The Ultimate Guide to LinkedIn Business Manager in 2025

LinkedIn has 875 million members and is the undisputed king of professional networking platforms.

Among social media platforms, LinkedIn is considered the most important for professionals to connect, engage, and advance their careers. It’s no exaggeration to say that it’s completely revolutionized how people network and look for jobs.

No matter what stage you’re at, a strong LinkedIn presence can make all the difference in today's competitive professional landscape.

LinkedIn is the definitive social network for career growth. And LinkedIn Business Manager is a fantastic solution for large companies and marketing agencies to simplify the process of managing Ad Accounts, Pages, and people.

In this ultimate guide to the LinkedIn Business Manager, you’ll learn everything you need to know about using the platform to maximize your productivity.

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What Is LinkedIn Business Manager?

Let’s start with the basics before you proclaim yourself to be a LinkedIn Business Manager guru. 

In July 2022, LinkedIn rolled out the Business Manager platform. It’s a comprehensive free-to-use tool that allows businesses and marketers to efficiently manage their LinkedIn Ad Accounts and Pages from a single dashboard. It dramatically improves the experience of managing a LinkedIn page which you would manage via your personal LinkedIn profile.

LinkedIn Business Manager makes giving access permissions simple. And it also allows matched audiences to be shared across Ad Accounts and fosters secure collaboration through Business Manager partnerships.

LinkedIn Business Manager makes marketing easier for businesses of all sizes. They can streamline their advertising efforts, reach their target audiences more effectively, and achieve measurable results with greater efficiency and precision.

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Why Should You Upgrade Your Standard LinkedIn Account and Use Business Manager? 

Well, it’s free. And your LinkedIn Business Manager account comes with features that will make your life easier if you work on multiple LinkedIn advertising accounts or collaborate with others on marketing campaigns.

It’s incredibly useful for marketers who manage multiple company Pages or Ad Accounts. With LinkedIn Business Manager, all of them can be managed from one handy dashboard. 

Collaborating with other businesses becomes hassle-free too. You can share access to specific accounts or company pages by adding them as a Business Manager Partner.

Another exclusive function of the platform is that businesses can easily add or remove people across all the Ad Accounts and Pages. You probably already know how essential it is for the right people to have the right user permissions, and this tool ensures security across various accounts.

One more excellent reason to upgrade is the ability to share matched audiences across ad campaigns. If your business has found success with matched audiences on specific campaigns, the LinkedIn Business Manager will let you share these audiences with other accounts. And targeting the right audiences on LinkedIn is key to achieving success in your marketing campaigns.

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How to Use LinkedIn Business Manager

The Business Manager is flexible, allowing brands and agencies to create a system that caters to their needs.

A brand can choose to have one global Business Manager to run all regions and business units. Or they can have multiple business managers, each working on a different region or business unit.

An agency has a similar choice. They can appoint one global Business Manager to run all their clients or they can have multiple Business Managers, appointing one to each client. Ultimately, the decision depends on the structure of your business. The platform provides the flexibility to choose the approach that best suits your specific needs.

Within a single Business Manager account, global companies can run Ad Accounts that use different billing and currency settings. 

A smaller organization won’t need to put too much thought into the structure of its LinkedIn Business Manager. Yet, a bigger business should dedicate some time to work out how they can maximize their efficiency on LinkedIn.

It’s also recommended to carefully think out who should be your organization’s Business Manager Admin. They should have good visibility across your marketing organization because they’ll be leading the account.

You should have at least two business managers with Admin permissions to avoid a lockout. 

Let’s take you through the LinkedIn Business Manager setup process step-by-step. Have no fear, this tool is here to uncomplicate things and make your life easier.

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How to Set Up a LinkedIn Business Manager Account

If you haven’t already signed up, follow these simple steps to create your very own LinkedIn Business Manager account.

1. Visit LinkedIn Business Manager and select Create Business Manager

2. Type your Business Manager Account Name, upload an optional business logo image, and enter the email address of the person you want to be linked to the dashboard.
   
