A booking form can revolutionize your business management. By automating the appointment scheduling process, you can increase the number of appointments and enhance your revenue. It also eliminates much of the tedious administrative work that often accompanies managing bookings.
With the right WordPress plugin, you can effortlessly design a booking form tailored to your unique business requirements. We highly recommend WPForms and Formidable Forms as excellent choices.
In this article, we will guide you on how to create an efficient and user-friendly booking form in WordPress.
Why Should You Create a Booking Form in WordPress?
Consider all the times you’ve scheduled an appointment. This could range from visiting a doctor, arranging a callback, reserving a table at your favorite restaurant, or purchasing tickets for a concert or movie.
At times, you might have made the reservation by calling the business. However, more often than not, you’ve likely booked online.
Increasingly, we anticipate being able to book various appointments online without the need to speak to a live person.
Your customers and website visitors expect this convenience as well.
If your business offers appointments, creating an online booking form is a smart move. This form allows visitors to schedule appointments, purchase event tickets, or make reservations conveniently online.
With a booking form, you’ll never miss out on a customer just because you weren’t available to take their call.
Booking forms can also streamline much of the booking process. This includes handling payments and sending automated reminder emails to your customers, enhancing their experience while reducing your administrative workload.
Now, let’s explore how to create a booking form in WordPress. We’ll guide you through two different methods, so feel free to click the links below to jump to your preferred option:
- Method 1: Creating a Booking Form with WPForms (Recommended)
- Method 2: Creating a Booking Form with Formidable Forms
Method 1: Creating a Booking Form with WPForms (Recommended)
WPForms is the top form builder for WordPress, utilized by over 6 million websites. You can easily add a booking form to your site using the plugin’s intuitive drag-and-drop builder.
Explore over 1,800 pre-designed templates to kickstart your project, including options for event planning, feedback collection, and user registration.
Utilize these ready-made forms to gather donations for your nonprofit organization or to schedule Zoom meetings with potential clients.
Additionally, WPForms seamlessly integrates with leading email marketing platforms, allowing you to easily send notifications and appointment reminders to your clients and team members.
In this guide, we’ll be using the WPForms Pro version, which offers an extensive library of templates, powerful add-ons, and support for multiple payment providers.
If you’re seeking a free form builder plugin, you can try WPForms Lite. It allows you to create basic forms and accept Stripe payments, but it lacks the premium templates and integrations found in the Pro version.
For further details, check out our comprehensive WPForms review.
To begin, install and activate the plugin. If you need assistance, refer to our guide on installing a WordPress plugin.
Once WPForms is activated, navigate to WPForms » Settings in your WordPress dashboard to enter your license key, which can be found in your WPForms account.
Next, proceed to WPForms » Create New FormFirst, assign a name to your booking form.
WPForms offers a variety of templates, allowing you to quickly create different types of forms. Since we are focusing on a booking form, it’s best to choose the Event Planning category from the sidebar.
In this section, you’ll find templates for various needs, including ordering wedding flowers, booking school trips, hiring DJs, and much more.
To see a template in action, click the ‘View Demo’ button, which will open the template in a new tab.
Once you find a design you like, click the orange ‘Create Form’ button to open the WPForms drag-and-drop editor.
For this tutorial, we will use the Online Event Registration RSVP form, which includes fields for customers to enter their name and email address.
Additionally, it asks visitors how they discovered your event, helping you identify which marketing channels are most effective in driving conversions.
You can leverage this information to enhance your future marketing strategies and attract more visitors to your booking form. For detailed insights on conversion tracking, refer to our comprehensive guide on conversion tracking in WordPress.
The Online Event Registration RSVP template allows visitors to include multiple attendees in a single booking, making it ideal for group events like tours or shows.
Customers can easily select their preferred date and time for attending your event using the dropdown menus.
All fields in the booking form are fully customizable. To modify a field, simply click on it, and the sidebar will display all the relevant settings for that field.
You can also enhance your booking form template by adding more fields. If the option isn’t already selected, click on the ‘Add Fields’ tab in the left-hand menu.
Next, drag and drop your selected field into the desired position on your booking form. You can also rearrange the order of the fields using the drag-and-drop feature.
After completing your edits to the booking form, be sure to click the Save button.
Now that your booking form is ready, it’s essential to configure notifications.
