For many companies, growing a LinkedIn Company Page feels like an important milestone.

A larger follower count creates credibility, strengthens social proof, and can make a business appear more established to potential customers, employees, and partners.

Because of that, many marketers eventually ask the same question:

Should we pay to grow our LinkedIn followers?

The answer is more nuanced than most people expect.

While LinkedIn offers advertising options specifically designed to generate followers, that doesn't necessarily mean they're the most effective use of your marketing budget.

Why Follower Growth Matters

Before discussing tactics, it's important to understand why follower counts matter in the first place.

A healthy follower base can create trust, so when prospects discover your company for the first time, seeing a page with only a few hundred followers may raise questions about the size or legitimacy of the organization. On the other hand, a page with thousands of followers often creates a stronger first impression.

This social proof can be especially valuable for companies investing heavily in LinkedIn Ads, where prospects may click through to a Company Page while evaluating whether to engage with an offer.

However, social proof only has value if the audience behind it is real and relevant. That's where many follower growth strategies fall apart.

The Problem With Paying for Followers

LinkedIn Follower Ads are specifically designed to help companies increase their follower count.

And to be fair, they work.

If your goal is simply to acquire followers through advertising, they're often the most effective paid option available on the platform.

The challenge is cost.

In many North American markets, follower acquisition costs can easily reach double-digit amounts per follower. Depending on your audience and industry, that can become an expensive way to achieve a metric that may not directly impact pipeline or revenue.

For some organizations, that investment may still make sense. But for most advertisers, there are usually higher-priority opportunities to invest budget before focusing on follower growth.

A Free Alternative Most Companies Overlook

One of the easiest ways to grow a LinkedIn Company Page doesn't require advertising at all.

LinkedIn allows users with Super Admin access to invite their personal connections to follow a Company Page. Each eligible user receives a limited number of invitations every month, creating an ongoing opportunity to attract followers without additional ad spend.

The real advantage is quality.

Unlike purchased audiences or broad follower campaigns, these invitations typically come from people who already have some connection to your employees, executives, or brand.

That often leads to stronger acceptance rates and a follower base that's more aligned with your target audience.

For companies looking to reach an early follower milestone, this approach can be significantly more efficient than relying entirely on paid campaigns.

Why Buying Fake Followers Is Never Worth It

Some businesses take an even more aggressive approach by purchasing followers from third-party services.

This is almost always a mistake.

Fake followers provide the appearance of growth without delivering any meaningful business value. They don't engage with content, don't become customers, and don't contribute to brand awareness in any measurable way.

In fact, they can create the opposite effect. 

Low engagement rates often signal that an audience isn't interested in your content. Additionally, LinkedIn routinely removes fake and inactive accounts, meaning those purchased followers can disappear over time anyway.

The short-term boost in numbers rarely justifies the long-term drawbacks.

How Many Followers Do You Actually Need?

One of the most common misconceptions is that LinkedIn success requires tens of thousands of followers.

For most B2B companies, that's simply not true.

The primary benefit of follower growth is social proof, not organic reach.

LinkedIn Company Page posts receive relatively limited distribution, even among followers. Having more followers doesn't automatically guarantee significantly more visibility.

What matters more is reaching a level where your page appears established and credible.

For many organizations, that threshold is somewhere around 1,000 followers. Once a page reaches that point, the incremental value of each additional follower tends to decrease significantly.

At that stage, investing resources into audience growth may produce less impact than investing in content, advertising strategy, creative development, or demand generation initiatives.

The Bottom Line

If your goal is simply to increase follower counts, LinkedIn Follower Ads can certainly help.

The bigger question is whether follower growth is the highest-value use of your budget.

For most companies, building a base of legitimate, relevant followers through employee invitations and organic growth efforts is a far more cost-effective approach.

Focus on attracting the right audience, not the biggest audience.

Because in the end, a smaller community of engaged professionals is far more valuable than a large follower count that doesn't contribute to business results.

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