AI LinkedIn Content Creator with Perplexity Research & Auto-Posting

AI-Powered LinkedIn Content Automation Workflow

Overview

This workflow automates the entire LinkedIn content lifecycle — from research and ideation to image generation and scheduled posting. It uses Perplexity AI for topic research, an Anthropic Claude model as the content strategist, and OpenAI's image generation model to create branded visuals. The workflow runs on two separate schedules: one for content creation (daily) and one for publishing (twice weekly). It stores all posts in a Google Sheet for review before they go live, giving you full control over what gets published.

This is ideal for founders, marketers, and content creators who want to maintain a consistent LinkedIn presence without spending hours writing, designing, and scheduling posts manually. The system learns from past content stored in Google Sheets and uses AI to generate fresh, on-brand posts that resonate with your target audience.

Node-by-Node Breakdown

Content Creation Pipeline (Runs Daily at 5 AM)

1. Schedule (n8n-nodes-base.scheduleTrigger) — No auth. Triggers the content creation workflow daily at 5:00 AM. This is the starting point for generating new post ideas.

2. Get Past Ideas (n8n-nodes-base.googleSheets) — OAuth2. Reads all rows from the "LinkedIn Posts" sheet in the Google Sheet "AI Content Database". This provides the AI with context about previously generated posts to avoid repetition.

3. Join Ideas (n8n-nodes-base.code) — No auth. A JavaScript code node that concatenates all past post ideas into a single text string, making it easy for the AI to reference them.

4. LinkedIn Creator Agent (@n8n/n8n-nodes-langchain.agent) — No auth (uses connected models). This is the core AI agent that generates LinkedIn post content. It uses:

   • Anthropic Chat Model (@n8n/n8n-nodes-langchain.lmChatAnthropic) — API Key auth. Uses Claude 3.7 Sonnet as the language model for content generation.
   • Perplexity Research (@n8n/n8n-nodes-langchain.toolWorkflow) — API Key auth. A sub-workflow that uses Perplexity AI to research current topics and trends.
   • Structured Output Parser (@n8n/n8n-nodes-langchain.outputParserStructured) — No auth. Ensures the AI output follows a structured JSON format with fields: about, copy, and image.

5. Image Style (n8n-nodes-base.googleDrive) — OAuth2. Downloads a reference image from Google Drive that serves as the style guide for generating new images.

6. OpenAI Image1 (n8n-nodes-base.httpRequest) — Header Auth (HTTP Header Auth). Sends a POST request to OpenAI's image generation API (gpt-image-1 model) with the reference image and a prompt describing the desired image for the LinkedIn post.

7. Convert to File (n8n-nodes-base.convertToFile) — No auth. Converts the base64 image data from OpenAI's response into a binary file for saving to Google Drive.

8. Save Image (n8n-nodes-base.googleDrive) — OAuth2. Uploads the generated image to a specific folder ("LinkedIn AI Posts") in Google Drive, naming it after the post title.

9. Save Post (n8n-nodes-base.googleSheets) — OAuth2. Appends a new row to the "LinkedIn Posts" sheet with the post text, description, image URL, and status set to "review".

Publishing Pipeline (Runs Every 3 Days at 2 PM)

10. Schedule 2 (n8n-nodes-base.scheduleTrigger) — No auth. Triggers the publishing workflow every 3 days at 2:00 PM.

11. Get Ready Posts (n8n-nodes-base.googleSheets) — OAuth2. Filters the Google Sheet for rows where the status column equals "ready", retrieving posts that have been approved for publishing.

12. Pick One (n8n-nodes-base.limit) — No auth. Limits the output to a single post (first row) from the filtered results.

13. Download Image (n8n-nodes-base.googleDrive) — OAuth2. Downloads the image associated with the selected post from Google Drive using the image URL stored in the sheet.

14. Publish Post (n8n-nodes-base.linkedIn) — OAuth2. Publishes the post to LinkedIn with the text content and attached image, set to public visibility.

15. Update Status (n8n-nodes-base.googleSheets) — OAuth2. Updates the status of the published post from "ready" to "posted" in the Google Sheet, matching by the "about" column.

Setup Instructions

Required Accounts & Services

1. Google Account — For Google Sheets and Google Drive access. You'll need to create a Google Cloud Project and enable the Sheets and Drive APIs, then create OAuth2 credentials.

2. Anthropic Account — Sign up at console.anthropic.com to get an API key for Claude 3.7 Sonnet.

3. Perplexity AI Account — Sign up at perplexity.ai and obtain an API key for research capabilities.

4. OpenAI Account — Sign up at platform.openai.com and get an API key for image generation.

5. LinkedIn Account — You'll need a LinkedIn profile or company page to post to. Connect via n8n's LinkedIn OAuth integration.

Configuration Steps

1. Create a Google Sheet named "AI Content Database" with a sheet called "LinkedIn Posts" containing columns: about, text, image, status.
2. Upload a reference image to Google Drive that represents your brand's visual style.
3. Update the Google Sheet ID and folder IDs in the nodes to match your own.
4. Configure all credential connections in n8n for each service.
5. Adjust the cron schedules to match your desired posting frequency.
6. Customize the AI system prompt in the LinkedIn Creator Agent to match your brand voice.

Use Cases & Variations

Primary Use Cases

• Personal Brand Building: Automate daily LinkedIn content for thought leaders and consultants.
• Agency Content Management: Manage multiple client content calendars from a single workflow.
• Content Repurposing: Adapt the workflow to generate content for Twitter, Instagram, or newsletters.

Possible Variations

• Platform Swap: Replace the LinkedIn node with Twitter, Facebook, or Slack nodes.
• Research Source: Swap Perplexity for a Google Search API or RSS feed reader.
• Image Model: Use DALL-E 3 or Stable Diffusion instead of gpt-image-1.
• Review Workflow: Add a Slack notification node to alert you when posts are ready for review.
• Multi-Platform Publishing: Duplicate the publishing pipeline for different social networks.
• Content Calendar: Add a calendar node to schedule posts for specific dates and times.

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