Automatic Form Detection

Once the Ruler Tracking Tag has been added to your website, Ruler can automatically detect and track most standard HTML forms.

Automatic form detection provides a quick and simple way to start tracking form submissions without requiring additional configuration for each individual form.

How Automatic Form Detection Works

Ruler's automatic form tracking listens for submit events on HTML <form> elements across your website.

When a form submission event is detected, Ruler records the event as a form completion.

For example, Ruler may record a form submission where:

• The user enters an invalid value.
• The form fails a CAPTCHA check.
• Additional validation prevents the form from being submitted successfully.
• The user submits the form multiple times.

Benefits of Automatic Form Detection

Automatic form detection can be useful when you want to quickly start tracking forms across your website.

It can be particularly useful when:

• Your website uses standard HTML forms.
• You want to track multiple forms without configuring each one individually.
• You are looking for a simple way to get started with form tracking.

Limitations

Automatic detection may not be suitable for every website or form setup.

For example:

Forms You Don't Want to Track

Ruler may detect any standard HTML form that generates a submit event, including forms that you do not want to report on. Ruler is able to add filters to certain forms on site, if the form has a unique ID/Class we can apply to an exclusion. Please flag this with your onboarding manager.

Duplicate Submissions

If a visitor submits the same form multiple times, Ruler may record each submission as a separate form completion.

Failed Submissions

Because the submit event can occur before validation is fully completed, Ruler may record submissions that ultimately fail.

This can result in the number of form completions reported by Ruler being higher than the number of successfully completed forms in your website or CRM.

When Should I Use Manual Form Tracking?

If automatic form detection does not accurately reflect your form submissions, we recommend using one of Ruler's manual form-tracking methods.

Manual tracking gives you greater control over:

• Which forms are tracked on site.
• When a form completion is sent to Ruler.
• Which submissions are considered successful.
• What data is passed to Ruler and its format.

This can provide a more accurate representation of genuine lead submissions, particularly for websites with complex forms, custom validation, or third-party form platforms.

Need Help?

If you're unsure whether automatic form detection is suitable for your website, or you are seeing unexpected form submissions in Ruler, contact a member of the Ruler team for advice on the best tracking method for your setup.