LinkedIn is significantly upgrading its event capabilities with new integrations and features designed to help businesses broadcast, promote, and manage their events more effectively. These enhancements come as LinkedIn reports a substantial increase in event activity on its platform, with a 24% rise in events shared last quarter, building on a 15% increase in Q4 of the previous year.
The professional networking giant notes that event ads drive, on average, 31% more viewership, underscoring the value of these new tools for marketers looking to maximize their reach and engagement.
Streamlined Event Management with ON24 Integration
First among the new offerings is an integration with the webinar hosting platform ON24. This allows event creators to manage their online events directly through ON24 while simultaneously launching and promoting them on LinkedIn.
This integration simplifies the process, enabling users to create an event in ON24 and launch a corresponding LinkedIn event, including running LinkedIn event ads, all from a single platform. LinkedIn explains the benefit:
“When hosting an event on ON24, it can be managed from start to finish after opting in and setting up the integration. And, regardless of whether the event is hosted on LinkedIn or not, marketers can now go to the Company or Event Page – before, during or after an event – to boost and reach more people.”
This provides a more cohesive workflow for amplifying and presenting events, complementing existing integrations like running LinkedIn events via Zoom.
Enhanced Lead Data Sync with Cvent
In another significant third-party integration, users of the event management software Cvent can now seamlessly sync their event data with LinkedIn. This feature simplifies the transfer of lead data directly into a CRM system, optimizing follow-up from event promotions.
The integration works by allowing marketers to connect Cvent event setups to LinkedIn. As LinkedIn details:
“When setting up an event in Cvent, the new ‘Connect to LinkedIn’ option under ‘Audience Segments’ turns attendee and registration lists into audience segments that marketers can choose inside LinkedIn’s Campaign Manager so they can seamlessly retarget high-intent audiences, personalize messaging based on event engagement, and drive conversions with precision.”
These two integrations offer more robust options for driving direct leads from LinkedIn events, helping businesses maximize their functions within the app.
New Lead Generation Objective for Event Ads
Finally, LinkedIn is introducing lead generation as a dedicated objective when running event ads. This new feature is designed to streamline the process of converting event interest into tangible business opportunities.
According to LinkedIn:
“Quickly turn event interest into pipeline by selecting ‘lead generation’ as the campaign objective and ‘event’ as the ad format to reach people most likely to register. Once leads are captured through the campaign, they will sync directly to a CRM or marketing automation platform (MAP), making it easier to demonstrate business impact.”
Additionally, users of Integrate or ON24 will now be able to collect leads from both organic and paid registration forms, with automatic routing to a CRM or MAP, eliminating manual uploads and delays. These additional options for maximizing LinkedIn events present a significant opportunity for businesses, especially given the rising interest in the platform's event format.
LinkedIn confirms that its event boosting and integrations with Cvent and ON24 are available globally. The lead generation objective for Event Ads and the Integrate integration are currently in beta.
