Here's a workflow I see automation builders run into constantly: you spot a promising lead on LinkedIn, and suddenly you're doing the manual shuffle — tab over to your CRM, type in their name, copy the title, paste the company, grab the URL. Repeat forever.
The backend side of this problem is solved. n8n handles lead enrichment and CRM updates beautifully. The gap is the browser — there's no clean way to kick off that workflow without leaving the page you're already on. (Worth noting: n8n's own docs point users toward Slack or Telegram as human-in-the-loop solutions. Technically does the job, but still takes you out of context where you work.)
Here's how to close that gap. We're going to attach a sidebar directly to LinkedIn using PixieBrix. It scrapes whoever's profile you're looking at, drops their info into a prefilled n8n form, and fires your enrichment workflow the moment you hit submit. No Chrome Web Store submission, no extension boilerplate.
🚨 Note on n8n hosting: Embedding the form in a sidebar iframe requires a self-hosted n8n instance. If you're on n8n Cloud, you can configure the mod to open the prefilled form in a new tab instead. Same data, slightly different experience.
Start in n8n. Create a new workflow and add a Form trigger as your entry point. Set up fields for the lead data you want to capture:
This form is what PixieBrix will load inside the sidebar — prefilled with whatever it scrapes from the profile.
✅ Checkpoint! 🏁 Once your form is live, grab the form URL from the trigger node settings. You'll need it in Step 3.
With the form trigger in place, chain together your enrichment and CRM actions. Here's the stack I use:
Swap any of these for whatever tools are already in your stack. The form submission is the trigger, what happens next is entirely up to you.
✅ Checkpoint! 🏁 Submit a test entry through the form manually and trace it through the workflow. Make sure data is flowing correctly before moving on.
This is the part where it gets interesting. PixieBrix includes an AI mod builder — describe what you want, and it generates the mod for you.
"A context menu that uses AI to find [PROPERTIES YOU WANT — e.g. first name, last name, company, title] on a LinkedIn profile page, then builds a URL with an n8n form and query params with those profile details, and opens a sidebar with that URL in an iframe brick."
PixieBrix should generate a mod with three bricks:
⚡ Pro tip: The AI might not nail it on the first try — especially if your query params don't match your form field names exactly. Just coach it in the chat. Tell it what's wrong and it'll adjust.
✅ Checkpoint! 🏁 All three bricks should appear in your mod pipeline. If something looks off, keep iterating with the AI before moving on.
Open the Render Document brick and check the iframe source field. The AI should have set the base URL and query params already — but double-check that the param names match your n8n form field names exactly. This is the most common place things break.
For example, if your n8n form field is firstName, your URL should include ?firstName= — not ?first_name or ?name.
✅ Checkpoint! 🏁 Param names in the URL should map 1:1 to your n8n form fields. Mismatches here will show up as empty fields in the sidebar.
✅ Final Checkpoint! 🏁 Prefilled form, successful n8n execution — you're done. One more step to save it.
Hit Save in the Page Editor. Close it out — the mod is live and ready to use.
Right-click any LinkedIn profile and your action will be there. But don't stop at LinkedIn. This same pattern works on Apollo, job boards, conference attendee pages, anywhere you're currently copying data by hand. Just adjust the prompt to describe what you want to scrape and the AI will handle the rest.
⚡ Pro tip: You can share the mod with your team directly from PixieBrix. Everyone gets the same sidebar without having to build or configure anything themselves.
You just wired your browser directly into your n8n workflow. No copy-paste, no tab switching!