Bonsai ActiveCampaign

Connects a WordPress site to an ActiveCampaign account so ActiveCampaign forms can be rendered and submitted natively — no ActiveCampaign JavaScript widget, no proc.php iframe.

What it does

1. Settings > ActiveCampaign — enter the API URL and API key from ActiveCampaign (Settings > Developer > API Access). Buttons to test the connection and sync forms now.
2. Sync — a WP-Cron job (default every 15 minutes) pulls every form definition from the ActiveCampaign API into a local table ({prefix}bac_forms). Missing forms are only deactivated after a fully successful fetch, so a partial API response can never wipe live forms.
3. Render — bac_render_form( $id ) outputs the form (fields, labels, button text, thank-you copy all come from ActiveCampaign).
4. Submit — the form posts to admin-ajax.php. The plugin creates/updates the contact via POST /api/3/contact/sync, then adds them to the form's list via POST /api/3/contactLists. On success the form is replaced by the ActiveCampaign thank-you message.

Theme API

All functions are guarded — a theme should call them behind function_exists() so it degrades gracefully when the plugin is inactive.

Hook

do_action( 'bac_form_submitted', $form_id, $contact_id, $submission );

Using it in an ACF module

The plugin doesn't ship a block or shortcode — themes call bac_render_form() directly. The usual pattern is a Flexible Content layout ("ActiveCampaign Form") with a single field for the form ID.

1. ACF field group

Add these sub-fields to the Flexible Content layout (Bonsai module pattern — one folder per layout: module.php, _module.scss):

If you'd rather editors pick from a list than paste an ID, make ac_form_id a Select and populate it with an acf/load_field filter:

/**
 * Populate the ActiveCampaign form picker from synced forms.
 */
add_filter( 'acf/load_field/name=ac_form_id', 'mytheme_load_ac_form_choices' );
function mytheme_load_ac_form_choices( $field ) {
    $field['choices'] = array( '' => __( '— Select a form —', 'mytheme' ) );

    if ( function_exists( 'bac_get_forms' ) ) {
        foreach ( bac_get_forms() as $form ) {
            $field['choices'][ (int) $form['ac_form_id'] ] = sprintf( '%s (#%d)', $form['name'], $form['ac_form_id'] );
        }
    }

    return $field;
}

2. Module template (module.php)

<?php
/**
 * Flexible Content layout: ActiveCampaign Form.
 */

defined( 'ABSPATH' ) || exit;

$ac_form_id      = (int) get_sub_field( 'ac_form_id' );
$heading         = get_sub_field( 'heading' );
$intro           = get_sub_field( 'intro' );
$fallback_list   = (int) get_sub_field( 'fallback_list_id' );

// Nothing to render without an ID, or if the plugin is inactive.
if ( ! $ac_form_id || ! function_exists( 'bac_render_form' ) ) {
    return;
}

// Optional: skip the whole module if the form hasn't synced yet.
if ( ! bac_get_form( $ac_form_id ) ) {
    if ( defined( 'WP_DEBUG' ) && WP_DEBUG ) {
        error_log( 'ActiveCampaign module: form ' . $ac_form_id . ' not synced yet.' );
    }
    return;
}
?>
<section class="active-campaign-module">
    <div class="active-campaign-module__inner">

        <?php if ( $heading ) : ?>
            <h2 class="active-campaign-module__title"><?php echo esc_html( $heading ); ?></h2>
        <?php endif; ?>

        <?php if ( $intro ) : ?>
            <div class="active-campaign-module__intro content-block">
                <?php echo wp_kses_post( $intro ); ?>
            </div>
        <?php endif; ?>

        <?php
        bac_render_form(
            $ac_form_id,
            array(
                'class'   => 'active-campaign-module__box--flex',
                'list_id' => $fallback_list, // ignored if the form already has a list
            )
        );
        ?>

    </div>
</section>

bac_render_form() echoes the markup, enqueues its own script/style, and handles the AJAX submit + thank-you swap. The theme only supplies the wrapper, heading and intro.

3. Guard checklist

• function_exists( 'bac_render_form' ) — degrades gracefully if the plugin is deactivated.
• if ( ! $ac_form_id ) — don't render an empty module when the field is blank.
• bac_get_form( $id ) check — optional, but avoids a silent empty module when a form ID is set but hasn't synced yet (run Sync forms now in settings).
• Field name for the ID must match whatever you pass to bac_render_form() — ac_form_id throughout above.

Markup / styling

Rendered forms use the same BEM classes as the NEC SWS theme's active_campaign_module (.active-campaign-module__input, .active-campaign-module__submit, …) so existing module CSS styles them. The plugin ships only minimal fallback CSS (assets/css/bac-form.css) for the error message and loading state.

Requirements

• WordPress 6.0+, PHP 7.4+
• An ActiveCampaign account with API access
• jQuery (bundled with WordPress) for the front-end submit script

Notes

• The API key is stored in the bac_settings option. The settings page is restricted to manage_options.
• Uninstalling the plugin drops the table and deletes all options.

Roadmap / ideas

Not built yet — a running list of improvements, roughly in priority order. Contributions welcome; delete an item when it ships and add a CHANGELOG entry.

Editor experience

• Ship a form picker instead of a raw ID field. Right now a theme has to wire up its own acf/load_field filter (see Using it in an ACF module). Options, cheapest first:
  • A helper bac_acf_form_choices() returning array( id => 'Name (#id)' ) so a theme's filter is a one-liner.
  • A drop-in filter the plugin registers itself for a conventional field name (e.g. any ACF field named ac_form_id or bac_form_id becomes a select), toggleable from settings.
  • A proper custom ACF field type (activecampaign_form) — nicest UX, most work, needs ACF Pro present.
• Gutenberg block + shortcode ([bac_form id="12"]) so non-Bonsai sites and the block editor can drop a form in without theme code.
• Preview in the admin — render a synced form on its row in Settings > ActiveCampaign so editors can see what they're picking.

Sync / reliability

• Manual "resync single form" action on each row, rather than all-or-nothing.
• Admin notice when a sync fails N times in a row (currently only in the log under WP_DEBUG).
• Webhook endpoint so ActiveCampaign pushes form changes instantly instead of waiting up to 15 minutes for cron.
• Store the raw API payload alongside the parsed form, to make debugging field-mapping issues possible without a re-fetch.

Forms / front-end

Native rendering means AC's own JS widget never loads, so anything it used to do for the form is now ours to reproduce:

• Honour all of the form's configured actions. The submit handler currently does contact/sync + a single contactLists subscribe. AC forms can also define tags, multiple lists, custom-field writes and deal actions in their action_data — parse and apply those.
• Honour the form's redirect action. If the AC form is set to redirect on submit rather than show a thank-you message, follow that instead of the inline swap. Fall back to inline when none is set.
• Honeypot + time-trap spam protection on the AJAX submit. AC's widget has its own spam/reCAPTCHA handling; native submit has none. No external service, no CAPTCHA.
• Cookiebot / consent awareness — optionally hold submission until consent, in line with the Bonsai tracking rules.
• Client-side validation messages styled to match the module, instead of the browser default bubble.
• bac_form_submitted → analytics — documented recipe for pushing a consent-gated GTM dataLayer event on success.

Housekeeping

• languages/ + a .pot file (the text domain is already loaded).
• PHPUnit coverage for BAC_Api (URL normalisation, error extraction) and the list-ID resolver in bac_get_form_list_id() — it has several fallback branches and no tests.
• Settings link straight to the ActiveCampaign API Access page.