LinkedIn ads pause rules

Turns "pause the losers" into rules the user approves once, led by a click-through rate (CTR) floor, and applies them the same way every week: a dry-run table first, a confirmed list second, and a logged reason for every pause.

When to use it#

• "Which LinkedIn ads should I pause?", "pause my losing ads", "clean up the account every Monday".
• Setting up or changing the rules themselves: the floor, the cap, what is protected.
• Re-running last week's rules on fresh data.

It doesn't:

• Review the whole account, scale winners or diagnose fatigue. Use linkedin-ads-performance-review.
• Judge whether a pause or a new ad worked. Use ad-experiment-lift.
• Change budgets, bids, targeting or ad sets. It only switches single ads off.
• Write the replacement ads. It tells you where a replacement is needed and how it should go out.

A naming note, because it decides what "the last ad" means. Campaign Manager now groups ads as campaign, then ad set, then ad. LinkedIn's Marketing API, and tools built on it, still call the ad set a "campaign" and the campaign a "campaign group". This skill says ad set for the level that holds the ads.

What you need#

Export mode#

The Ad performance report from Campaign Manager, exported at the ad account level so every ad is a row:

1. Open the ad account in Campaign Manager and click Advertise in the left menu.
2. Set the time range at the top right to the rule window (default: last 30 days).
3. Click Export at the upper right. In the Export CSV Report dialog, pick Report Type Ad performance.
4. Pick a column view that includes conversions: all columns, or a custom view with impressions, clicks, spend and conversions.
5. Set Time breakdown to All, then click Export.

If the file has no conversions column, also export Conversion ad performance and join the 2 files on the ad ID.

Columns used. Match them by name, case-insensitive, because names vary between export versions: ad ID, ad name, ad status, ad set name, campaign name, impressions, clicks, spend (often "total spent"), conversions. Ad format or objective, if present, scopes the floor (Method step 1).

Reading the file:

• Campaign Manager CSVs can open with report-information rows (report name, date range, account) above the column header. Find the header row: the first row that contains both an impressions column and a clicks column. Everything above it is metadata.
• Detect the delimiter and encoding instead of assuming comma and UTF-8.
• Strip currency symbols, thousands separators and percent signs before doing math.
• If you exported with a Daily or Monthly breakdown, sum the rows for each ad first.
• Recompute CTR as clicks divided by impressions and cost per conversion as spend divided by conversions. Don't average the CTR column.
• No ad status column? Ask the user which ads are live, or mark the last-active check "unverified" in the table and have them confirm it in Campaign Manager before pausing.

Export mode changes nothing. The skill hands back the confirmed list, and the user switches those ads off in Campaign Manager.

Connected mode#

With Adwarp, a free open-source MCP server and CLI for LinkedIn Ads and Google Ads, the skill reads live data, pauses the confirmed ads and logs why. Pausing and optimization: https://adwarp.dev/linkedin-ads/optimization. Setup: https://adwarp.dev/docs/install.

Notes:

• update_ad touches 1 ad and nothing else in its ad set. LinkedIn refuses to pause an ad that is still in review.
• CLI periods are presets (last_7_days, last_30_days, last_90_days, month_to_date, last_month). For a custom window, use the MCP tools with startDate and endDate.
• Adwarp journals every status change it makes under the ad's ID. log_ad_change adds the reason, so the journal says why as well as what. The journal is a local file, so on a hosted Adwarp server log_ad_change and list_ad_changes aren't available. Keep the reasons in the run report instead.

Method#

1. Agree the rules before reading any numbers. Show the rule block below, ask the user to approve or change each line, and save the approved block as pause-rules.md in the working folder so every later run uses the same values. Every number here is a default the user can change, except where a source is named.

Window:      last 30 days                                   (default)
Scope:       Sponsored Content ads in ad sets optimizing     (default)
             for clicks, website visits, leads or conversions
Floor:       CTR under 0.40% once an ad has 1,500           (default)
             impressions in the window
Cap:         5 pauses per run, highest spend first           (default)
Protected:   top 5 ads by conversions, then CTR              (default)
Protected:   the last active ad in an ad set                 (structural, see below)
Protected:   cost per conversion at or under the target      (target from the user;
                                                              default: account average
                                                              for the window)

Why scope matters: LinkedIn counts clicks as "chargeable clicks based on your ad set's objective", so a click under one objective isn't the same event under another. Keep 1 floor per objective and format. Sponsored Messaging and video-view or awareness ad sets stay out unless the user sets a separate floor for them.

Why the last ad is protected: an ad displays only while its campaign, ad set and ad are all active, so pausing the last active ad stops the whole ad set without anyone deciding to stop it.

2. Pull the data. Export mode: the Ad performance file. Connected mode: list_campaigns for the active ad sets, then for each one list_ads (status) and get_performance at creative level with the ad set as parentId. Keep paused ads in the data for the account totals. Only active ads can be candidates.

