Should your company advertise on LinkedIn?

The social network boasts a largely professional user base, and is functions vary gratefully from its distant cousin Facebook.However,

Much like Facebook – LinkedIn Direct Ads allow you to target specific demographics (age groups, gender, location). They also allow you to upload a company logo or otherwise relevant picture to accompany your ad. In this way, LinkedIn sets itself apart from competitor Google – who offers only a string of keywords with which to find your target audience.

The biggest concern that we have with the ability of LinkedIn to generate a Facebook-like revenue stream is that that users simply spend less time on LinkedIn than they do on Facebook. Unless a company is looking to hire individuals, or you’re a new user who is setting up their profile – the likelihood that you’ll spend more than a few minutes a day on the site is pretty minute. Thus, a company looking to advertise for a particular event or product is better off reaching the same audience on Facebook with a cheaper cost-per-click rate and a larger possible audience.

According to Nielsen, LinkedIn’s monthly viewership is a small fraction of Facebook, MySpace, and even Twitter’s. Social media advertising dollars would therefore be more useful if spent on mediums on which a greater number of users spend a larger quantity of time (ie. checking out vacation photos on Facebook or refreshing your page for new tweet on Twitter). The professionalism of LinkedIn means that companies advertising job openings may have greater success on that site that any of the other social networking portals – however, if you are not advertising a position, your advertising money could be better spent elsewhere. As with most advertising, it’s important to pick your advertising channel properly, and tailor your message (and medium) to your audience.

The Bivings Report official answer for whether or not you should advertise on LinkedIn: NO