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How to connect LinkedIn to Circl

LinkedInsetupguideimport

Most of your professional network lives on LinkedIn. The problem is it stays there - locked behind a feed algorithm, disconnected from the rest of your relationships.

Circl pulls it out. Connections, messages, the lot.

How it works

The EU Digital Markets Act (DMA) forces LinkedIn to let you export your data. Circl uses LinkedIn's portability API to import:

  • Connections - names, titles, companies, profile URLs
  • Messages - full conversation history, matched to contacts
  • Merging - if a LinkedIn connection already exists in Circl from Gmail or Calendar, they become one record
LinkedIn API (DMA export) Circl identity resolution Merged contacts LinkedIn + Gmail + Calendar data

Setup

Four steps. Takes about 5 minutes.

1
Get LinkedIn API credentials
2
Connect in Circl
3
Sync your data
4
Review results

1. Get your credentials

Head to the LinkedIn Developer Portal. Create an app (or use one you already have). Copy the Client ID and Client Secret.

2. Connect in Circl

Go to Connections in Circl's sidebar. Find the LinkedIn section. Paste your Client ID and Client Secret.

3. Sync

Hit Sync Now. You'll see a live log - connections importing, messages processing, contacts merging. If something doesn't match cleanly, it gets flagged for your review.

4. Review

After the sync finishes, you get a summary: new contacts created, existing contacts updated, messages processed. Check the numbers make sense.

What happens to your data

  • New LinkedIn connections become new contacts
  • Existing contacts get their LinkedIn profile, title, and company merged in
  • Messages land in each contact's interaction timeline
  • Relationship scores recalculate with LinkedIn data included

Enrichment

After importing, you can enrich contacts with more detail - current job, company size, location. Costs 1 token per profile. Worth doing for key contacts.

Auto-sync

Toggle auto-sync on the LinkedIn connection card. Circl will periodically pull new connections and messages so your data stays current.

Tips

  • First sync can take a few minutes if you have thousands of connections
  • Check Connections > LinkedIn > Unresolved after import for message senders that didn't match
  • Use circles to organize imports by context - conferences, former colleagues, industry groups