Formbot

User Guide

Install

Use the following code as a template for your form. Specify a name attribute for each of your form inputs, as Formbot will use them as labels.

<form action="https://formbotapp.com/YOUR_API_KEY/default" method="POST">
    <input type="text" name="name" placeholder="Name">
    <input type="email" name="email" placeholder="Email">
    <textarea name="message"></textarea>
    <input type="submit" value="Submit">
</form>

Form action

The form's action is set to your Formbot URL. The last bit of the URL, /default, names this form "default", which will be shown in your email notifications and/or Slack messages.

Field names

Each input has a name attribute. When a visitor submits your form, whatever you set the name attribute will be used as a label on your email & Slack notifications.

Prevent Spam

Unfortunately, web form spammers are becoming more ruthless and it's difficult to stop spam completely. However, Formbot supports the Honeypot technique for fighting spam. To use a honeypot in your form, create a text field with a real-sounding name:

<input type="text" name="address" class="honeypot" placeholder="Leave this field blank" />

Then, hide the field using CSS:

.honeypot {
  display: none;
}

And specify the formbot__honeypot query parameter on your form's action:

<form action="https://formbotapp.com/API_TOKEN/example?formbot__honeypot=address">
  ...
</form>

Special Fields

If you include a field named email, Formbot will automatically set the Reply-To header on each email notification to the value of the field. This makes it easy to reply to your visitors from your inbox.

Set a redirect URL (optional)

By default, Formbot uses a built-in success page after the user submits your form. If you'd like to specify a custom page, add a formbot__redirect_uri hidden field:

<input type="hidden" name="formbot__redirect_uri" value="http://mysite.com/form/success" />

Troubleshooting

My form shows an error after submitting

If an error appears after submitting your form, check for the following:

1. Are you using the correct form action attribute?
   I recently added SSL support to Formbot and changed its domain name. You may need to update your form's URL. Make sure your form's URL begins with https://formbotapp.com and not http://formbot.guilded.co.

2. Have you specified a name for your form in the action URL?
   Your form's action URL should include a suffix to represent your form's name. This name appears in Slack when a visitor posts the form.

   For instance, you might want to create a form named "contact". To do this, you'd post to https://formbotapp.com/YOUR_API_KEY/contact.

I'm still getting spam

If you're still getting spam to your Formbot form, I'm really sorry! Please reach out on the form below and I'll do my best to improve Formbot's spam prevention.

Need help?

Send me a message and I'll get back to you within 24 hours.