LinkedIn Citadel

LinkedIn Citadel is a comprehensive LinkedIn marketing and advertising platform that provides advanced campaign management, audience targeting, and analytics tools to help businesses maximize their LinkedIn advertising effectiveness and reach professional audiences with precision.

Power end-to-end data operations for your LinkedIn Citadel API with Nexla. Our bi-directional LinkedIn Citadel connector is purpose-built for LinkedIn Citadel, making it simple to ingest data, sync it across systems, and deliver it anywhere — all with no coding required. Nexla turns API-sourced data into ready-to-use, reusable data products and makes it easy to send data to LinkedIn Citadel or any other destination. With comprehensive monitoring, lineage tracking, and access controls, Nexla keeps your LinkedIn Citadel workflows fast, secure, and fully governed.

Features

Type: API

SourceDestination

• Seamless API Integration: Connect to any endpoint as source or destination without coding, with automatic data product creation
• Visual Composition & Chaining: Build complex integrations using visual templates, chain API calls, and compose workflows with data validation and filtering
• API Proxy: Expose curated slices of your data securely with a secure and customizable API proxy that validates and transforms data on the fly
• Request optimization with intelligent batching, retry, and caching to minimize API calls and costs

Prerequisites

Before creating a LinkedIn Citadel credential, you need to create a LinkedIn application in the LinkedIn Developer Portal to obtain OAuth2 credentials (Client ID and Client Secret) and configure the Token Endpoint URL. The OAuth2 credentials are required for 2-legged OAuth2 authentication with the LinkedIn Citadel API.

To obtain your OAuth2 credentials, follow these steps:

1. Sign in to your LinkedIn account and navigate to the LinkedIn Developer Portal.

2. Click Create app to create a new LinkedIn application. Provide a name for your application and accept the LinkedIn API Terms of Use.

3. In your application settings, navigate to the Auth tab to view your OAuth2 credentials:

   • Client ID: This is automatically generated and is required for LinkedIn Citadel API authentication. Copy this value as you will need it for your credential.
   • Client Secret: This is also automatically generated. Click Show to reveal the Client Secret, then copy it immediately as you will need it for your credential.

4. Note the Token Endpoint URL, which is typically https://www.linkedin.com/oauth/v2/accessToken. This URL is used to obtain the access token for the LinkedIn Citadel API.

5. Store the Client ID, Client Secret, and Token Endpoint URL securely, as you will need them to configure your Nexla credential.

The Client ID and Client Secret are used for 2-legged OAuth2 authentication, which uses the client credentials flow to obtain an access token. This authentication method is suitable for server-to-server communication where user interaction is not required. The access token is then sent in the Authorization header with the Bearer prefix for all API requests to the LinkedIn Citadel API. The LinkedIn Citadel API provides access to LinkedIn sales lead creation and management. For detailed information about OAuth2 credential setup, authentication flows, and available API endpoints, refer to the LinkedIn Developer Portal and LinkedIn OAuth2 documentation.

Authenticate

Credentials required

Field	Required	Secret	Description
Client ID	Yes	No	LinkedIn Citadel Client ID
Client Secret	Yes	Yes	LinkedIn Citadel Client Secret
Token Endpoint	Yes	No	LinkedIn Citadel Token Endpoint

Create a credential in Nexla

1. After selecting the data source/destination type, click the Add Credential tile to open the Add New Credential overlay.

New Credential Overlay – LinkedIn Citadel

2. Enter a name for the credential in the Credential Name field and a short, meaningful description in the Credential Description field.

LinkedIn Citadel uses 2-legged OAuth2 authentication with the client credentials flow. This authentication method is designed for server-to-server communication where user interaction is not required. The Client ID and Client Secret are used to obtain an access token, which is then used to authenticate API requests to the LinkedIn Citadel API.

3. Enter your LinkedIn Citadel Client ID in the Client ID field. This is the Client ID you obtained from your LinkedIn application settings (Developer Portal > Your App > Auth tab). The Client ID is a unique identifier for your application and is used along with the Client Secret to obtain an access token for API authentication. The Client ID is not sensitive and can be shared, but it should be kept secure to prevent unauthorized use.

4. Enter your LinkedIn Citadel Client Secret in the Client Secret field. This is the Client Secret you obtained from your LinkedIn application settings. The Client Secret is used along with the Client ID to obtain an access token for API authentication. The Client Secret is sensitive information and must be kept confidential.

