Did you know that your business requires at least 5 online forms to stand a better chance of remaining competitive? We live in a digital era where businesses need customer data to provide the best offering. However, some laws protect consumer data privacy to avoid violating customer privacy.
Web forms are the reasonable compromise available to businesses in collecting the customer data you need. They are convenient tools for collecting data that consumers provide voluntarily.
Therefore, you will have the data you need to inform your business strategy development process. And it will not come at the cost of being unethical by violating the privacy of your customers.
What Are Web Forms
A web or HTML form is an online page allowing user input. It allows users to enter data or personal information that is then sent to a server for processing. These forms occur as an interactive page that imitates a paper document or form, whereby users fill out particular fields.
There are no rules regarding the format, length, appearance, or content type of your web form. Instead, you prepare a web form that meets your business needs and will help you gather all the information you need from your leads.
The following are some major web forms your website should not miss.
1. Contact Form
There is hardly any competitive website that does not have a contact form embedded in the contact page. It is a web form that contains fields that require leads to indicate their name, contact information, and a message field.
Contact forms are a great way for your business to collect customer information and gather new leads. It is an efficient way for you to filter messages and keep the spammers away.
The contact form should be easy to find on your business website. For example, you can associate it with a call to action such as "Contact Us" or "Customer Support." Customers associate such buttons as the link to your contact form.
On the other hand, your contact form should be simple to fill out yet authoritative so that your leads are not hesitant to fill it. Therefore, it should contain only the three main fields (Name, contact information, message).
You can add drop-down fields on the message field to make the form "conversational" to prevent abandonment. The idea is for your leads not to feel like they are required to create a creative message. Instead, they will just be involved in a simple Q&A session.
2. Lead Capture Form
Are you looking for new leads to add to your sales funnel? A lead generation form is an excellent way to go about it.
The lead capture form helps you convert your website visitors into leads. They encourage your website visitors to provide basic information such as name, company, email address, and sometimes the phone number.
Some businesses may prefer to present them as subscription forms. They are the tempting pop-up forms that appear on a website and inform you of this amazing offer you cannot resist.
3. Order Form
If your website includes an e-commerce functionality, it is no brainer that you need an order form. The form prompts sales conversions on your website. Therefore, they are necessary for pushing your leads down the sales funnel.
The order form allows website visitors to place an order for a product or service on your website. It also allows you to gather vital customer information that will be relevant in delivering the product to the customer's doorstep. These details include:
· Name and last name
· Street address
· Delivery address
· City/State
· Contact number
· Email address
4. Online Payment Form
The order and payment form go hand in hand. Once a customer completes ordering from you, they will need to pay for the product or service. The online payment form ensures that your customers can enter their credit card or debit card details to facilitate the purchase.
The most critical aspect of the payment form is security. Your customer wants to be assured that their credit or debit card details will not be stolen after using them on your website. Therefore, only integrate your payment forms with the safest payment processing companies, such as PayPal, Stripe, Square, or Authorize.net.
Also, make sure that your payment form is embedded on your website. Customers hate it when they are redirected to a different place to complete payment. Some customers will even abandon their order for fear of being conned or their credit card details being stolen.
An online payment system also requires trust. Therefore, your payment should include a breakdown of the payment, including any taxes or discounts involved. Moreover, you can also integrate your payment form with tools like slack to get notifications when a customer places and pays for an order.
5. Customer Feedback Form
Feedback is vital for your business. It lets you know what customers think about your product and services. Such feedback is essential in your customer relationship-building journey.
You can also use the feedback forms to evaluate a product's performance. The additional benefit is that you create a form that includes drop-down options to help you collect more comprehensive feedback from your customers.
How Do You Build These 5 Online Forms?
Building online web forms is easier than you may think. Just make sure you are using Cognito Forms to create your forms. The builder contains unlimited templates you need to build your form. It also has available resources, such as user guides and the customer support you may need whenever you feel stuck when creating your web form.