   Take note that the email address doesn’t need to match your personal LinkedIn account. Select your primary reason for using the platform and click Create.

3. You’ll receive an email inviting you to join the Business Manager. Open it and click Accept Invitation.  

4. You will be taken to a screen where you need to click Agree & Confirm to confirm your identity and create your Business Manager profile.

5. Success! You’re now equipped with a Business Manager account.

How to Invite Team Members to Your LinkedIn Business Manager

Franklin D Roosevelt once said: “I'm not the smartest fellow in the world, but I can sure pick smart colleagues.”

So now that your organization’s Business Manager account is up and running, it’s time to bring your team members on board. Don’t worry, the process is not complicated in the slightest.

1. From the LinkedIn Business Manager Dashboard, select People on the left-hand menu.

2. Click Invite People in the upper right corner.

3. Enter the email address of the person you wish to invite. Decide what permission levels you want to grant them: Admin, Employee, or Contractor. Click Invite. 

4. Success! You’ve invited a team member and now you can invite anyone else who requires access.

Once the invitation is sent, they’ll receive an email. The user will not have access to the platform until they accept the request.

The Different Access Permissions You Can Give

As touched upon briefly before, LinkedIn Business Manager provides three user permission levels that you can assign to team members. This is important for controlling their level of access and responsibilities within the platform.

Failing to manage access levels properly can have disastrous consequences. So let’s take a quick look at the three levels of access you can give.

Admin

Admins have unrestricted access and can manage everything in the Business Manager. They can invite employees, add Ad Accounts and Pages, form Partnerships, share and unshare Matched Audiences, and access all accounts and company pages. 

Employee

Employees have view-only access that is limited to the Ad Accounts and Pages to which they’ve been assigned. 

Contractor

Contractors have similar permissions to employees, but this access level is designed for people who don’t work in your organization. They also have view-only access that is limited to the Ad Accounts and Pages to which they’ve been assigned.

You can change a user’s role at any time and revoke access if you so wish. 

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How to Add Your Own Company Pages to LinkedIn Business Manager

It's time to add your assets to your LinkedIn Business Manager platform. There are two ways of doing so, and it depends if you own the page or if it’s the company page of another business.

We’ll first show you how to add LinkedIn Pages that are your own.

1. From the dashboard, select Pages from the left-hand menu and then click Add Page.

2. You’ll be faced with two options. Provided it’s your company page, select Add Page. We’ll show you how to Request Access afterwards.

3. Search for your page by entering your company name or URL.

4. Tick the two boxes and select Add. You’ll only be granted access if one of the page super admins is part of your Business Manager.

Once you’ve managed to link your company page, you’ll see it listed in your Business Manager.

If you work with an agency, LinkedIn has got you covered. Business Manager Admins can then share the Page with other Business Managers, giving them the freedom to easily grant access to their own people themselves.

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How to Request Access to a LinkedIn Page in LinkedIn Business Manager

This is the route you’ll need to take if the company page is from another organization, and that organization doesn’t have a Business Manager.

If they do have a Business Manager, they can share access with you via a Business Manager Partnership (which we’ll explain in more detail below.)

1. Select Pages on the left-hand menu and then select Add Page.

2. This time, select Request access.

3. Search for the page by entering the company name or URL.

4. Select all the roles you would like to request to run the LinkedIn Page. Once you’re done, hit Send Request.

You’ll get access once an existing Super Admin on the Page approves the request.

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How to Use Ad Accounts on LinkedIn Business Manager

The LinkedIn Business Manager allows one business to own an Ad Account and others to access it. It’s recommended that the company that manages the billing be the owner. If both parties agree, LinkedIn can help transfer the ownership of an Ad Account.

Similar to adding Pages, there is more than one way to add Ad Accounts to your Business Manager. And it depends on whether the Ad Account is yours or if it belongs to another business.

