Tips for Avoiding Spam Form Submissions

We think it’s pretty safe to say that no one likes spam. It’s annoying, it clogs up your inbox, and it can make finding the things you actually need more difficult.

Recently, we’ve received a handful of messages from clients using the Gravity Forms plugin (part of the SNO Site Booster bundle) about spam form submissions. Unfortunately, if forms are published on your site, spammers and bots can find them and fill them out.

As a result, we’ve added an alert that will notify you and your staff if you have any unread form submissions. We hope this will help you not only better track your form notifications, but also take action on any forms receiving spam submissions.

If you do notice a large amount of spam, here are a few solutions you can try.

1. Delete Unused Forms: Even if you no longer monitor them, any forms that are published will still be open for spam submissions. The easiest way to eliminate these spam submissions is to simply delete those unused forms.

2. Activate a Honeypot: This is probably our top recommendation (and not just because it has a cool name). Essentially, a honeypot acts as a sort of “trap” in your form and creates a field that only spammers or bots see and complete. You can activate a honeypot on any form with the click of a button, and it’s up to you what you want the form to do if the honeypot flags a submission – skip the entry entirely, or mark it as spam.

3. Add a reCAPTCHA Field: You’ve probably seen this one before – the “click here if you’re not a robot” box. Before you can add any reCAPTCHA fields to your forms, there are a few extra steps you’ll need to take to set it up. You can learn more about these steps here.

For more detailed directions on how to utilize any of these spam mitigation options, you can check out this support article or reach out to us for support.

Here’s hoping your form submissions are a little less crowded (and spammy) moving forward!