Contact forms are an indispensable feature of any WordPress website, enabling visitors to quickly get in touch and contact you regarding inquiries, questions or any other messages that need addressing.
Installing a fully functional contact form onto your WordPress site is made easier with plugins. We will explore step-by-step how to build and embed such forms with some of the top plugins:
These WordPress contact form plugins offer user-friendly form builders for creating everything from basic contact forms to complex multi-page lead generation forms with conditional logic and email notifications.
Let’s begin by exploring some key features of these plugins to assist with choosing one:
Table of Contents
Choosing a WordPress Contact Form Plugin
All the plugins listed are great options that can help you integrate an inquiry form, lead capture form or other contact forms into WordPress; each offers something special; however they have different capabilities:
Contact Form 7
- Lightweight and simple forms
- Create basic to moderately complex contact forms
- Form builder with drag-and-drop interface
- Compatible with many third-party plugins
- Free version available
Ninja Forms
- Simple drag-and-drop builder
- Quickly build complex multi-page contact forms
- Multiple field types and form layout options
- Payment integration available
- Free and paid versions Available
Gravity Forms
- Powerful form builder for beginners and experts
- Numerous field types and customization options
- Accept payments and subscriptions
- Excellent integration capabilities
- Only paid version available
Contact Form 7 is usually adequate for basic contact forms; Ninja Forms offers more complex multi-step forms as well as lead capture functionality.
Gravity Forms offers great capabilities for accepting payments and integration capabilities, while Caldera Forms excels in terms of flexibility and affordable pricing.
Now let’s go through the installation steps for each contact form plugins.
Install and Activate Contact Form Plugins in WordPress
Installing a WordPress plugin is straightforward and takes only a few clicks – here are the general steps:
- Log into your WordPress dashboard
- Navigate to Plugins >> Add New
- Search for and locate desired plugin 4. Install Now Once the installation process completes, activate its activation
- Finally! Your plugin has now been successfully installed and activated on WordPress site.
Now let’s see how to install some of our featured WordPress contact form plugins:
Installing Contact Form 7
- Navigating to Plugins > Add New
- Search “Contact Form 7”
3 Click Install Now - After the installation completes successfully, activate it.
Contact Form 7 is now installed and active! Congratulations on its installation and activation!
Next, let’s review some of the plugin settings and options before creating our first contact form.
Install Ninja Forms
- Navigating your WordPress dashboard, navigate to Plugins > Add New
- Search “Ninja Forms”
3 Once installed, click Install Now - Once activated, click Activate
- Enter and activate your Ninja Forms license key on the settings page
Ninja Forms is now ready for use to build WordPress contact forms with. Before we jump right in though, let’s familiarize ourselves with its builder first.
Install Gravity Forms
- Navigating to “Plugins > Add New, “
- Search “Gravity Forms,” and
3.Click Install Now
4. After the installation finishes, click Activate
5. On the Settings Page, enter your Gravity Forms license key for activation
Gravity Forms has now been installed and activated; we can start making use of its powerful form builder.
Now that we’ve covered installation, let’s move on to building contact forms with these plugins.
Creating a Contact Form in WordPress
Each WordPress contact form plugin we cover offers an intuitive drag-and-drop form builder to easily design contact forms without needing to rely on coded solutions.
Your contact form allows for simple customization of its fields, layout, notifications and settings – from fields and layout to email notifications and settings – making the form truly your own. Take a look at how our featured plugins help create contact forms:
Creating a Contact Form with Contact Form 7
- Once Contact Form 7 has been installed, go into its plugin menu
- Click Contact > Add New
- Give your new contact form an appropriate title
- Drag-and-drop fields like Name, Email and Message into its form builder to get going, then create it!
- Customize labels, field sizes and other options
- Click Save to save your contact form.
And you’re done! Contact Form 7 makes creating a basic contact form extremely straightforward, while Ninja Forms could offer even greater simplicity for creating complex forms.
Creating a Contact Form with Ninja Forms
- Go to the Ninja Forms menu after installing the plugin
- Click Forms > Add New to start constructing a new inquiry form
- Select a template or start from scratch
- Drag and drop desired fields into your form
- Customize labels, sizes, and other field options
- Arrange the form row and columns
- Click Save Form to save
As you can see, Ninja Forms provides an intuitive form building experience as well. Now let’s explore Gravity Forms.
Creating a Contact Form with Gravity Forms
- In your WordPress dashboard, go to Forms > New Form
- Select a template or start from scratch
- Drag and drop desired form fields like name, email etc
- Customize labels, descriptions, sizes and other options
- Click on Settings > Form Settings to customize additional options
- Click Save and your contact form is now ready!
Gravity Forms combines power and ease-of-use for creating WordPress contact forms. Finally, let’s build a form with Caldera Forms.
Next we’ll cover how to embed these forms on your pages and posts so visitors can access them.
Adding a Contact Form to Your WordPress Site
Once your contact form has been created using one of WordPress plugin form builders, the next step should be embedding it on pages and posts so visitors can access and submit it easily.
Add an online contact form within seconds with any plugin, no matter the complexity. Here is an overview:
Putting a Contact Form 7 Form on Your Site
- After creating your form, go to Contact > Contact Forms
- Hover over your form, and copy the shortcode
- Paste the shortcode on any page or post where you want the form
- You can also embed the form in widgets and templates using the shortcode
Contact Form 7 makes it super easy to embed your forms anywhere on your site using the generated shortcode.
Displaying Ninja Forms on Your Website
- Go to Forms > All Forms after making your contact form
- Hover over your form and copy the embed code
- Paste the embed code into any post, page or text widget
- Use the code to display it in templates like your header/footer
Ninja Forms generate a form embed code you can conveniently place to display your contact forms.
Showing Gravity Forms on Your Site
- After creating your Gravity Form, go to Forms > Forms
- Click on your form name
- Scroll down and copy the shortcode
- Paste the shortcode on any page or post
- You can also use the shortcode in widgets or templates
Gravity Forms primarily relies on shortcodes to embed forms anywhere with ease.
So getting those contact forms on your site is quick and painless!
Now that you have created a working contact form and added it to your WordPress site using some of the most popular form plugins, you can start collecting inquiries and leads.
Conclusion
Contact forms are key components in engaging your site visitors and leads. Luckily, WordPress makes adding one easy with plugins designed specifically to do just this task.
In this guide, we covered step-by-step processes for:
- Choosing the best contact form plugin for your needs
- Installing and activating popular plugins like Contact Form 7, Ninja Forms, Gravity Forms, and Caldera Forms
- Creating contact forms using the user-friendly form builders
- Embedding contact forms on site pages, posts, and widgets using shortcodes and form codes
Although all of the plugins provided for WordPress contact forms are excellent, some may be better-suited than others for particular uses:
- Contact Form 7 works nicely for basic contact forms
- Ninja Forms is ideal for complex multi-step forms
- Gravity Forms is great for collecting payments
Download one or more of these plugins today to create customized WordPress contact forms tailored specifically to your needs in minutes – without needing to engage any coding!
We hope this detailed guide has provided a roadmap on how to set up and integrate contact forms for lead generation or inquiries using WordPress plugins, while answering your questions along the way. Please reach out if there are any further issues.
