Pulling LinkedIn information into Sales CRM - one way interface into HubSpot

[Miles]

Hi, we have LinkedIn Sales Nav Teams and Sales CRM, considering upgrading to the paid HubSpot version, but we have a few concerns.

Is there a way to:

1. Get HubSpot to pull information from LinkedIn when a lead’s first and last name is added to a new contact?

I.e. when a lead’s first and last name is added in HubSpot manually, the current company of lead, current role of lead, and other details are automatically pulled from LinkedIn. One way interface into HubSpot.

2. Get HubSpot to pull “Activity” notes added on LinkedIn?

I.e. to pull notes that are made on LinkedIn lead profiles (along with the date the note is made), and sync it with the notes section on HubSpot. One way interface into HubSpot.

3. Get HubSpot to pull “Tags” added on LinkedIn, and ideally classify where the lead is in the sales cycle per tag?

I.e. when a tag is added to a leads profile, HubSpot recognises that as a change in sales stage, and updates the stage in the CRM. One way interface into HubSpot.

[MFrankJohnson]

**

**

Q: Can we scrape LinkedIn Sales Navigator data into HubSpot if we use a HubSpot paid account?

Short A: No, no and yes. But not necessary. -

Nov 2018 Update (bottom of thread)

Longer A:

No.
While it’s possible to scrape LinkedIn Sales Navigator data and deposit it into HubSpot, Microsoft has made it a cumbersome, clunky and dated process by design. Not to mention, if Microsoft even thinks you’re applying scraping tools to the LinkedIn platform they will terminate your account with NO REFUND on any annual contract you may have agreed to for Sales Navigator.

While LinkedIn’s attempts to label this work as ‘attacks’ under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act have been unsuccessful in court, the work still violates the LinkedIn User Agreement.
- see LinkedIn Takes Data Scraping Fight to Ninth Circuit

No means ‘no’.
When HubSpot announced the LinkedIn Sales Navigator integration just over a year ago in June 2017, they used very precise language in their product release. Language like, “… nestled right into your HubSpot database.” and “… you’ll see a slew of useful information pulled directly from LinkedIn.”

What this means is that the LinkedIn Sales Navigator data pulled directly from LinkedIn and nestled right in your HubSpot database

DOES NOT RESIDE IN HubSpot

!

- see LinkedIn Sales Navigator, meet HubSpot CRM

It’s only in the HubSpot KB article, Using HubSpot’s integration with LinkedIn Sales Navigator, that you’ll find the following note:
(see image)

- see Using HubSpot’s integration with LinkedIn Sales Navigator

Yes -- the cumbersome; the clunky; the free; and risky.
If you absolutely must scrape LinkedIn data because you don’t want to risk granting a cheap VA from Upwork access to your premium LinkedIn account (for good reason), here are a few free resources. Just don’t say you weren’t warned.
[this is not an exhaustive list]

Zapier - HubSpot + LinkedIn Integrations (LinkedIn limits access)
LinkedHub.io
How to Setup LinkedIn to HubSpot Integration in 5 Minutes

Nov 2018 Update

LinkedIn has added the following additional privacy option with a default setting intended to auto-protect your email address from bulk-downloads. As GDPR adoption heats up more and more global SaaS corporations are implementing additional privacy options to protect their members.

(see image)

Good luck on your project.

[Miles]

Hi Frank,

Great soultion! Thank you for the inight.

We had a look at LinkedInHub previusaly, but didn’t realise it was frowned apon and could result in a LinkedIn account being deleted.

Would you know by any chance if both Dynamics and Salesforce can scrape LinkedIn?

[MFrankJohnson]

You’re welcome @Miles

Here’s the little LinkedIn catch-all phrase used to target anyone deemed as a ‘scraper’ on the platform
- see LinkedIn UA (8.2b Don’ts)

Microsoft owns LinkedIn, so it’s doubtful that Dynamics would facilitate such violations. Not sure about Salesforce, but even if it does LinkedIn’s increasing value to an overall B2B marketing strategy makes the risks quickly outweigh short-term rewards.