By default, WPForms will send an email to your WordPress admin each time someone submits the booking form. If needed, you can direct these emails to a different address or even notify multiple recipients.
Creating email notifications with WPForms is straightforward. To modify your notifications, click on ‘Settings’ in the left-hand menu, then select ‘Notifications.’
On this screen, locate the ‘Send To Email Address’ field. By default, it is set to {admin_email}, which dynamically uses the email associated with your WordPress admin account.
You can remove this dynamic text and enter any other email address you prefer. Just type the new address directly into the ‘Send To Email Address’ field.
To send emails to multiple recipients, simply separate each email address with a comma.
Ensure that all emails sent from your website reach the recipient’s inbox and do not end up in the spam folder. The most effective way to achieve this is by using an SMTP service provider. For more information, check out our guide on resolving WordPress email sending issues.
After completing your WordPress booking form, it’s time to publish it. You can either create a new page or add the form to an existing page.
The process remains the same regardless of your choice. Just open the webpage where you want to showcase your booking form and click on the black + icon.
WPForms has its own dedicated block, so start typing ‘WPForms.’
When this block is displayed, add it to your webpage.
In your new WPForms block, click the dropdown menu and select the booking form you just created.
You can now update or publish your page.
That’s it! Visit your website to see your booking form in action.
Method 2: Creating a Booking Form with Formidable Forms
Formidable Forms is the most advanced WordPress form plugin available. Utilize its drag-and-drop interface to create a booking form with enhanced features, including calculations.
Formidable Forms integrates seamlessly with other tools you may already use, such as MemberPress, WooCommerce, or your email service provider.
In this guide, we will use Formidable Forms Pro, which offers a variety of booking form templates, making it easy to design a user-friendly booking form for your WordPress site.
First, install and activate Formidable Forms Lite, the free version of the plugin. This version serves as the foundation for the advanced features found in the Pro version. For detailed instructions, refer to our guide on installing a WordPress plugin.
After that, navigate to Formidable » General SettingsNext, click on the ‘Click to enter a license key manually’ link.
Your license key can be found in the Downloads section of your Formidable Forms account.
You can now paste your license key into the provided box and click the ‘Save License’ button.
Once your license key is activated, select Formidable Forms from the WordPress menu.
Next, click on the ‘Add New’ button.
You can now select the template you wish to use. Since we are creating a booking form, consider focusing on the Event Planning category.
To see all templates in this category, start typing ‘Event Planning’ in the search field. When the Event Planning category appears, click on it.
You can now choose the template you want to use. In our screenshots, we are using the ‘Travel Booking’ template.
After selecting your template, give it a name and write a description. Then, click the ‘Create’ button to launch your template in the Formidable Forms editor.
To edit a field, click on it. The Formidable Forms sidebar will display all the settings available for your selected field.
This sidebar includes various fields that you can incorporate into your form. These fields allow you to gather additional information from your visitors or provide them with options. For instance, you could enable them to request a room with a sea view or inquire about their dietary preferences.
You can easily rearrange the order of each field in your form using a simple drag-and-drop feature.
Once you are satisfied with your design, click on ‘Update’ to save your modifications.
When someone fills out your booking form, you’ll want to be notified! Similar to WPForms, Formidable Forms automatically sends an email notification to your WordPress admin.
If you prefer, you can configure Formidable Forms to send these email notifications to any other email address. You can even send them to multiple recipients.
To personalize these default email notifications, click on the Settings tab. Then, choose ‘Actions & Notifications’ from the menu on the left.
Next, click on the ‘Send Email’ icon. This will add a new section containing all the settings necessary to configure your email notifications, including changing the recipient or adding additional recipients.
The final step is to integrate this booking form into your WordPress website.
To get started, click the ‘Embed’ button located at the top of the screen. This will open a popup where you can choose to add the form to an existing page or create a new one.
Alternatively, you can add this form to a widget. This is a convenient way to showcase your booking form in your theme’s sidebar or header.
To add your form to a widget, select the ‘Insert Manually’ option. Formidable Forms will generate a shortcode for you. Simply copy this code and paste it into any shortcode block.
We hope this guide has helped you learn how to create a booking form in WordPress. You might also be interested in learning how to create an email newsletter or exploring our list of essential WordPress plugins for business websites.
