Forms

A contact form, a booking request, a quote enquiry. Build the fields you want, drop it on a page, and every submission is saved and emailed to whoever should see it.

The short version

• Forms live under Forms in a website's sidebar.
• Every submission is saved, whether or not the email arrives, and you can download them all as a spreadsheet.
• Choose who gets notified, per form, and whether the person who filled it in gets a confirmation.
• Spam protection is automatic. There is nothing to switch on.
• A form can add everyone who fills it in to an email list.

Building one

Choose New Form, or open a form's settings, and on its General tab add the fields you need and mark the ones people must fill in. Keep it short: every extra field costs you submissions, and you can always ask the rest by email once somebody has got in touch.

Name and email plus one open box is enough for most businesses. If you are taking bookings, add the date and anything you genuinely cannot quote without.

Putting it on a page

Add the form to a page in the editor. It behaves as one piece rather than as a stack of separate fields, so clicking it opens the form itself rather than selecting an input.

The same form can go on several pages, and every submission lands in the same place whichever page it came from.

What happens when somebody submits

The entry is saved first, then the notification email goes out. That order matters: if the email fails for any reason, you have still got the enquiry.

The visitor sees a thank-you on the page. Write your own in the form's Thank-you message, on its General tab, or leave it blank for a simple "Thanks! Your submission has been received."

You can also email the person who filled it in a confirmation, with a copy of their answers: switch on Send a confirmation on the form's Notifications tab. It needs an email field on the form and a verified sending domain. Use its Additional message to say what happens next and when they will hear back, because the alternative is somebody submitting the same form three times.

If an address someone types looks like a slip, such as gmial.com, or belongs to a domain that does not take email, the form asks them to check it before it is sent. Sending it again as it is keeps what they typed.

Who gets notified

Choose which people on your team get an email for each form, on the form's Notifications tab. Different forms can go to different people, so a careers form does not have to reach whoever is handling sales. A new form notifies whoever made it until you change that.

A form can also fill an email list for you, from its Mailing list tab. The email campaigns guide explains how, and when it is a good idea.

Reading and exporting entries

Every form has its own list of entries, with what was submitted and when. Nothing depends on the notification email having arrived, so this is the reliable place to look.

Entries you have not opened yet are marked, so the list works the way an inbox does. The marks are yours alone: a colleague reading something does not clear it for you, and yours does not clear it for them. Use Mark all as read to start from a clean slate.

Export CSV downloads the entries as a spreadsheet, with a column for each question. While you are searching the list, it downloads just the matches.

Spam protection

Every form is protected automatically, with several checks that run before an entry is accepted. There is no setting for it and nothing to configure.

This is deliberate. Spam protection that is off by default protects the people who already knew to look for it, which is not who needs it.

Some of these checks are invisible to real visitors. Occasionally one shows a short challenge, which is normal and is not a sign anything is wrong.

When form emails are not arriving

Check the entries list first. If submissions are there, the form is working perfectly and the problem is only delivery.

Then open the form's Notifications tab: check that Email us each submission is on and that the right people are chosen, and look in their spam folders. Notifications from an unfamiliar sender land there more often than anywhere else.