LinkedIn automation is the subject of controversy in the social marketing space. Are LinkedIn automation tools allowed? Or will they restrict your account or even see you get banned from the platform?
Short answer: it depends. Many of the tools that automate activities on LinkedIn are strictly prohibited. But LinkedIn also works with approved marketing partners to help recruiters, marketers and advertisers automate some of their tasks on the platform, from finding candidates to managing ad campaigns.
In this post, we’ll explain how to stay on the white hat side of the LinkedIn automation equation. Plus, we share some of the best (legitimate) LinkedIn automation tools to improve your performance on this business-focused social network.
What is LinkedIn Automation?
LinkedIn automation is the process of using specialized tools to automate certain LinkedIn tasks.
Certain types of LinkedIn automation tools are prohibited on LinkedIn and violate the LinkedIn Terms of Service. We won’t talk about these kinds of tools in this post other than to advise you to avoid them.
Instead, we’ll talk about legitimate LinkedIn tools to help you make the most of your time on the platform without breaking the rules, including authorized LinkedIn partner tools like Hootsuite.
The 16 Best LinkedIn Automation Tools for 2023
All of the LinkedIn automated tools in this list are provided by LinkedIn itself or by official LinkedIn marketing partners. This means that they are all legitimate tools approved for use on the platform.
LinkedIn Planning Tools
Among the various LinkedIn marketing tools, LinkedIn planning tools may be the easiest to use. They can offer huge time savers for busy salespeople, recruiters, and social media professionals.
These tools help you automate the tasks associated with posting content on LinkedIn. Advance content planning allows you to create content in allocated blocks of time. This is much more effective than interrupting the workflow during the day.
1. Composer Hootsuite
Hootsuite Composer allows you to schedule content on your connected personal LinkedIn profile or business page for any date and time in the future. When you click the “Schedule”button, Hootsuite recommends a recommended time to post for best results. Or you can choose the posting time yourself. You can edit or delete scheduled posts at any time with Hootsuite Planner, which offers a calendar view of all your scheduled posts across different networks.
If you want to schedule multiple LinkedIn posts at once, you can use Hootsuite’s Bulk Composer to schedule up to 350 posts at once.
Cost: Hootsuite plans start at $99/month with a 30-day free trial.
2. Built-in LinkedIn Scheduler
Source: Linkedin
LinkedIn’s built-in scheduling tool lets you schedule posts up to 90 days in advance. You can use it directly from the LinkedIn interface if you’re on desktop or Android. (It’s not yet available for iOS.) It only works for personal profiles, not company pages, so it’s more useful for individuals than brands.
Cost: free
We have a full blog post that walks you step by step on how to schedule your LinkedIn posts using both of these tools. More of a visual learner? Here’s a video that explains how to use both of these LinkedIn scheduling tools.
LinkedIn Analytics Tools
Any worthwhile task is worth measuring. LinkedIn analytics tools show you how the time and energy you invest in LinkedIn pays off. Learning from your LinkedIn analytics will help you understand what works and what doesn’t, so you can refine your strategy over time.
The best LinkedIn analytics tools also include automatic reporting features. This is useful when you want to share your findings with the rest of your team and other relevant stakeholders.
3. Analytics Hootsuite
Hootsuite Analytics helps you understand how your LinkedIn strategy is performing by tracking metrics such as:
- subscriber growth
- betrothal
- impression
- cliques
You can also see how your LinkedIn efforts compare to your other social channels.
Easy-to-understand charts and graphs can be exported so you can easily include them in your social media report.
To automate LinkedIn reports with Hootsuite Analytics, start with a report template. Then drag the included report tiles to the locations you want, or add new ones of your choice. Finally, set up data export for automatic delivery to your email address on any schedule that suits you.
Cost: Hootsuite plans start at $99/month with a 30-day free trial.
4. LinkedIn Page Analytics
Source: Linkedin
LinkedIn Page Administrators have access to LinkedIn’s built-in Page Analytics tool. It allows you to track visitors, subscribers, leads, competitors and content performance. You can also drill down to see metrics for specific LinkedIn Page posts.
Cost: free
5. LinkedIn profile analytics
Individual LinkedIn members can use profile analytics to see who viewed your Page and how many people found you through LinkedIn searches. You can also track results for individual posts, articles, and videos.
Cost: Free for all LinkedIn members, but LinkedIn premium users have access to much more extensive data about who has accessed their profile.
For details, check out our blog post on how to effectively use all of these LinkedIn analytics tools.
LinkedIn Lead Generation Tools
These LinkedIn search tools will help you connect with the people most likely to be interested in your business. Lead generation is an important part of social selling as you need to develop relationships over time to maximize your sales.
Remember, while most of LinkedIn’s automated messaging tools violate the platform’s terms and conditions, all of the tools listed here are approved for use on LinkedIn.
6. Advertising messages
Combined with a lead generation form, LinkedIn sponsored posts can be an effective way to fill your funnel of leads. The LinkedIn Lead Gen form is automatically pre-populated with your LinkedIn profile information. Users can fill out a form to subscribe to your offer with just a couple of clicks or taps.
Cost: The auction model is paid per impression or click.
7. Sales Navigator
Source: LinkedIn Sales Solutions.
