Actions

Adding an action

Actions are what a Mosaic form does when a visitor submits it: send an email, redirect the visitor, or run a search. To use them, select the Form wrapper and, under On submit in its settings, choose Actions (the default). The other option, Submit to a URL, hands the form off to an external address instead and is covered on the Form page.

With On submit set to Actions, you build a list of actions that run when a submission succeeds. Add an action and pick its type: Email, Redirect, or Search. Each opens in its own window with two tabs:

• General: the action’s own settings, such as the recipient of an email or the address to redirect to.
• Condition: optional rules that decide whether the action runs at all. See Running an action only when a condition matches below.

Set up the action and select Apply form action to save it. A form can have several actions, and they run in the order they appear in your list. A single form could, for example, email you a copy of the submission and then send the visitor to a thank-you page.

Email action

The Email action sends a notification email each time the form is submitted. It is addressed to your site’s admin address by default, with a default subject, so the main thing you set up is the message you want to send. Its main settings are:

• To email: who receives the email. Defaults to your site’s admin address. You can send to several recipients by separating them with commas, and each entry can be a plain address or include a name, like Roland <roland@example.com>.
• From name: the name shown next to the From address. It only applies when you also set a From email; if you leave From email empty, WordPress’s own default sender and name are used instead.
• From email: the sender address. Leave it empty to use WordPress’s own default sender, which is usually the most reliable choice for delivery.
• Subject: the email subject line. Defaults to “New form submission on” followed by your site’s name.
• Message: the body of the email. It starts empty, so you write it with your own text and dynamic variables, for example the All fields variable to include everything the visitor submitted. See Filling actions with dynamic variables.

Select More options for the rest:

• Content type: whether the message is sent as HTML (so formatting and links display) or plain text. The default is HTML.
• Reply to email: the address a reply goes to. A common setup is to insert the visitor’s own email field here, so you can reply straight to them.
• CC and BCC: extra recipients, in the same format as To email.
• Attachments: attach the files from one or more File upload fields to the email. Only file fields appear in this list.

Redirect action

The Redirect action sends the visitor to another page after a successful submission. It has a single setting, Redirect URL, which works just like a link field: start typing to search your site’s pages and pick one, paste in any web address, or build the address from dynamic variables.

Because a redirect takes the visitor to a new page, it replaces the form’s Success screen: when a redirect applies, the visitor is sent to the URL and the success screen is not shown. If you pair the Redirect action with conditions, you can route visitors to different destinations based on their answers, for example sending each plan choice to its matching checkout page. When more than one redirect could apply, the first matching one in your action list decides where the visitor goes.

Search action

The Search action turns your form into a search form. It has a single setting, Search phrase, which is the text to search your site for. On submit, the visitor is taken to your site’s normal search results page for that phrase, using the same results page and permalink settings as WordPress’s built-in search.

In practice you set the Search phrase to the value of a search input on your form, using a dynamic variable, so it searches for whatever the visitor typed. Like a redirect, a search takes the visitor to the results page instead of showing the success screen.

Filling actions with dynamic variables

Most action settings accept dynamic variables, so an action can react to what was actually submitted instead of being fixed text. Insert a variable from the variable picker on a setting, and it is filled in for each submission when the action runs. You can use them in the email subject and body, the reply-to address, a redirect URL, a search phrase, and more. Available variables include:

• Submitted field values: the value the visitor entered in any field, referenced by its name.
• All fields at once: a single variable that outputs every submitted field as a readable list, handy for including the whole submission in an email.
• File details: for a File upload field, separate pieces you can drop in individually, such as the file’s download link, name, size, and type.
• The form name: the form’s name, handy for an email subject that says which form was submitted.
• Request details: information about the submission itself, such as the visitor’s IP address, browser, and the page the form was submitted from, useful for spam triage.
• Site and user details: values like your site title and, for logged-in visitors, details about the current user.

For the full list of variables and how the picker works, see Data variables.

Running an action only when a condition matches

Every action has a Condition tab where you can add rules that decide whether that action runs. Leave it empty and the action always runs. Add a rule and the action runs only when the rule is met, so different submissions can trigger different actions.

The most common rules read the visitor’s submitted field values. For example, you might send visitors to a different page depending on which option they chose in a radio field, or only send a certain email when a checkbox is ticked. Rules can also be built from other context, such as:

• The current visitor: whether they are logged in, their user role, and other account details.
• The current post: the page the form appears on, including its categories, tags, or format.
• The request: details like a URL query parameter or a cookie.

Because each action is gated on its own, you can combine them: several Email actions that each notify a different team depending on the answer, or several Redirect actions that each send a different group to the right place.

Saved submissions and retrying failed actions

Not every action is recorded. The Email action saves a copy of the submission so you have a record of it, while the Redirect and Search actions do not save anything on their own, since they simply send the visitor somewhere. This keeps things tidy: a search form built with the Search action does not fill your Form submissions with entries. When a form has an Email action, its submissions are always saved.

If an action does not complete, for example an email that could not be sent, the submission is flagged as not fully completed. You can then open it in Form submissions and retry the action, which runs it again using the same details it had at submit time.