3. Compute per ad: impressions, clicks, CTR, spend, conversions, cost per conversion. Compute the account's average cost per conversion over the window (total spend divided by total conversions) for the default target.

4. Apply the rules in this order. The order is part of the rules.
5. Not active (paused, archived, draft, in review): skip it, count it, don't list it.
6. Under the impression minimum: Wait, too early to call.
7. CTR at or above the floor: Keep. Counted, not listed.
8. In the protected top N by conversions, then CTR: Keep.
9. At least 1 conversion and cost per conversion at or under the target: Keep.
10. Everything left is a candidate. Sort the candidates by spend in the window, highest first, because that is the money at stake.
11. Walk the sorted candidates. If pausing one would leave its ad set with no active ad (count the ads already marked for pause this run), mark it Keep, replace first. Otherwise, if the run is under the cap, mark it Pause. Otherwise mark it Next run.

5. Build the dry-run table in the format under Output: every ad that hit a rule, with the rule and the action, plus a count of ads above the floor and ads skipped.

6. Ask for confirmation of the exact list. Show the pause list with ad IDs and names and say nothing has changed. Accept edits ("drop row 3") and show the final list again if it changed. Approval of the rules covers no list. Every run needs its own confirmation, and a scheduled run never pauses on its own.

7. Apply the confirmed list.
8. Connected mode: for each ad, update_ad with dryRun: true to preview the patch, then update_ad with status: "PAUSED". Right after each pause, log_ad_change with entityType: "creative", the ad ID and name, a note with the rule and the numbers (for example "CTR 0.28% on 8,200 impressions, floor 0.40% after 1,500, 0 conversions"), label: "pause rules <date>" and tags: ["pause-rules"]. Then list_ads on each touched ad set to confirm the new status. Report any ad LinkedIn refused, with its error. Don't retry it silently.
9. Export mode: hand back the list (ad ID, ad name, ad set, reason) for the user to switch off in Campaign Manager, with the same reason lines so they can keep their own log.

8. Plan the replacements as new draft ads. In practice, LinkedIn doesn't carry edits made to the post behind a live ad into the ad, so never fix a paused or weak ad by editing its post. LinkedIn's help also says an edited paused ad goes back to review. Write the replacement as a new ad, created as a draft, and launch it on an explicit request. A new ad also starts with clean numbers, so next week's run judges it on its own. For every Keep, replace first row, the replacement has to be live before the old ad can be paused.

Run it weekly#

Keep the same rules file and window length, and run on the same day each week. A weekly run with a cap of 5 removes the clear losers steadily without gutting an ad set in 1 day.

• Scheduled agent. Schedule a weekly task in your agent with this prompt: "Run the linkedin-ads-pause-rules skill with the rules in pause-rules.md. Dry run only: send me the table and the pause list, and pause nothing." The user confirms the list in a normal session, where step 7 runs.
• Cron with the CLI. Save a weekly snapshot of ad metrics for the agent to read at review time:

0 8 * * 1 cd "$HOME/linkedin-pause-rules" && npx -y adwarp report perf creative -p last_30_days > "creative-$(date +\%F).txt" 2>&1

Crontab treats % as a newline, hence \%. Never put --apply in a scheduled job. The snapshot has no ad set or status columns, so the agent still runs list_campaigns and list_ads before it builds the table.

After 4 weekly runs, read the logged pauses (list_ad_changes with the pause-rules tag, or the saved run reports). If every run hits the cap, the floor is above where this account's ads land, or the creative needs a broader refresh. If no run ever pauses anything, the floor is doing nothing. Suggest a new floor to the user either way, and change it only when they approve.

More detail on the rules file and scheduling: references/weekly-run.md.

Judgment floors and caveats#

• 1,500 impressions is a thin sample. Treating clicks as random, an ad whose true CTR is 0.60%, half again above the floor, still shows under 0.40% at 1,500 impressions about 12% of the time. At 5,000 impressions that drops to about 2%. Sorting by spend puts the biggest samples first, and the cap limits what a run can get wrong. If the account has the volume, suggest raising the minimum to 3,000.
• CTR measures attention. The floor catches ads nobody clicks. An ad with a fine CTR and no conversions passes it, and that call belongs to a performance review.
• Conversions arrive late and include views. LinkedIn counts a conversion "based on impressions or after clicking", so a low-CTR ad can be credited with conversions from people who never clicked. Recent clicks can still convert inside the attribution window, so the last few days undercount. Say so when a candidate had clicks in the final days of the window.
• Small audiences never reach the minimum. A 1:1 account-based ad set or a small retargeting pool may not show 1,500 impressions per ad in a month. Judge those over the whole flight.
• Check where the impressions ran. If an ad set delivers on the LinkedIn Audience Network, the Audience Network ad performance export splits delivery on LinkedIn from delivery on partner apps and sites, so you can see which side the low CTR comes from before pausing the creative.
• What the data can't tell you: why an ad lost (message, image, audience fit or placement), or whether the replacement will do better. The table says what to pause. What to write next is a separate job.

