ActiveCampaign

Estimated reading: 6 minutes

Overview

ActiveCampaign blends email marketing, marketing automation, and a sales CRM. AFI’s ActiveCampaign integration is one combined task; Add Contact/Deal/Note; that can subscribe the contact to a list, attach tags, create a deal in a specific pipeline stage, and add a note to the contact, all from a single form submission. Connection is via your ActiveCampaign API URL + API Key.

Supported actions

Add Contact/Deal/Note (Free + Pro); create or update the contact (matched by email), apply tags, subscribe to one or more lists, optionally create a deal in a chosen pipeline stage, and optionally attach a note to the contact.

AFI Pro adds richer field mapping for ActiveCampaign; more sender-plugin field types (phone, date, dropdown, hidden, custom fields) are exposed in the mapping panel, and your ActiveCampaign custom contact fields surface alongside the standard ones.

Quick reference

Need to…	Do this
Subscribe a contact to a list	Map the list ID (or pick from the dropdown) under Lists.
Tag a new contact	Enter tag names in the Tags field, comma-separated. Tags are created in ActiveCampaign if they don’t exist.
Create a deal alongside the contact	Fill the Deal fields (Title, Value, Owner, Pipeline, Stage) under the same integration.
Attach a note to the contact	Fill the Note field with the text or a smart tag like `{{form_data}}`.
Map custom contact fields	Custom fields appear in the mapping dropdown automatically once the API key has the right account permissions.

Heads up: the API URL has to be exactly the one shown in ActiveCampaign > Settings > Developer (it’s the https://<account>.api-us1.com form, not the marketing URL). Tag and list IDs from the dropdown are the live values from your AC account at the time of setup.

How to Setup

Step 1: Connect Your ActiveCampaign Account

Go to WordPress Admin > AFI > Settings > General
Enable the ActiveCampaign checkbox and click Save Changes
A new ActiveCampaign tab will appear at the top
Click the tab and enter your:
- API URL
- API Key

You can find these credentials in your ActiveCampaign dashboard under Settings > Developer

Click

Save Changes

.

activecampaign settings

activecampaign authorization

Step 2: Create New Integration

Go to AFI > Add New
You’ll see the New Integration page

Title

Give your integration a descriptive title so it’s easier to manage.

Trigger

Form Provider: Select the form plugin (e.g., Contact Form 7, WPForms, Elementor, etc.)
Form/Task Name: Choose the form you want to connect

Step 3: Action Settings

Platform

Select either:

ActiveCampaign (Free version)
ActiveCampaign [PRO] (Pro version with extended features)

Task

Choose: Add Contact/Deal/Note

This task first creates or updates the contact, then processes lists, automations, accounts, deals, tags, and notes if configured.

activecampaign integration - afi pro

Map Fields

Now you need to select and map the necessary form fields that you want to send to ActiveCampaign.

Account, List and Automation

The dropdown fields for Accounts, Lists, and Automations will be automatically populated with the available options from your connected platform.

These fields are optional. You may select one or more as needed. For example, if you choose an Account or a List while configuring the integration, any new contact created through the form will be automatically added to the selected Account and/or List upon form submission.

activecampaign map fields

Contact

You will see several input fields for the Contact, such as Email, First Name, Last Name, Phone, and more. For each field, use the dropdown on the right to select the corresponding form field from your site.

In the Pro version of the plugin, Tags and Custom Fields will appear below the standard fields.

Fill in the fields you need, and feel free to leave the others blank.

Deal

Below the Contact fields, you will also find fields related to Deals. The Deal Title field is required; if you want to create a deal along with the contact, you must fill in this field.

Complete any other fields as needed, and leave the rest blank.

Note

You can also add a note by filling the Note input field.

Save Integration

Finally, click the

Save Integration

button and you are done. You can start testing now.

Troubleshooting

After the integration is made, when users fill up the form and submit it, the plugin initiates the process of sending data to the configured platform. It also saves a log that includes what data it tried to send, and what it got in response from that platform. So if you find an integration is not working, your first task is to check the logs. Go to [direction]AFI > Log[/direction] menu and check the recent logs.

log

Common issues & fixes

Most ActiveCampaign issues are auth- or mapping-related. Work through these in order:

Use the right API URL. Copy it from ActiveCampaign > Settings > Developer (the “URL” field). Paste it as-is into AFI; no trailing slash, no /admin/ path.
Regenerate the API Key. If the API key was rotated in ActiveCampaign, paste the new value in AFI > Settings > ActiveCampaign and Save.
Refresh the lists/tags/fields dropdowns. Click the refresh icon next to each dropdown in AFI to re-pull from ActiveCampaign; new lists, tags, or custom fields added after the integration was created need a re-fetch.
Confirm the email field is mapped. AC deduplicates contacts by email; a missing email map causes every submission to be skipped.

Specific symptoms

401 / 403 from ActiveCampaign. API key invalid, or API URL points at the wrong account. Re-copy both from AC > Settings > Developer.
Tags not being applied. Tag names are case-sensitive in some AC accounts. Copy the tag name verbatim from ActiveCampaign.
Deals not appearing in the expected pipeline stage. Pipeline and Stage IDs are picked from the AC pipeline at setup time; if you renamed or restructured pipelines, re-pick them in the integration.
Custom fields missing in dropdown. Click refresh next to the field dropdown; if still missing, confirm the custom field is set to Per-list or Global in AC matching where you’re subscribing the contact.

Notes & caveats

One combined task. The integration writes contact + tags + lists + deal + note from a single form submission; you don’t need separate integrations for each action.
List IDs vs list names. AFI maps by list ID, not by name, so renaming a list in AC won’t break the integration.
API rate limits. ActiveCampaign caps at ~5 requests per second per account. For high-volume forms, enable AFI’s Job Queue (Settings > General) to smooth bursts.

Related