| Start with creating a Classic ad set, and manually build-your-own audience | Create a Classic ad set and then add your Matched Audience segments during ad set creation. | You want to build your audience while creating your ad set. You can choose a Matched Audience segment to start building your audience, then further refine by specifying inclusions and exclusions based on company/contact lists, and retargeting segments. | |
| Start with creating an Accelerate ad set and generate an audience similar to your Matched Audience | Create an Accelerate ad set and then add your Matched Audience segments during ad set creation. | You want a simplified, AI-powered audience building experience. You can add data sources to build an audience that is likely to perform similar actions. | Create an Accelerate ad set in Campaign Manager Edit targeting settings and audience signals for an Accelerate ad set |
Troubleshoot common issues
Once you’ve started using Matched Audiences, you might need guidance to solve common issues. Learn more about some common issues and how to troubleshoot them.
Important to know
The size of Matched Audiences may be limited within the European Economic Area (EEA) and Switzerland. LinkedIn will only match members who opt-in to this feature in the consent interstitial or their ad settings. Learn more about best practices for audience targeting.
| Issue | Suggested action | Learn more |
|---|---|---|
| Match rate is empty or low | Confirm your data is uploaded correctly and is high quality. | Learn how the match rate for your company or contact list is determined and what you can do to help improve rates. |
| Audience is building for more than 24 hours | Building a Matched Audience can take up to 48 hours and, in some rare instances, up to 72 hours. | Learn more about Matched Audience statuses. |
| Matched Audiences have expired | Re-activate your Matched Audience, or re-upload it to ensure that you have the most up-to-date information. | Learn how to make expired Matched Audiences active. |
| Issues with adding your data sources | Review your data source to ensure that it’s uploaded or connected correctly, and make sure you’re waiting enough time for the data to populate. | Learn how to solve for issues with website retargeting, contact targeting with data integration, company and contact targeting with a CSV file, or through your Conversions API. |
Optimize performance
Use our best practices and learn additional tips to optimize your Matched Audiences.
| Topic | Learn more |
|---|---|
| Learning resources | |
| Comprehensive learning path for Matched Audiences | We recommend taking the LinkedIn Marketing Labs training course on Using LinkedIn’s Ad Targeting. This course explores LinkedIn’s unique targeting and the important steps and best practices to tailor your strategy to your ad set objective. |
| Best practices and recommendations | |
| Optimize your Matched Audiences | Get recommendations for ways to improve your Matched Audience setup. |
| Optimize your overall audience | When building an audience, you can use other features to help further refine your audience. Learn more about audience best practices. |
| Share your Matched Audiences with Business Manager | To share your Matched Audiences, you need a Business Manager. Learn how to share Matched Audiences using Business Manager and what permissions you need. |
| Data and privacy | |
| Data collection and storage for Matched Audiences | Learn more about the security safeguards used for Matched Audience information. |