How to give an agency access to your LinkedIn ad account in Campaign Manager

An account manager on your LinkedIn ad account opens Campaign Manager, clicks Account Settings > Manage access > Add user, enters the agency person's name or LinkedIn profile URL, picks Campaign manager as the role and clicks Add. If the ad account has been added to LinkedIn Business Manager, people are added there instead. To create ads for your company, the agency person also needs a role on your LinkedIn Page, such as Sponsored Content poster, which a Page super admin gives.

This page is for the advertiser who gives access, and for the agency checking which role and Page permission it needs.

Campaign Manager or Business Manager?

LinkedIn manages ad account access in one of two places:

• Campaign Manager, if your ad account has not been added to Business Manager. An account manager adds people on the ad account.
• Business Manager, if your ad account has been claimed by or added to a Business Manager. LinkedIn says user access must then be managed there.

If you are unsure, ask whoever set up your LinkedIn ads whether the company uses Business Manager. LinkedIn's troubleshooting article explains how to see whether an ad account sits under your personal profile or under a Business Manager.

Before you start

• You must be an account manager on the ad account to add people in Campaign Manager. Only account managers can.
• The agency person must be a 1st-, 2nd- or 3rd-degree connection of yours on LinkedIn, when you add them in Campaign Manager.
• Pick the role first. LinkedIn asks for one when you add someone.

LinkedIn also recommends having more than one account manager on an ad account. Make sure that is someone in your business, not only the agency.

Add the agency person in Campaign Manager

LinkedIn's add a user article gives these steps:

1. Go to your ad account in Campaign Manager. From the LinkedIn homepage, click Advertise in the upper-right corner, or open the For Business menu and click Advertise.
2. Click Account Settings in the left menu, then Manage access.
3. Click Add user at the top of the page.
4. Enter the person's name or LinkedIn profile URL, and select them from the list.
5. Select a role.
6. Click Add.

Add them in Business Manager

If the ad account is in Business Manager, a Business Manager admin, or an account manager on the ad account, adds the person there. The person must first be invited to your Business Manager and accept:

1. Sign in to Business Manager and click People in the left menu.
2. Click Invite people, enter the person's work email address and select a business role.
3. Click Invite. The person accepts from the email LinkedIn sends. They need a LinkedIn profile, but the email address does not have to be the one on it.

Then give them the ad account:

1. In Business Manager, click Ad accounts in the left menu and click the ad account's name.
2. Click Add people and tick the person.
3. Click Assign role, select the role and click Add.

If the agency has its own Business Manager, you can instead make it a partner. A Business Manager admin adds the agency's Business Manager ID under Partners, then opens the agency's name, clicks Share ad accounts, selects the ad account, clicks Assign role to set the highest role the agency may give, and clicks Share. The agency then adds its own people. LinkedIn says that to stop sharing an ad account with a partner, you contact LinkedIn support, and the billing admin must not be one of the partner's people.

Which role to give

LinkedIn's roles table in plain words:

• Billing admin: everything an account manager can do, plus changing the account's billing details. Every ad account must have one. The person who created the account starts as billing admin.
• Account manager: creates and edits campaigns, ad sets and ads, manages who has access, edits account details and prints payment receipts. It cannot change billing details.
• Campaign manager: creates and edits campaigns, ad sets and ads, and views performance and billing history. It cannot manage user access, edit account details or change billing details.
• Creative manager: edits new and existing ads, but cannot create or edit campaigns and ad sets.
• Viewer: views performance and billing history only.

Our advice, based on that table:

• An agency that runs your campaigns: Campaign manager. It can do the work, but it cannot add or remove people or change billing details.
• An agency that only makes ads: Creative manager.
• An agency that only reports: Viewer.
• Billing admin and at least one account manager: keep these with your own people.

The Page roles ads need

A role on the ad account is not enough to create ads for your company. LinkedIn's permissions article says the person also needs one of these roles on the LinkedIn Page tied to the ad account:

• Super admin
• Content admin
• Sponsored Content poster

For an agency, Sponsored Content poster is the narrowest of the three. It can create, edit and delete Sponsored Content and sponsor your Page's posts, but it cannot edit organic Page posts. To download leads from Lead Gen Forms, the agency needs Lead Gen Forms manager as well. LinkedIn's add-user article says Sponsored Content permissions can only be assigned by a Page super admin, on the Page or by email, not in Campaign Manager. If a Business Manager has claimed your Page, a Business Manager admin gives them instead.

Our guide to giving an agency admin access to your LinkedIn Page has the steps.

Change or remove the agency later

To change the role in Campaign Manager, an account manager opens Account settings > Manage access and chooses a new role in the dropdown next to the person's name. LinkedIn saves the change automatically.

To remove the agency person:

1. Go to your ad account in Campaign Manager.
2. Click Account settings in the left menu, then Manage access.
3. Click the Trash icon next to the person's name.
4. Click Remove.

If the agency person is the billing admin, add another billing admin first. In Business Manager, open Ad accounts, click the ad account, find the person, click the More icon next to their name, choose Revoke ad account access and click Revoke access. Removing someone from Business Manager altogether takes them off all its ad accounts and Pages. Remember the Page role too, and see our guide to removing an old agency's access.

Troubleshooting

You cannot find the agency person

They must be within three degrees of you on LinkedIn. Connect with them first, or ask another account manager who is connected to them.

You cannot add users

Only account managers can add users. Ask an account manager on the ad account, or ask them to raise your role. If the ad account is in Business Manager, people are added there instead.

The agency can see the account but cannot create ads

Check both sides: Campaign manager or higher on the ad account (Creative manager is enough only for ads in existing ad sets), and Super admin, Content admin or Sponsored Content poster on your Page.

The agency cannot find the ad account

If your company uses Business Manager, the agency person may be looking under their personal profile. LinkedIn's troubleshooting article says to switch between your personal profile and the Business Manager that owns the account in the dropdown menu in the center of the page.

Doing it with an access link

Our access link covers adding a user in Campaign Manager as a guided step. It shows the steps on this page beside LinkedIn's own screen, with the profile of the person to add. Nobody signs in through the link for this: you add the user and say when it is done, and the agency confirms once it can see the ad account. What an agency can ask for is on the LinkedIn ad account integration page.