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When you run a business, information is vital. Web forms play a pivotal role in collecting input from visitors and turning them into leads. There are a variety of different forms – contact request forms, request a quote forms, questionnaires, etc. – all of which give your visitors the chance to give you key information.
Of course, you need to build a web form before they can gather that information. The problem is that it’s not always easy to create simple, responsive forms if you don’t have the right tools. An ideal content management system (CMS) will make it notably easier to create and manage successful web forms.
That need for a flexible, well-designed CMS that’s easy to use is why Umbraco forms can benefit your business. Let’s break down why Umbraco is great for web forms and how it benefits your business.
There’s a reason why Umbraco labels itself as “the friendly CMS.” Websites come in all shapes and sizes, so Umbraco is made to be as simple and friendly as possible to accommodate different projects and users.
Umbraco makes building forms as easy as editing content whether you need a basic contact us form or a multi-step questionnaire. The CMS allows you to drag and drop different fields and features so that you can create your forms without any complex coding. That ease-of-use is a major advantage if you don’t have any development or design experience.
Of course, that’s not to say that Umbraco is only for basic form building. Umbraco is an open-source program, so you do have the freedom to build out advanced multi-step questionnaire or other complicated form if you want, whether you have the internal resources or hire an outside expert.
It’s not uncommon for businesses to connect web forms to a variety of third-party services. For example, you may want to connect your forms customer relationship management (CRM) platform like Salesforce, an automation tool like Zapier, or some other application. The problem is that integrating third-party services can be an incredibly complicated process if you don’t have the right web form builder.
Fortunately, Umbraco integrates nicely with a wide variety of third-party apps. Umbraco comes with customizable workflows where you can integrate Umbraco into your CRM, Excel sheets, or other outside sources. That makes your life a lot easier than if your CMS simply won’t integrate with key business tools and platforms.
Once your visitors have filled out forms, it’s important to have quality reporting so that you can review the information. While WordPress and other form builders will simply send you an email every time a form is completed, Umbraco stores those details in a database. That database gives you a built-in, centralized reporting tool where those submissions live instead of getting lost in someone’s inbox.
Another benefit of Umbraco forms is that it’s very easy to pull your submissions so that you can use them elsewhere. All you need to do is go into your database and export your leads as an Excel sheet or some other file type.
Have you ever wanted a field that asks follow-up questions? Umbraco makes it easy to do so.
Conditional statements are one of the many options that you can add when building out your forms. Let’s say that you’re making a questionnaire to help your users figure out which products are best for them. In Umbraco, you can opt to show fields if visitor answers “yes” or uses a specific word. That flexibility makes it easy for you to customize the user experience and get more information.
If you build out a web form, you want people to submit good information. Umbraco forms give you the means to make sure that your users give legitimate answers before users submit them.
Umbraco is outfitted with a variety of validation features to check for fake or invalid answers. Say you want to validate that a user submits an email. Umbraco can check for patterns to make sure somebody types in an actual email in the text field. Other validation features can also check for any typos or other mistakes. These measures can make sure you get useful information.
These days, it’s essential to make sure your website is accessible. Website accessibility is not only a good way to boost your site’s search engine optimization, but also mandatory because of the Americans with Disabilities Act.
To be accessible, web forms need to have a certain semantic structure. The problem is that anyone without professional expertise isn’t necessarily going to know how to build a form in a field set, add a legend, and other key features. Here’s the good news – Umbraco builds those features in for you. As such, you can focus on simply building out your forms instead of worrying about the technical aspects of accessibility.
Whether you’re redesigning your website or trying to building your online presence from scratch, web forms are critical for developing communication between your company and your users. Umbraco gives you the freedom to manage web forms on your own or turn to a web design and development team to create fully custom forms that initiate those key conversations.
Are you ready to improve your online presence? Aztek’s web design and development team takes a mobile and content-first approach to give your users the best experience possible. Contact us today to see how we can help you grow your business online!