5. Enter the Token Endpoint URL in the Token Endpoint field. This is the URL used to obtain the access token for the LinkedIn Citadel API. The default value is https://www.linkedin.com/oauth/v2/accessToken, which is the standard LinkedIn OAuth2 token endpoint. If your LinkedIn application uses a different token endpoint, enter that URL instead.

   Keep your Client Secret secure and do not share it publicly. The Client Secret provides access to your LinkedIn Citadel account data and should be treated as sensitive information. If your Client Secret is compromised, you should immediately regenerate it in your LinkedIn application settings. Your LinkedIn Citadel Client ID and Client Secret can be found in your LinkedIn application settings (Developer Portal > Your App > Auth tab) where you manage your OAuth2 credentials. The Client ID and Client Secret are used to obtain an access token using the 2-legged OAuth2 client credentials flow. Nexla automatically obtains and refreshes the access token as needed. The access token is valid for a limited time and is automatically refreshed when it expires. The Token Endpoint URL is typically https://www.linkedin.com/oauth/v2/accessToken for standard LinkedIn OAuth2 authentication. For detailed information about finding your OAuth2 credentials, setting up authentication, and available API endpoints, see the LinkedIn Developer Portal and LinkedIn OAuth2 documentation.

6. Click the Save button at the bottom of the overlay. The newly added credential will now appear in a tile on the Authenticate screen during data source/destination creation.

Use as a destination

Click the + icon on the Nexset that will be sent to the LinkedIn Citadel destination, and select the Send to Destination option from the menu. Select the LinkedIn Citadel connector from the list of available destination connectors, then select the credential that will be used to connect to the LinkedIn Citadel account, and click Next; or, create a new LinkedIn Citadel credential for use in this flow.

Endpoint templates

Nexla provides pre-built templates that can be used to rapidly configure destinations to send data to common LinkedIn Citadel endpoints. Select the endpoint to which data will be sent from the Endpoint pulldown menu. Then, click on the template in the list below to expand it, and follow the instructions to configure additional endpoint settings.

Create Sales Lead

Create Sales Lead

• This endpoint automatically creates a sales lead from each record of your Nexset in your LinkedIn Citadel account. No additional configuration is required beyond selecting this endpoint template. Check the API documentation link for the required record schema and field names.
• The endpoint uses POST requests to https://api.linkedin.com/v2/salesLeads. The endpoint URL is fixed and does not require any path parameters.
• The endpoint sends data from your Nexset as the request body in JSON format. The request body is automatically formatted according to the schema fields and data mapping you configure. Each record in your Nexset will be sent as a JSON object containing the sales lead data to create. The data mapping is set to automatic mode, which means Nexla will automatically map fields from your Nexset to the LinkedIn Citadel API schema.
• This endpoint does not automatically create a data source to track the responses received from the LinkedIn Citadel API after each call.

The request body must be properly formatted JSON that matches the LinkedIn Citadel API specification for creating sales leads. The endpoint requires OAuth2 authentication with an access token, which is handled automatically by your credential configuration. The Content-Type: application/json header is automatically included in requests. The access token is sent in the Authorization: Bearer {access_token} header for all API requests. The request body must contain the required fields for sales lead creation according to the LinkedIn Citadel API schema. The data mapping is set to automatic mode, which means Nexla will automatically map fields from your Nexset to the API schema. For detailed information about creating sales leads, including required fields, field names, and request formats, check the API documentation link provided in the endpoint configuration or refer to the LinkedIn Sales Navigator API documentation.

Manual configuration

LinkedIn Citadel destinations can also be manually configured to send data to any valid LinkedIn Citadel API endpoint. Select the Advanced tab at the top of the configuration screen, and follow the instructions in Connect to Any API to configure the API method, data format, endpoint URL, request headers, attribute exclusions, record batching, and response webhooks.

LinkedIn Citadel API endpoints typically follow the pattern https://api.linkedin.com/v2/{endpoint_path} and expect JSON request bodies, with the access token sent in the Authorization: Bearer {access_token} header.

Save & activate

Once all endpoint settings have been configured, click the Done button in the upper right corner of the screen to save and create the destination. To send the data to the configured LinkedIn Citadel endpoint, open the destination resource menu, and select Activate.

The Nexset data will not be sent to the LinkedIn Citadel endpoint until the destination is activated. Destinations can be activated immediately or at a later time, providing full control over data movement.