Connect LinkedIn

Connect LinkedIn to m18t by generating your own access token and author URN. Post as a personal profile with w_member_social, or a company Page with review.

What you'll learn

  • Why LinkedIn, like Meta, means bringing your own access token — there is no one-click connect yet.
  • The difference between posting as a personal profile and a company Page, and which you can set up today.
  • How to generate a LinkedIn token, find your author URN, and wire both into m18t's LinkedIn connection.

The concept

m18t publishes to LinkedIn natively through LinkedIn's Posts API using your access token — it's BYOK, the same model as Meta. There is no consumer "Log in with LinkedIn" shortcut for posting. You create a LinkedIn app, request a posting product, authorize to get a token, find your author URN, and hand those to m18t.

Decide first — whose voice are you posting in? This determines the whole path:

  • Personal profile — the workable path. Uses the scope w_member_social via LinkedIn's Share on LinkedIn product. Lighter approval, good enough for real posts today.
  • Company Page — the gated path. Uses w_organization_social via the Community Management API, which requires LinkedIn's partner review — slow and sometimes denied. If you need to post as a company right now and are not approved, post as a personal profile instead and queue the review separately.

LinkedIn changes their developer surfaces regularly, so the provider-side steps below are described by intent.

Step 1 — Create a LinkedIn app and request a posting product

  1. Go to LinkedIn Developers and create an app. It must be associated with a Company Page you administer — even if you will only post as a personal profile.
  2. On the app's Products tab, request the product for your path:
    • Personal profile → Share on LinkedIn (grants w_member_social).
    • Company Page → Community Management API (grants w_organization_social — needs LinkedIn review).
  3. On the Auth tab, run the OAuth flow to generate an access token that carries the posting scope. Copy it — treat it like a password.

Token expiry: LinkedIn access tokens are relatively short-lived — roughly 60 days (with a refresh window up to about a year). You will re-paste a fresh token in m18t when it lapses; tell your team so it is not a surprise.

Step 2 — Find your author URN

m18t posts on behalf of an author URN — LinkedIn's stable ID for the profile or organization.

  • Personal profile: urn:li:person:{id} — get the id from /v2/userinfo (or /v2/me) with your token.
  • Company Page: urn:li:organization:{id} — the numeric id in your Page's admin URL.

Step 3 — Wire it into m18t

  1. Go to Business Settings → Connections (/studio/business/connections).
  2. Click Add Connection.
  3. Pick a brand — connections are per brand.
  4. Pick a provider — under Social, choose LinkedIn.
  5. On the setup step, confirm the Label and leave the Base URL at its LinkedIn REST default. Environment = Production.
  6. On the Authentication step, choose + Add new vault key (suggested name LINKEDIN_ACCESS_TOKEN) and paste your token. It is encrypted in the Vault before storage.
  7. On the Outlets step, give the outlet a name, choose Posting as (Personal or Company), and paste the author URN from Step 2.
  8. Finish with Create connection — the LinkedIn channel is created and wired to the token.

Step 4 — Confirm it works

Compose a content piece, assign the LinkedIn channel, and Publish (or Schedule). A success returns the post's URN; failures land in the sync log with LinkedIn's raw response.

FAQ

Can I post as my company Page today? Only if LinkedIn has approved your app for the Community Management API (w_organization_social). That review is slow and can be denied. Until then, post as a personal profile — it works immediately with w_member_social.

My token stopped working after about two months. LinkedIn tokens expire (~60 days). Generate a fresh token and rotate the value on the Vault tab — the channel keeps working with the new token.

What is the author URN and where do I get it? It is LinkedIn's ID for who posts. Personal: urn:li:person:{id} from /v2/userinfo. Company: urn:li:organization:{id} from your Page admin URL.

Does LinkedIn sync likes and comments back like Facebook? Not today. m18t publishes to LinkedIn but does not yet read engagement metrics back from it — Facebook and Instagram metrics sync, LinkedIn is publish-only for now.

What's next

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