Getting banned from LinkedIn can impact not only the personal profile, but company pages owned by that profile, showcase pages (based on those company pages), the ability to run ads, and the ability to recruit for jobs -- arguably one of LinkedIn’s greatest strengths.

Getting banned from LinkedIn is like losing one’s driver’s license -- it isn’t the end of the world, but can sure make getting from point ‘A’ to point ‘B’ much more difficult. haha

More LinkedIn Info

[xDzonox]

Hi Frank,

How about scraping data from some other sites? Is there a way to acquire data from one site and create a deal in Hubspot basing on this data?

Regards

Jonasz

[sarafachetti]

I use other database/contact software that legally pulls in data from LinkedIn profiles by using a screen capture tool via Chrome Extension. It works perfectly and if there were any legal issues with it, I’m sure this 30 year old software company would have heard about it and been stopped by now. So, this article and information is misinformed. There absolutely is functionality to do this, and Hubspot should get on it!

[MFrankJohnson]

WOW -- interesting 1st post @sarafachetti … (head shaking)

It is each business owner’s choice whether or not to follow LinkedIn’s UA, and the overarching Microsoft terms. That’s their right. Practicioners in some fields are particularly fond of playing fast-n-lose with LinkedIn rules.

However, as investment in social media advertising increasingly becomes a more relevant part of corporate marketing plans/budgets, it makes less and less business sense to use anything that significantly jeopardizes that investment. LinkedIn, and many other social platforms have made their position crystal clear -- i.e., use unapproved tools against our platforms and risk being banned for life with no LEGAL recourse. Period.

-ps
By the way, that was the very first (and only) time we used the term ‘legal’ in this entire thread.

Misinformed? We thinks not. (Re-)Read? We thinks so.

[DamianThompson]

Since this is a first post kinda thread, I’ll dive in…

Thanks for your viewpoints Frank, and for not biting back too hard on being told your article was misinformed, you are not.

I am the cofounder of a prospecting tool and in our early days we collected data in myriad ways, but a chrome extension that VIEWED publicly available information was our biggest source (OK our only source) of lead data.

We thought we were cute, we had a solid argument (see view=public data) and the courts were starting to rule against the social networks who were suing companies like ours as it really is publicly accessible data.

Some people read that paragraph above and go “See told ya so, its legal Hubspot should do it, it’s all just an excuse” but just because something is not illegal does not mean it is smart.

What the social networks did was smart, they tightened up their terms of service to make it a USER violation not a vendor issue (alhtough they still were aggressive there).

Sure there are plenty of software companies willing to sell and promote a scraping tool fully knowing this because they dont bear the brunt in most cases, their customers do. They cover their asses in the EULA clearly stating some nonsense about it being a “testing” tool, they declare that it is against the TOS of many social networks, and that they bear no responsibility. Which covers them from the end-user for the most part.

But If the big Social Networks do come after the vendor, then you have to fight a multi-billion dollar corporation in court, which will cost years and tens of millions of dollars. If you’re a startup, it’ll kill you. Even if you are also a big company the man-hours, costs, distraction are probably not worth it in the end ESPECIALLY because it creates animosity and not collaboration.

The business of software these days is all about integration, no one is building a “blackbox” anymore. Why would a company like Hubspot that serves the same market as LinkedIn but dont directly compete NOT want to partner?

So who loses out? The user of the software when they get banned from the networks and possibly lose money as well as opportunity. Sorry got a bit wordy, but I might have a feeling or two about this

[MFrankJohnson]

“…ESPECIALLY because it creates animosity and not collaboration.”, well said. Distraction strategy at its finest. Gotta love smart people.

Welcome to the jungle @DamianThompson ,
Always cool to have input from someone who’s actually ‘been there … done that’! Appreciate the candor. Hopefully, this is the 1st of many posts.