For B2B sales professionals, LinkedIn Sales Navigator is another valuable lead generation tool. It includes enhanced network access, advanced search, lead recommendations, and the ability to save leads and receive relevant alerts.
Cost: Plans start at $79.99 per month.
8. Bombora
Bombora tracks 2.8 million companies across over 6,000 B2B topics and then uses data science to predict buying intent. Bombora integrates with LinkedIn Campaign Manager, allowing brands to target the most relevant leads based on topics of interest to them.
Cost: Corporate rates are available upon request. Subscriptions are valid for 24 months with the option to pay annually.
9. Leedsbridge
Source: Leads Bridge
LeadsBridge allows you to integrate LinkedIn Lead Gen Forms with LinkedIn Matched Audiences and CRM. It’s designed to help you figure out when is the best time to reach out to leads and includes customizable lead capture options.
Cost: Free basic plan with more robust plans starting at $22/month.
LinkedIn Engagement Tools
LinkedIn may be the most business-focused social platform out there, but it’s still a social platform. This means that engaging with your audience – and encouraging them to interact with you – is an important part of your strategy.
10. Houtsuit
Hootsuite has several features that can help automate and improve your LinkedIn experience.
First, the Best Time to Post tool shows you the best time to post your LinkedIn content to maximize engagement with your audience. An interactive recommendation heatmap shows the average engagement rate for your posts on a given day and time.
The recommended posting time is based on your specific audience’s activity over the past 30 days.
Second, Hootsuite Streams makes it easy to view and reply to comments on your LinkedIn content, and track content from other LinkedIn users you’d like to interact with, all on the same screen.
Finally, Hootsuite Inbox lets you manage conversations on your LinkedIn page with automatic message replies to common questions and the ability to assign LinkedIn messages to other team members for follow-up.
Cost: Hootsuite plans start at $99/month with a 30-day free trial.
11.6sens _
Source: 6sense
Instead of boosting engagement on your LinkedIn content, 6sense uses LinkedIn to attract the right accounts to maximize sales. The platform combines intent and engagement data with other information from its customer data platform to predict which LinkedIn accounts are willing to buy at a very early stage.
Cost: Free basic plan, corporate pricing available upon request.
LinkedIn Recruiter Tools
LinkedIn is a goldmine for recruiters, but finding the best candidates among the platform’s 875 million users can be tricky. These tools can help narrow the field so you spend more time chatting with potential newbies rather than searching and scrolling.
12. LinkedIn Recruiter
Source: LinkedIn Talent Solutions
Using unauthorized LinkedIn auto messaging tools to solicit potential new hires is a quick way to get yourself into trouble on the platform. Luckily, LinkedIn Recruiter itself includes both the bulk features of LinkedIn and customizable InMail templates.
It also allows you to narrow down your search for the best candidates using customizable filters and personalized candidate recommendations.
Cost: Recruiter Lite costs $170 per month but does not include bulk messaging. For pricing on the full Professional or Enterprise plan, contact LinkedIn sales.
13. PBX integration
Source: LinkedIn Talent Solutions
The ATS integration links your candidate tracker with LinkedIn Jobs and LinkedIn Recruiter. Among other benefits for recruiters, this allows candidates to apply for your jobs directly from the LinkedIn interface using customizable security questions.
Over 30 ATS integrations available including ADP, Oracle and Saba.
Cost: LinkedIn does not charge for ATS integration, but some ATS providers may charge for certain features.
LinkedIn Advertising Tools
LinkedIn advertising is the fastest way to get your LinkedIn content to a target audience that is larger than your existing network.
These LinkedIn advertising tools will help you manage your campaigns for the best results with the least effort.
14. Social advertising Hootsuite
Hootsuite Social Advertising tracks your paid and organic LinkedIn performance in one dashboard, along with results from all your other social channels. You can use it to schedule and post LinkedIn ads directly from your Hootsuite dashboard while managing your ad budget across all social platforms.
This particular set of LinkedIn marketing tools is designed to streamline content creation, reporting, and analytics for LinkedIn ads and understand how they fit into your overall social marketing strategy.
15. Ambina
Source: Ambine
Ambine is an advertising tool specifically designed for B2B marketers looking to optimize their advertising budgets. It reallocates budget to top-performing ads and includes a beta campaign scheduler that pauses and reactivates campaigns weekly to avoid days of inactivity.
Cost: Plans start at €500 per month.
16. Dreamdata
Source: dreamdata
Dreamdata is a B2B revenue attribution platform that helps you determine the ROI of your LinkedIn advertising campaigns. It provides a visualization of the customer journey by displaying all sessions and contacts.
Cost: Free basic plan, and group plans start at $999 per month.
LinkedIn Automation FAQs
Is LinkedIn automation illegal?
LinkedIn automation is not illegal, but using unauthorized automation tools is against the LinkedIn User Agreement and can lead to serious issues on the platform. Your account may be restricted.
What Does LinkedIn Automation Do?
Legitimate LinkedIn automation tools can help you save time on manual tasks like posting content and analyzing your results. They will also help you use LinkedIn more effectively to generate more leads.
What is the best tool for LinkedIn?
We may be biased, but we believe that the best tool for LinkedIn is Hootsuite. It includes features to help automate LinkedIn scheduling, analytics, engagement, and advertising. As an official LinkedIn marketing partner, Hootsuite is an approved LinkedIn automation tool that is authorized for use on the platform.