This article explains how to receive an email for each request sent by a form. You will learn to add a notification, write its message, send it for certain answers only and send a copy to the visitor.
Before you start
- Notifications are set in the editor, on the Form block. A form can have several, for example one for the sales team and one for support.
- A notification set on the Staging goes out from your live site after the site is published. A test submission on the Staging sends the notifications.
- Emails go out from your site’s server. For them to reach the inbox, your domain must carry the DKIM and SPF records described in Connect your domain name.
Add a notification
- In the editor, select the Form block, for example in the list view.
- In the Settings tab, open the Email notifications panel.
- Click Add notification. The Notification 1 frame appears.
- Under Recipients, enter an email address.
- Click Add. The address appears as a tag. Repeat these two steps for each recipient.
- Under Message, write your text, or leave the field empty to receive all of the visitor’s answers.
- Save the content.
- Publish the content.
The next submission of the form sends an email to each recipient. To remove a recipient, click the cross on their tag. To delete the notification, click Remove notification.
Set a notification
| Setting | Effect | Default value |
|---|---|---|
| Recipients | The addresses that receive the email. Each one receives its own message and does not see the other addresses. | None |
| Or use an email field | Adds to the recipients the address the visitor enters in an Email field of the form. | No field |
| Sender name | The name shown as the sender in the inbox. | The site name |
| Subject matter | The subject of the email. | The site name and the form name |
| Reply-to field | The Email field of the form that your reply goes to. Choose it to answer the visitor with one click on Reply. | None |
| Message | The text of the email and its tags. Each line becomes a paragraph. | All of the visitor’s answers |
| Send conditions | The answers that trigger or block the sending. When empty, the notification goes out on every submission. | No condition |
The sending address is the one of your site’s server. Only its name can be changed.
Write the message
The message mixes your text and tags that the site replaces with the visitor’s answers. Under Message, one button per tag inserts it at the end of the text.
| Tag | Replaced by |
|---|---|
{{all_fields}} | All the answers, one line per field with its label. Hidden fields are left out. |
| A field’s button, for example Your name | The answer to that field alone. The button inserts the field’s identifier between double curly braces. |
A choice answer appears with the text of the option the visitor saw. Several choices are separated by commas.
The email carries the site name as a title, then your message. It ends with the line You receive this email because a form was submitted on followed by the site name.
An empty Message sends all of the visitor’s answers, like the {{all_fields}} tag. The field says so in gray while it is empty: The email lists all the answers when this field stays empty.
An empty Subject becomes the site name and the form name, for example “Atelier Sauge: new response to the Quote request form”. The form name is the one the Forms menu displays. The Subject field shows this subject in gray. Its help says Leave empty to send the subject shown in the field.
Send a copy to the visitor
A notification sends the same email to all its recipients, with the same Subject, the same Message and the same Reply-to field. Added to your team’s notification, the visitor would therefore receive exactly the message written for the team. If the Reply-to field is their address, they write to themselves when they reply. Create a notification of their own.
- In the Email notifications panel, click Add notification.
- In Or use an email field, choose the field where the visitor enters their address, for example Your email. The field is added to the recipients.
- Write the Subject and the Message, for example “We have received your request. We will reply within 48 hours.” followed by
{{all_fields}}.
The visitor receives their own message and never sees your addresses. An address receives at most twenty copies of the same form in 24 hours. Beyond that, its copy no longer goes out, your notifications keep going out and the Lovely Render team is alerted. This limit prevents a form from being used to flood a third party’s inbox.
Send according to the answers
A notification can go out only for certain answers, for example to an on-call address when the visitor chooses “Urgent”.
- In the notification, under Send conditions, click Add condition.
- In Action, choose Send or Ignore.
- In When field, choose the field that decides.
- In Operator, choose equals, does not equal, is not empty or is empty.
- Enter the Value. For a choice field, the list offers its options.
Conditions are read in their order and the first one met decides. If none is met, the notification goes out only when it has no Send condition.
| Conditions | Result |
|---|---|
Send when the Priority field equals Urgent | Goes out only for urgent requests. |
| Ignore when the Company field is empty | Goes out for all requests, except those with no company. |
| No condition | Goes out on every submission. |
Know when a notification goes out
- On a form sent in one go, the notification goes out on submission.
- On a form saved at each step, it goes out once, when the submission reaches its Conversion step. The following steps send nothing.
- A submission rejected by the spam protection sends no notification.
After sending, the visitor sees the form’s Success message. Create a form explains how to set it.
Find an email that did not arrive
- Look for the email in the recipient’s spam folder.
- In the DNS panel of the dashboard, check that DKIM (TXT) and SPF recommendation (TXT) are green.
- Open the Forms menu and check that the submission arrived. Read requests and where they come from shows where to find it.
- If the submission is there and the email is missing, write to us. The Lovely Render team keeps a record of each sending, its recipient and its outcome, never its content.