++

One obstacle to a closer partnership between HubSpot and LinkedIn may be driven by differences between their core offerings -- HubSpot being primarily a martech + sales CRM (i.e., a suite of tools to obtain and manage contacts ‘owned’ by US), and LinkedIn being primarily a community-based ad network (i.e., a channel with a membership ‘owned’ by THEM). If ever there was a clear case of ‘US versus THEM’, this is it. Godzilla vs King Kong! haha

And while there’s a little crossover due to HubSpot’s foray into ‘community’ via Community.HubSpot.com and LinkedIn’s push into ‘connection management’ via Sales Navigator, neither amounts to much more room for collaboration (beyond what already exists) without signicant risks to both. In other words, HubSpot probably isn’t willing to share advanced marketing intelligence about contact behavior, and we already know LinkedIn isn’t willing to share their ‘owned’ membership for less than the price of blood.
- see image

LinkedIn Sales Navigator Pricing (June 2019)

[ Ok. So $1200 per year / per user isn’t exactly ‘blood’, but hey … this is marketing news -- “if it bleeds, it leads”. ]

The November 2018 default setting by LinkedIn to disallow email address downloads during LinkedIn exports sealed the fate of many scraping outfits. We can only imagine what it must’ve been like to go into work one day and be greeted by all your new LinkedIn data exports being devoid of email addresses. Woah. Talking about a bad day → week → month → year. (head shaking)

And, regarding the “public data” loophole. Yeah, back in the day, we were successful prospecting using publicly visible LinkedIn data as well. Right up until LinkedIn enacted their public data restrictions that force-blocked profiles unless you were logged in to LinkedIn. Which, by the way, they intentionally turned on around the same time they introduced ‘profile view limits’.

Gotta love smart people.

All that being said, we’re not mad at LinkedIn for trying to do what any good community ‘owner’ should do -- retain and grow their membership. It’s just sad that we can’t have all of their beautiful LinkedIn profile data seamlessly baked-in and accessible within HubSpot -- sorta like ‘Insights for Contacts’!

Talking about marketing POWER. What a HubSpot day that would be.

Enjoy

[MFrankJohnson]

The LinkedIn Saga continues …

Update November 2019

“Scraping public data from a website probably isn’t hacking, says court” -- The Verge

And, the 9th Circuit Denies LinkedIn’s Petition for Review -- The National Law Review

Suspect LinkedIn may now change the public profile setting to private (by default). Still gives LinkedIn members the option to set their profiles ‘public’. However, will potentially shield 10’s of millions of profiles from search indexes (by default). Only time will tell.

[GEasthouse]

the courts of law have disagreed with you data scraping will never be illegal or the government would have to Burn the UDC to the ground, and they just spent billions on updating their hardware so no its not going anywhere

[GEasthouse]

what extension is that?

[DianaGomez]

Hi @GEasthouse I believe the information you are looking for, is here: Using HubSpot’s integration with LinkedIn Sales Navigator.

Best,

Diana

[arpan_shah]

You can use tools like Leadconnect.io and use hubspot integration to pull available data from LinkedIn to hubspot.

[jeremiah27]

Hi Miles

First off, thank you for raising this, I sell a b2b product and have found linkedin data to be the most useful as i can identify the position and titles of the individuals that can give me an idea of how relevant the lead is, and then to reach out to them.

I’ve been trying to extract data from LinkedIn myself by writing my own custom scraper but it is literally impossible to bypass LinkedIn’s restrictions and scrape the data at mass. I gave in and started paying for a service called Mantheos , its has a pretty cool API that allows me to query for profiles with different search filters and extract the full profile’s data including their contact information.

On the legality of it, its essentially risk free for me since I’m using the platform and it would be their risk to take. I think its a good middle ground to feeding a healthy source of leads into my funnel.

Hope this helps!