# Linkedin Ad Teardown > Pull a competitor's live + recent ads from LinkedIn's public Ad Library and turn them into a strategy read — recurring themes, offers, ad formats, posting cadence, EU-disclosure targeting signals, and the gaps they're leaving open. Sources via our existing scrapers (Browser MCP free-first, then Firecrawl / Apify under the credit gates) — the Ad Library is public transparency data, never a login-gated member scrape. Bound to a competitor set; the first use is ClientCo vs its advice-tech rivals. Feeds /competitor-research with the paid-creative dimension it doesn't cover. Triggers: "LinkedIn ad teardown", "what ads is X running", "competitor ad library", "teardown [competitor] LinkedIn ads". NOT for our own account (use /paid-ads-audit) and NOT a full competitor profile (use /competitor-research). - Skill: `matteotitta/linkedin-ad-teardown` (Agent Skill) - Install (CLI): `npx skillmds@latest add matteotitta/linkedin-ad-teardown` - Raw SKILL.md: https://api.skillmd.com/api/skills/matteotitta/linkedin-ad-teardown/raw - Safety review: pending - Works with: Claude Code, Claude.ai, OpenAI Codex - Category: Marketing & Growth - Author: matteotitta (https://skillmd.com/u/matteotitta) - Updated: 2026-09-17 - Page: https://skillmd.com/skills/matteotitta/linkedin-ad-teardown --- # LinkedIn Ad Teardown — competitor paid-creative strategy read LinkedIn's Ad Library is public (it exists for ad transparency). This skill reads a competitor's ads from it and turns them into a strategy read: what themes and offers they're pushing, in what formats, how often, who they're targeting (from the EU "who's shown this" disclosure), and — the part that matters most — where the gaps are that the client can move into. **Adapted from** `github.com/stan-default/liam`'s `liam-competitors` / `inspect_competitor_ads` (MIT), accessed 2026-07-14, via /steal — see [`.claude/discovery/0726-liam-steal-analysis.md`](../../../../discovery/0726-liam-steal-analysis.md). Concept port; the sourcing runs on our scraper stack, not Liam's Playwright engine. --- ## Doctrine inherited - [`quantitative-evidence-floors.md`](../../../../rules/quantitative-evidence-floors.md) — no strategy read below the floor. State how many ads the read rests on. - [`crawl-cost-discipline.md`](../../../../rules/crawl-cost-discipline.md) — free discovery first (the public Ad Library URLs), metered extraction only on the ads you keep. - [`apify-credits.md`](../../../../rules/apify-credits.md) — if an Apify actor is used for bulk, gate it and estimate the cost first. - [`storage-policy.md`](../../../../rules/storage-policy.md) + [`pii-redaction.md`](../../../../rules/pii-redaction.md) — the Ad Library is public transparency data (no member PII); route the teardown to `{client}/competitors/`, don't over-collect. --- ## Sourcing — public, gated, cheapest-first The library lives at `https://www.linkedin.com/ad-library/` — searchable by advertiser, no login for the basic view. Source in this order: 1. **Browser MCP (free).** Navigate the public Ad Library, search the advertiser, read the results. The cheapest path — try it first. 2. **Firecrawl scrape (metered).** When the page is too JS-heavy to read cleanly via the browser. 3. **Apify LinkedIn Ad-Library actor (metered, gated).** Only for bulk across many competitors, and only after the `apify-credits.md` estimate + go-ahead. Never scrape login-gated member data — the Ad Library only. It's transparency data, but stay polite (`crawl-cost-discipline.md`): respect rate limits, don't hammer. --- ## What to extract per competitor - **Inventory** — how many active + recent ads (this is the count the whole read rests on — cite it). - **Themes** — the recurring messages, value props, and pains they lead with. - **Offers** — demos, trials, gated content, events, discounts; what the CTA asks for. - **Formats** — single image / carousel / video / document / thought-leader ad. - **Cadence** — from launch dates, the posting rhythm (steady drip vs burst). - **Targeting signal** — from the EU disclosure ("who's shown this": roles, seniorities, countries) where present. - **Gaps** — the formats, angles, and segments they're *not* running. This is the opening. --- ## The floor — voice-locked **No strategy read below the floor.** Under ~5 ads, report the inventory only — not a "strategy." A competitor with 2 ads isn't a strategy you can reverse-engineer; it's two ads. State the count every time (`quantitative-evidence-floors.md`), and when the disclosure doesn't show targeting, mark it `[UNAVAILABLE]` — never infer who they're targeting from the creative alone. --- ## Anti-patterns - ❌ Reading a strategy from 2 ads — inventory only below the floor. - ❌ Scraping login-gated member data — Ad Library only. - ❌ An ungated Apify bulk run — estimate + gate per `apify-credits.md`. - ❌ Inferring targeting the EU disclosure didn't show — mark `[UNAVAILABLE]`. - ❌ Design-cloning a competitor's creative — this is gap-finding + inspiration, not a copy job. --- ## Integration with other skills - **Feeds `/competitor-research`** — the paid-creative dimension its 11-dimension profile doesn't cover. - **Feeds `/paid-campaign-strategy` + `/linkedin-ads-copy`** — the gap becomes our angle. - Pairs with [`a1-gallery-protocol.md`](../../../../rules/a1-gallery-protocol.md) when you want design references for the formats you spotted. --- ## Final ship gate Run `/premortem --output` before ship. See [`/premortem` skill](../../../../meta/orchestration/premortem/SKILL.md) for the 5 execution domains + output template. ---