Output#

The dry run, then the confirmation request. Rows sorted by action (Pause, Keep replace first, Keep protected, Next run, Wait), then by spend.

LinkedIn pause rules: DRY RUN, nothing has changed
Account: <name> | Window: <start> to <end> | Source: <Ad performance export | Adwarp>
Approved rules:
  1. Floor: CTR under <0.40%> once an ad has <1,500> impressions
  2. Cap: <5> pauses per run, highest spend first
  3. Protected: top <5> ads by conversions, then CTR
  4. Protected: the last active ad in an ad set
  5. Protected: cost per conversion at or under <$target> (<user target | account average>)
Ads read: <n> (<n> active, <n> not active, skipped)

| # | Ad | Campaign | Ad set | Impressions | CTR | Spend | Conversions | Cost per conversion | Rule hit | Action |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | <ad name> (<ad ID>) | <campaign> | <ad set> | <n> | <0.00%> | <$> | <n> | <$ or none> | <rule> | Pause |

Not listed: <n> active ads at or above the floor, <n> ads not active.

PAUSE LIST, waiting for your confirmation (<n> ads, <$> spent and <n> conversions in the window):
  1. <ad ID>  <ad name>  (<ad set>)
Reply "pause these <n>" to apply, or name the rows to drop. Nothing is paused until you do.

Actions, ranked by spend at stake:
  1. Pause the <n> ads on the pause list. Together they spent <$> on <n> impressions for <n> conversions.
  2. Write a replacement for <ad> as a new draft ad in <ad set>, launch it, then pause the old ad.
  3. Recheck <ad> next run (over the cap).
  4. <any caveat that changes a decision, such as a small audience judged over the flight>

After the user confirms (Connected mode):

Paused <n> of <n>. Each status change is in the change journal with its reason.
  <ad ID>  ACTIVE -> PAUSED  reason: <rule>, CTR <x%> on <n> impressions
Refused: <ad ID> <LinkedIn's error, for example still in review>
Next run: recheck <IDs>; replace <IDs> first.

In Export mode the second block is the same list headed "Pause these by hand in Campaign Manager".

Safety#

• Reads: ad-level performance and ad statuses.
• Changes: only the status of ads on the confirmed list, only to PAUSED, only through Adwarp (update_ad or adwarp ad pause --apply). It never sets an ad ACTIVE, never archives or deletes, and never edits ad sets, campaigns, budgets, bids or targeting.
• Confirmation: the user sees the exact list (IDs and names) and confirms it in this session. A confirmation covers that list on that run only. Approved rules, a schedule or silence never count as approval.
• Undo: a paused ad can be switched back on (update_ad with status: "ACTIVE" or adwarp ad resume <creativeId> --apply), but only when the user asks, because that starts spend again.
• Export mode changes nothing.

Sources#

• LinkedIn Help, "Export reports in Campaign Manager": https://www.linkedin.com/help/lms/answer/a441785, checked 2026-10-20. Export steps, report types, column views, time breakdown.
• LinkedIn Help, "Reports available to export in Campaign Manager": https://www.linkedin.com/help/lms/answer/a452049, checked 2026-10-20. Ad performance and Conversion ad performance reports, and the level deciding whether rows are ad sets or ads.
• LinkedIn Help, "Performance metrics in Campaign Manager": https://www.linkedin.com/help/lms/answer/a445476, checked 2026-10-20. Clicks are chargeable clicks based on the ad set's objective; CTR is clicks divided by impressions.
• LinkedIn Help, "Conversions and leads metrics in Campaign Manager": https://www.linkedin.com/help/lms/answer/a420212, checked 2026-10-20. Conversions counted based on impressions or after clicking; cost per conversion is spend divided by conversions.
• LinkedIn Help, "Ad status definitions in Campaign Manager": https://www.linkedin.com/help/lms/answer/a415873, checked 2026-10-20. An ad displays only when the campaign, ad set and ad are all active.
• LinkedIn Help, "How LinkedIn's advertising tool works": https://www.linkedin.com/help/linkedin/answer/a420420, checked 2026-10-20. The account, campaign, ad set, ad hierarchy.
• LinkedIn Marketing API docs, "Advertising - Overview": https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/linkedin/marketing/integrations/ads/ads-overview, checked 2026-10-20. The API's ad accounts, campaign groups, campaigns (which carry targeting and budgets) and creatives.
• LinkedIn Help, "Edit Direct Sponsored Content ads for ad sets": https://www.linkedin.com/help/lms/answer/a426200, checked 2026-10-20. An edited paused ad is resent for review.
• Not on LinkedIn's help pages: that edits to the post behind a live ad don't carry into the ad. Treat it as field experience, and test it on 1 ad if it matters to you.
• The 12% and 2% figures in the caveats are arithmetic from a Poisson model of clicks. Neither is a benchmark.