How to Add an Ad Account to LinkedIn Business Manager (That Your Business Owns)

1. Select Ad Accounts from the left-hand menu in LinkedIn Business Manager and then click Ad Accounts.

2. You’ll then be faced with some options in a drop-down menu. Claim Ownership (ID) is the most convenient option if you only need to add a handful of ad account IDs. You may prefer to select Claim Ownership (CSV) if you intend to link many Ad Accounts to your Business Manager. If that’s the case, LinkedIn will guide you through the process.

3. If you’ve clicked Claim Ownership (ID), you’ll be prompted to type your Ad Account IDs. Ad Account IDs are 9-digit IDs that you can find in the Accounts tab in your LinkedIn Campaign Manager. Click Add.

4. Success! If the person adding the Account is an Account Manager, it’ll automatically be approved and added to your Business Manager. Otherwise, the Account Manager will receive an email inviting them to give their approval.

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How to Add an Ad Account to LinkedIn Business Manager That Another Business Owns

Take this route If you’re a marketing agency that wants to add Ad Accounts that belong to another company.

Only follow these steps if the company doesn’t have a Business Manager. If they do have a Business Manager, it’s much easier to create a Business Manager Partnership where they can share Ad Account access with you. 

1. Select Ad Accounts from the left-hand menu and then click Ad Accounts.

2. From the drop down menu, select Request access (CSV).

3. Download the CSV template, fill in the necessary information, and upload it to the platform.

How to Approve an Ad Account Request

An Account Manager can approve your request in Campaign Manager by clicking their profile picture and selecting Business Manager Requests.

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How to Manage Ad Accounts From Your LinkedIn Business Manager

The LinkedIn Business Manager makes it easy to manage people working on various Ad Accounts. From the dashboard, it’s possible to grant access, change access levels, and revoke access.

After adding your Ad Accounts to the Business Manager, you’ll be able to manage them with ease. An Admin can manage all the Ad Accounts while Employees and Contractors can only manage accounts on the specific ones they’ve been granted permissions on. 

Click on an Ad Accounts on the left hand menu and you’ll see all the people who have access and the roles they have.

To invite people to work on the Ad Account, click Add People. From here, you can also remove access or change access levels by clicking the pencil icon. They can be made billing admin, account manager, campaign manager, creative manager, or viewer.

Even if you added people to your Business Manager, they can't manage your Ad Account until you have assigned them permissions.

The best place for managing team members is through the People tab on the left-hand menu of LinkedIn Business Manager. Some people may have the role “Needs review” and this is showing you who previously had access to the Ad Accounts and Pages but hasn’t yet been invited to the Business Manager.

Confirm whether or not the person under “review” is an employee of your business.

To Invite them, enter their work email address and choose which level of access you want to give them, then click invite.

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What is the Difference Between LinkedIn Business Manager and LinkedIn Campaign Manager? 

LinkedIn Campaign Manager is where you can manage all your sponsored activity, you'll find it within your LinkedIn Business Manager and it's linked to whatever ad accounts you have access to.

What can you see in the LinkedIn Campaign Manager? 

• All your active and inactive advertising campaigns
• Current month total spend and historic spend on LinkedIn ads
• Ad status
• Ad performance
• Audiences
• Analysis
• Conversion tracking
• The possibility to run a test
• Account settings and billing centre

How to Find LinkedIn Campaign Manager  

There are two ways to access the Campaign Manager for the LinkedIn Ad Accounts you manage.

1. From your LinkedIn Business Manager

To do it this way select Ad accounts on the left menu of your Business Manager, next to the Ad account you've been assigned to click on the square with the arrow pointing up (you'll find it next to the Ad Account name), like this: 

The LinkedIn Campaign Manager looks like this: 

2. From Your Personal LinkedIn Homepage

From the top menu on your homepage, click Advertise in the top right-hand corner:

‍This will take you directly to a list of accounts you manage in the LinkedIn Campaign Manager: 

Click on the account you want to work on and it will take you to the Campaign Manager dashboard for that account where you can get straight to work on running ads: 

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How to Set Up a Business Manager Partnership

This is one of the standout features of LinkedIn Business Manager. A partnership is perfect if you’re turning to an agency with multiple employees or if you want to be 100% secure when collaborating with external contractors. It’s an easy way to share access to your Ad Accounts and Pages.

