How To Create A Caldera Forms Add-On

We have created the following resources for you, and we’re pushing out more. If the list below is missing something you need, tell us.

• Getting Started With Creating A Caldera Forms Processor
• The developer guide that addresses Caldera Forms core and add-on development
• More details on Caldera Forms processor classes

Below are some examples of common add-on formats, which you may use as a starter template for your add-on:

• A payment processor
• A mailing list / marketing automation add-on

If you build a Caldera Forms add-on we encourage you to give access to your Git repo to Josh (Shelob9 on Bitbucket and Github) so that we can check out what you’re doing and be helpful if we can. It is required if you want to sell on our site.

Please send development related questions to Josh via email – Josh@CalderaWP.com – or via DM in WordPress.org Slack (Shelob9).

Need Ideas?

Want to make money with Caldera Forms, but not sure what to build? We get integration requests from customers all of the time – we have a list of things you could build and be guaranteed to make sales. We’re especially short on CRM integrations. We could also use add-ons that make Caldera Forms look cooler. Here is a Google Doc that details some additional out-of-the-box ideas.

How Your Relationship With The Caldera Forms Team Will Work

We think of our third-party developers as team members, we want you to rock this, have fun and make solid supplemental income doing it. Third-party developers get added to our Slack and treated like team members. With that in mind, here are some expectations that will help make sure that we’re all working together.

From Everyone:

• For us both to succeed, timely written communication is a must. We will do our best to communicate bugs, issues, feature requests, and other relevant information in a timely, efficient manner. Likewise, we expect that you will return our emails, respond to issues, etc. with the same care and consideration.

From Us:

• We will list your add-on on our site and promote it along with all our other add-ons.
• We will help you write better copy for your sales pages, as well as make suggestions about descriptions and screenshots that will increase conversions.

From You:

• Before your add-on can go live, you must submit all required items (see the checklist below) and we must approve all of them.
• You will understand that part of the promotion of your product is that sometimes we run sales, and this may cut into your regular commission per sale.
• When a new version of WordPress or Caldera Forms is released, your add-on should be tested with it promptly.
• We expect that you will be actively improving and updating your extension as necessary. Responding to bugs and feature requests will help your extension be successful.
• If a user reports a bug or has an issue that is more in-depth than settings questions, we expect you to provide prompt support. This will be handled via the email you have provided to us, so you must check that email regularly.

If we feel that you are not meeting these expectations, we will let you know so that any issues can be corrected. If these remain uncorrected after a reasonable amount of time, we may take action about your add-on to make sure that our users do not have negative experiences.

Where Can I Sell My Add-On?

We have 4 different ways in which we would love to help distribute your add-on.

1. You develop it and give it away on WordPress.org or Github
   • We’ll add it to our 3rd-party integrations page and readme.
2. You develop it and sell it on your site.
   • We’ll add it to our 3rd-party integrations page and readme.
   • Let’s be each other’s affiliates 🙂
3. You make something cool and give it to us. We sell it and continue development.
   • We pay you a flat fee in this scenario, to be negotiated based on the add-on. This is the “I made something cool for a client, maybe you can use it” situation where you don’t want to be responsible for ongoing work.
4. You develop it and we sell it on our site and we provide first-tier support.
   • We sell it and give you a commission.
   • Support goes to us. If there is a bug, we will open a detailed issue in your Git repo and expect a fix.

Show Me The Money