In this step-by-step guide, we'll use the Data Fetcher Airtable extension and the Proxycurl API to import data from LinkedIn into Airtable. For a list of LinkedIn profile URLs, we will import job title, profile pic, LinkedIn headline and summary. We'll also set this up to run automatically for any new LinkedIn profile URLs we add.
What is Proxycurl?
Proxycurl is a tool that allows you to perform tasks such as looking up people, companies and their contact information, as well as enriching profiles with various information. Proxycurl uses a credit system for billing. Each lookup for a person will cost two credits.
Create 'People' Table
Create a table in your Airtable base called 'People'. Or if you happen to have an existing table, just follow this tutorial with the equivalent fields in that table.
Add a new field called 'LinkedIn Profile' with filed type 'URL', then add the list of LinkedIn person profile URLs you want to import info for.
Rather than manually populating the LinkedIn profile URLs, you could use Proxycurl's 'Find the closest person to a role at company(s)' endpoint before following this tutorial.
Create a Grid view in the 'People' table called 'Needs Info' and set the following filters:
• 'Name' is empty
• 'LinkedIn Profile' is not empty
Install Data Fetcher
Data Fetcher enables you to import data into Airtable from many different apps and APIs, as well as Proxycurl.
Add Data Fetcher to your base from the Airtable marketplace and create a free Data Fetcher account. Enter a password and click 'Sign up for free' or click 'Continue with Google'. If you already have an account, use the 'Have an account?' button on the bottom left of the screen.
Import LinkedIn Profile Info to Airtable
Click 'Create your first request' on the Data Fetcher home screen. Requests are how Data Fetcher connects with external tools to import or send data.
On the create request screen in Data Fetcher, for Application, select 'Proxycurl' to use the LinkedIn to Airtable integration.
Get a Proxycurl API Key
If you are new to Proxycurl you can sign up here. You will need to copy your API key which you can find here. Paste this key under Authorization.
For Endpoint select 'Full person profile(s) for LinkedIn person profile URL(s)'.
Give your request a name such as 'Import LinkedIn Person Profiles' and click 'Save & Continue.'
For LinkedIn person profile URL, we want to insert a reference to our 'LinkedIn person profile URL' field so click the + button.
On the modal that opens, select 'People' for Table and 'LinkedIn Profile' for Field and click 'Confirm'.
The LinkedIn company profile URL field should now contain a reference to your output table.
Having Fallback to cache set means Data Fetcher can retrieve older information if an error occurs when fetching the profile data. This information comes from LinkDB, Proxycurl's database of LinkedIn data.
There are two options for Use cache; 'If present' fetches data from LinkDB cache regardless of the age of the profile. 'If recent' costs an extra 1 credit and fetches data no older than 29 days. You can leave this as the default 'If present' for this tutorial.
Make sure the Output Table & View is set to 'People' and 'Needs Info', then click 'Save & Run'.
The Response field mapping modal will open, where you can configure how the fields from LinkedIn should map to fields in your output table.
You can either import or filter each field. For an imported field, you can either map it to an existing field or create a new one in your output table. You can also set the field type for each new field.
Click 'Filter all' to remove the preselected fields, then use the search bar to find the fields you wish to import.
Map the 'Profile picture' field to a new field with the type 'Attachment'. (This should be already suggested by default.)
Map 'Full name' to the existing 'Name' field and map 'Headline' and 'Summary' to new fields.
Then click 'Save & Run'.
Data Fetcher will create any new fields in the output table and run the request to Proxycurl to retrieve the LinkedIn profile data. You will now be able to see this in your output table.
Automatically Lookup LinkedIn Profile Data in Airtable
Currently, we'd have to run the Data Fetcher request each time we added new information to Airtable to look up new LinkedIn Profile data.
However, it is possible to automatically import LinkedIn profile data in Airtable using Data Fetcher's Trigger feature.
Triggers let you automatically run a request whenever a change is made to an Airtable record. For example, when a new record is created, updated, deleted or enters a view.
Triggers are a paid Data Fetcher feature, so you'll need to upgrade your account. Scroll to the tabs that say Schedule / Trigger / Webhook URL and click on the 'Upgrade' button underneath.
Select a plan and enter your payment info.
In Data Fetcher, click 'I've done this'.
Next, select the 'Trigger' tab and underneath, click '+ Authorize'.
Accept the prompt 'I understand, let's Authorize'.
Click '+ Add a base'.
By selecting 'All current and future bases in all current and future workspaces', we'll avoid the need to re-authorize access for individual bases in the future.
Click on 'Grant access'.
Back in Data Fetcher, ensure the Trigger tab is selected. For this example, we'll use the trigger type of 'Record created' (meaning the request will be triggered every time a new record is created). Then select your 'People' table and the 'Needs info' view.
Click 'Save'.
Now, every time you add a new LinkedIn profile URL in the 'Needs info' view, Data Fetcher will automatically populate the name, profile picture, headline, and summary fields by importing the data from LinkedIn.