Setting up a Business Manager partnership isn’t too complicated, as long as both parties have already completed their Business Manager setup (head back to the top of this article to learn exactly how to set up your LinkedIn Business Manager). Either one can initiate the partnership, but only an Admin can add a partner. Follow these simple steps:

1. Select Partners on the left-hand menu in your Business Manager.

2. Next, you’ll have to ask them for their Business Manager ID, which they’ll be able to find on their Business Manager dashboard in the top left-hand corner. Once they send it to you, copy-paste, and click Add Partner.

3. Nothing will be automatically shared with a partner. You can now choose which company Pages and Ad Accounts to share with them. And it’s a two-way partnership so they can choose to share their assets with you too.

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Three Expert Tips for Maximizing LinkedIn Business Manager

With the LinkedIn Business Manager setup complete, let’s see how the platform can enhance your company’s content marketing strategy. Implement these easily applicable tips to harness the full potential of a LinkedIn Business Manager.

1. Improve Targeting by Sharing Matched Audiences

There’s another feature of LinkedIn Business Manager that deserves your attention. As soon as you add Ad Accounts to the platform, you’ll be able to share and unshare Matched Audiences across the different accounts. It’s a real time saver which can help companies more accurately reach their target audience with their paid campaigns. 

The Business Manager makes the process of sharing and managing Audiences across multiple Ad Accounts so much easier.

Only Admins can share Audiences across Ad Accounts, and they can also share access to Audiences with another business, as long as they’ve created a Business Manager Partnership.

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2. Connect and Collaborate

Linkedin Business Manager offers fantastic collaboration tools both in-house and when working with agencies. The platform fosters collaboration and communication - two essential elements of any successful business. 

Each user added to the Business Manager has clear roles and responsibilities. And it’s remarkably easy for an Admin to modify or revoke access, when appropriate. 

The platform also connects you with other businesses and agencies, through the Partnership function. The partnerships are two-way, allowing both parties to share LinkedIn Pages and Ad Accounts with one another. It’s a secure option for working with external contractors and will undoubtedly boost your chances of forging successful long-term partnerships.

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3. Use Valuable Insights to Make Data-Driven Decisions

There’s one last tool in the Business Manager we still haven’t mentioned. While LinkedIn’s Campaign Manager is designed for managing and evaluating the success of your campaigns, the Revenue Attribution report tab allows businesses to understand exactly how much influence their LinkedIn ads have on revenue.

Connect your CRM and you’ll have access to key performance metrics that have been influenced by LinkedIn. This information is priceless for businesses and agencies hoping to achieve their marketing goals. 

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LinkedIn Business Manager Best Practices 

Before you go off on your merry way, we advise you to read a little about the best practices for working on the platform.

At the very beginning, it’s important to consider how your business wants to structure the Business Manager. There are lots of decisions which need to be taken to avoid confusion, such as whether all Ad Accounts and Pages are run globally by one Business Manager or divided by region.

Once you’re up and running, you should have at least two business managers with Admin access in case one gets locked out or leaves the company. 

Admins have full access to every Ad Account and Page on the Business Manager, so it’s recommended to provide most people with the Employee role. Regularly view and manage inactive and active people, revoking access when appropriate. 

Final Thoughts

There’s no doubt about it. LinkedIn Business Manager is a powerful solution that will streamline your user and audience workflows across a complex portfolio of accounts. It’s particularly useful if you’re working with multiple clients or if you just want more control over your campaigns.

And just like that, we’ve come to the end of this ultimate guide to LinkedIn Business Manager. It’s time for you to spread your wings and explore this centralized platform for yourself. Remember that you don’t need to be a business owner or a LinkedIn expert to take advantage of the Business Manager’s practical features.

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