Updated LinkedIn Ads Features and What They Mean for Your 2026 Campaigns

Part 1 of RG’s LinkedIn Strategy Guide for Financial & Professional Services Marketers

LinkedIn was busy rolling out updates in the back half of 2025, and we've finally had enough time to truly see the impact of these changes. These are the new and updated features that matter, alongside our guidance on how to make the most of them.

Updated Ad Features Worth Your Attention

Broader ‘Thought Leader Ads’ Discovery (Launched: October/November 2025)

LinkedIn's most strategically important ad format for professional services brands got significantly more powerful. Thought Leader Ads allow you to boost organic posts from real individuals (executives, employees, or any LinkedIn member) rather than your company page, and they deliver up to 2x higher click-through rates than standard single-image ads with the same objective.

The major 2025 feature update extended discovery beyond first and second-degree connections. Marketers can now search and identify expert voices across 1st, 2nd, and 3rd-degree+ connections and sponsor organic posts mentioning their brand or event, expanding collaboration well beyond their immediate network. Inside Campaign Manager's new "Partnerships" section, you can filter discoverable posts by content type or brand mention, request permission from the author via automated workflow, and turn approved posts into fully targeted campaigns.

This effectively enables an influencer marketing motion within LinkedIn's native ad ecosystem, and it's particularly powerful for professional services firms looking to amplify credible external voices like clients, analysts, or conference speakers.

Thought Leader Event Ads (Globally available, 2025)

A dedicated version of Thought Leader Ads built specifically for event promotion. Brands can sponsor member posts that link to event pages, pairing organic authenticity with precise audience targeting to drive registrations.

For financial services firms running investor days, webinars, or conferences, this format creates significantly more credible event promotion than a standard company page event ad.

First Impression Ads (Globally available, June 2025)

A new full-screen, vertical video format that guarantees your ad is the first ad a targeted member sees when they open LinkedIn on a given day. According to a recent LinkedIn survey, 77% of B2B marketers say day one of a campaign is extremely important in driving the highest impact, and First Impression Ads are LinkedIn's direct answer to that.

They are ideal for major announcements, product launches, or time-sensitive campaigns where day-one visibility is critical.

Reserved Ads (Globally available, 2025)

For campaigns where sustained top-of-feed placement matters beyond a single day, Reserved Ads allow you to purchase guaranteed first ad placement in the LinkedIn feed for your targeted audience.

They're particularly valuable for extended campaign windows, including market launches, brand campaigns, or multi-week product education pushes where maintaining competitive visibility is critical throughout the flight.

Connected TV (CTV) Ads (US & Canada targeting, expanded 2025)

One of LinkedIn's most significant advertising expansions to date: the ability to reach your professional target audience on streaming television using LinkedIn's first-party professional data for targeting. CTV Ads now include expanded Paramount streaming inventory and integrations with Innovid and Sprinklr for cross-screen campaign management and unified reporting.

Early data is compelling. LinkedIn CTV reaches four times more on-target impressions compared to traditional linear TV for B2B audiences, and real-world results back it up. Salesforce cited a similar 4x on-target advantage in a published case study, while ServiceNow credited LinkedIn CTV with a 19 point lift in awareness among large-company audiences and a 45% improvement in lead submission rate.

For financial services and professional services firms, the implications are significant. A wealth management firm can now run a brand awareness campaign on streaming TV targeted specifically to high-net-worth professionals by job title, industry, and seniority, a targeting capability that simply didn't exist in professional-audience TV advertising before. For creative, the best practices are straightforward: 15–30 second spots, no subtitles, the highest resolution available, and brand appearance within the first four seconds. Retarget CTV viewers with in-feed content to create a full-funnel sequence.

AI Ad Variants (announced September 2025)

LinkedIn now offers AI-powered creative variant generation, allowing marketers to input a base ad and generate multiple alternative versions for A/B testing. It's a useful speed-to-test tool, particularly for teams running multiple campaigns across practice groups or service lines. That said, in regulated industries, messaging accuracy is non-negotiable, and human review of every variant remains essential.

Buyer Group Targeting (Rolled out 2025)

One of the most practically powerful targeting updates for B2B professional services: LinkedIn can now identify and build audiences representing the full buying committee around a specific prospect or account. Rather than manually layering every relevant title, function, and seniority level, Buyer Group Targeting uses LinkedIn's first-party intent signals to automatically add the surrounding decision-influencers around your target contacts.

For firms selling to complex, multi-stakeholder buying committees, which describes most of professional services, this is a meaningful leap forward.

Company Attribution in Revenue Attribution Report (Globally available, 2025)

LinkedIn has added company-level attribution to its Revenue Attribution Report, connecting CRM data from HubSpot, Salesforce, and Microsoft Dynamics to LinkedIn campaign activity at the account level. For firms running account-based marketing strategies, this finally makes it possible to see how target companies are moving through your funnel as a result of LinkedIn exposure, not just individual contact-level conversions. It's a meaningful measurement leap for any enterprise ABM program.

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Key Numbers to Know

Thought Leader Ads vs. standard image ads

2x higher CTR

CTV vs. linear TV on-target impressions

4x better targeting

Have we piqued your interest? Let's talk.

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