Web Lead Providers can send leads to your VanillaSoft projects by posting data directly into them via the web. They can do so using a simple “form” post (http post), an HTTP post with XML as the Request body (also known as an XML post) or an email with XML as the email body. A GET will also work but is not recommended at it has a data size limitation.
When a form post is used, VanillaSoft does not return any success/failure code, but it does for the XML HTTP posts. If your lead provider has the ability to “send again later” in cases where our system would be momentarily non-responsive, then we strongly recommend they use the XML post method.
Your lead provider will need to post the data to the following link: https://new.vanillasoft.net/post.aspx?id=WebLeadID (WebLeadID is a unique number that VanillaSoft generates when you create an Incoming Web Lead Profile in a VanillaSoft project).
If your Web Lead Provider uses an XML post that has the proper information in the header, VanillaSoft will automatically detect that it’s an XML post. Otherwise, they can append “&typ=XML” to the link to make sure VanillaSoft reads it as XML data, e.g. the link would then become: https://new.vanillasoft.net/post.aspx?id=WebLeadID&typ=XML
When using XML posts, a successful insertion of the lead in VanillaSoft will return the following XML to your Lead Provider: <ReturnValue>Success</ReturnValue>
In cases of failure, the following XML will be returned: <ReturnValue>FAILURE</ReturnValue><ReturnReason>reason text</ReturnReason>
When using the XML Email method, your Lead Provider should send it as a plain/text email to the following address: WebLeadID@vanillaleads.com (WebLeadID is a unique number that VanillaSoft generates when you create an Incoming Web Lead Profile in your VanillaSoft project).
We can accept many different XML formats. Here is an example of a valid XML format:
<Lead>
<fname>John</fname>
<lname>Smith</lname>
<workNumber>819-555-4789</workNumber>
<address></address>
<city></city>
<state></state>
<zip></zip>
</Lead>
Note that VanillaSoft can accept any field names from your Lead Provider, e.g. VanillaSoft allows you to define mappings between your provider's field names and the VanillaSoft fields defined in your project. You must first ask the Lead Provider to supply you with the list of field names they will be sending out. This will allow you to define the proper field mappings in your Incoming Web Leads profile. Once your Incoming Web Lead profile is complete, just send the "Post Link" information to your Web Lead Provider (which includes the unique WebLeadID mentioned earlier).
Caution: When XML data is sent by your Lead Provider, the VanillaSoft mappings will be case sensitive, so make sure the names entered in the VanillaSoft mappings exactly match the XML field names that are being sent to VanillaSoft