LinkedIn Ads benchmarks by company size 2026: what it costs to reach SMB, mid-market and enterprise, from 249 accounts and $4.5M

This is the seventh cut of Kiin Labs' LinkedIn Ads Benchmarks 2026 and the only one by firmographic rather than function: what advertisers pay when the campaign's company size targeting sits entirely inside one band. Campaigns that span bands (most of them) are excluded, so the three groups are clean. Every number is the median advertiser account; ranges are the 25th to 75th percentile; pounds at $1 = £0.79. The function cuts are at benchmarks by audience.

The three sizes side by side

The whole-panel audience table (which counts any campaign whose targeting includes a band) shows the same shape at a smaller scale: enterprise-only $73.67 CPM against $38.25 for SMB-only. This cut is stricter and the gap is wider. The reason is not that enterprise members are rare; it is that every enterprise vendor bids for the same 10,001-plus employees, and the auction prices them accordingly. Small-company members are plentiful, click more (they are the decision-maker and the user), and convert forms at 12.7%, the best completion of any non-executive cut.

SMB: 1 to 200 employees

933 campaigns, 153 accounts, $3,352,630; 134 accounts with feed delivery. Median audience 69,000 members (middle half 22,000 to 160,000).

The best landing page CTR in the series (0.35%; the top quarter of accounts over 0.55%) and the cheapest visit ($12.57). LinkedIn's CTR column reads 2.2% because small-company members react and comment at three times the platform rate. The US costs $58 CPM against $41 in the UK, but the visit costs the same ($12.57 against $13.18) because US small-company members click more.

By ad format

Lead gen forms

186 campaigns, 44 accounts, $540,631, 6,564 leads; 8 accounts with no lead.

The cheapest lead in the series: $125 at 12.7% completion, $114 on a document ad at 23.1%, $136 on single image, video or carousel at 9.2%. Director-and-above targeting inside SMB produces a $67 lead at 15.3% completion (14 accounts): founders and owner-operators fill in forms.

By seniority targeted

UK and US

Who actually sees the ads

Mid-market: 201 to 5,000 employees

334 campaigns, 56 accounts, $691,380; 37 accounts with feed delivery. Median audience 40,000 members (middle half 19,000 to 76,000).

The awkward middle: dearer than SMB per impression ($52.70) and per visit ($18.38), with the lowest landing page CTR of the three (0.23%), on the smallest sample (37 accounts with feed delivery). Mid-market-only targeting is rare because most advertisers include the band alongside others; the campaigns that isolate it are usually ABM lists, which price like lists. The UK is $50.70 and the US $80.79 per thousand.

By ad format

Lead gen forms

102 campaigns, 32 accounts, $235,138, 1,580 leads; 3 accounts with no lead.

$235 a lead at 8.9% completion, $248 on a document ad and $235 on single image, video or carousel; no seniority filter gives $193 at 10.2% completion. The document premium is smaller here than anywhere else, on a small sample.

By seniority targeted

UK and US

Who actually sees the ads

Enterprise: 5,001+ employees

161 campaigns, 40 accounts, $495,340; 26 accounts with feed delivery. Median audience 46,000 members (middle half 17,000 to 150,000).

The dearest inventory on LinkedIn: $84.84 CPM at the median account and $129 at the dearer quarter, $38.90 per landing page click, 0.24% landing page CTR. The US is $110 per thousand at the median, the UK $85. Twenty-six accounts with feed delivery; only single image and video reach seven accounts. The premium is the auction: enterprise buyers are the target of every enterprise vendor.

By ad format

Lead gen forms

63 campaigns, 23 accounts, $237,241, 1,525 leads; 4 accounts with no lead.

$281 a lead at 7.0% completion, $197 on a document ad at 12.5% (nine accounts), $449 on single image, video or carousel at 3.2%. Enterprise-only targeting is where the single-image-with-form setup fails hardest and the document ad earns its place. Seniority splits are withheld for sample size.

By seniority targeted

UK and US

Who actually sees the ads

How Kiin uses company size

• One band per ad set. SMB, mid-market and enterprise members price and behave differently enough that mixing them hides which is working. Split them and let the report choose.
• Budget by band: enterprise needs 2.2 times the media per impression and 3 times per visit against SMB; an enterprise campaign at an SMB budget reaches nobody.
• SMB for forms, enterprise for documents and the inbox. Small-company members convert feed forms (12.7%); enterprise members convert documents (12.5%) and messages, and ignore feed forms (3.2%).
• Exclude the bottom two bands (1 and 2 to 10 employees) from every campaign that is not selling to sole traders: they cost 5 to 20% above the campaign average on the delivered side and click through at a fraction of the rate, across every function cut in this series.
• Read the delivered size in the demographics report. A campaign targeting 1,001-plus will still deliver a share to smaller companies through member profile errors; if it is over 15%, tighten with an uploaded list.
• Enterprise is where CTV and thought leader ads pay. At $85 to $130 CPM in the feed, a thought leader post or a CTV spot to the same list is not the expensive option any more. See the CTV notes.

Method and citation

Campaigns whose company size targeting is entirely within one band (SMB: 1 to 200 employees; mid-market: 201 to 5,000; enterprise: 5,001 and above), with delivery between 8 September 2025 and 7 September 2026, at least $50 of spend and 2,000 impressions, LinkedIn Audience Network campaigns excluded, 14 currencies converted to USD at September 2026 rates: 933 / 334 / 161 campaigns, 153 / 56 / 40 accounts, $3.35M / $0.69M / $0.50M. Feed metrics are the median advertiser account across single image, video, carousel, document and event formats on every objective except lead generation; lead gen form metrics are the median account on the lead generation objective. No cell with fewer than seven accounts is shown. Free to cite with a link.

The series: HR · IT and engineering · finance · marketing · sales · C-suite and founders · by company size.