Forms

Forms gather information from website visitors. Create unlimited custom-designed forms with an unlimited number of unique fields.

Add forms to your website using the Text Editor Insert Form tool located in all Content areas under Page Settings, Image Settings, or Tag Settings.

Forms are typically included on contact pages, but forms can be inserted in any Content area anywhere on your website. You can receive and store an unlimited number of submitted responses.

Warning: Data gathered by forms is often critical to your business. Periodically test all functionality to verify form operation.

To create or manage forms:

1. Sign in to your Good Gallery administrator account.
2. Hover your cursor over the Forms menu.
3. Under the Your Forms menu heading or Form Tools menu heading, choose the appropriate option.
4. Modify the appropriate settings.
5. Click the Save Changes button.

User Experience

User experience (UX) refers to how visitors interact with your website. The goal of a perfect user experience is to meet the exact needs of your visitors by merging the best of social and technical engineering, graphic design, interface design, and psychology in the presentation of your online forms.

Based on extensive research and testing, Good Gallery forms are carefully crafted to take advantage of the best practices in user experience.

Labels

Labels are top-aligned to form fields. This method allows visitors to read both labels and input values with a single eye movement.

Studies have shown that this results in the fastest completion times and fewer cases of visitor abandonment. As an additional benefit, this label position is also preferred on mobile devices where horizontal space is at a premium.

Validation

Form validation is the process by which a web-based form checks the information provided by a visitor and ensures it is complete and correct.

Good Gallery forms employ inline validation instead of validating information after the form has been submitted. This means that validation signals and messages are displayed immediately after a visitor types information into a form field, reducing friction.

• Correct information: The border around the field is instantly set to green indicating success
• Incorrect information: The border is immediately set to red and a warning message is provided

Required Field Legend

When required fields are present in a form, a legend is displayed above the form showing that a red asterisk indicates a required field. All required fields are presented with a red asterisk.

This highly visible indicator of required fields aids users in form completion and reduces form friction.

Polite Communication

Any form errors are communicated using positive language. Error messages are not presented using a negative tone. Instead, all messages offer helpful advice on what the user needs to do to fix the error.

Helpful Suggestions

Many form fields offer visitors helpful suggestions. For example, if a visitor enters an email address with a possibly misspelled domain, the form will suggest the recommended corrections.

Better Captchas

Instead of presenting visitors with images of slightly illegible letters and digits that must be manually decoded, Good Gallery forms employ the much easier-to-use reCAPTCHA.

Google reCAPTCHA is a service that uses adaptive intelligence to detect and prevent automated software from submitting information through forms.

Easy to Read

When a visitor submits a form, the content of that submission is sent to you in an easy-to-read HTML email message. Those emails are formatted to display the questions on your form and the visitor-supplied answers. Questions are displayed in a bold font while answers are displayed in a standard font.

The Form Name is displayed as the submission heading. The Form Name can be changed providing easy identification of form data if multiple forms are employed on your website.

Text Only Option

If you prefer text-only emails, forms offer the ability to change submission from the default HTML email version to a text-only version.

Responsive

Forms offer advanced responsive characteristics that make them incredibly well-suited to encourage completion on mobile devices.

Better Forms

Here are a few suggestions to consider when you are adding forms to your website.

Essential Information

When you offer an online form, you should only request the information you need. Asking for non-essential information on a form increases the amount of time required to complete a form while adding friction and frustrating visitors. In some cases, requesting too much information can result in visitor abandonment.

Avoid Required Fields

You should avoid using required fields in forms unless the information requested is essential. For most forms, if you present visitors with a request for reasonable information, most users will provide that information.

However, in cases where users are required to provide information that they do not want to provide, that can lead to feelings of resentment and influence your first contact with that visitor. In extreme cases, some visitors may choose to enter incorrect information or abandon the form.

Explain When Necessary

If you need visitors to provide sensitive or extensive information, consider offering a brief explanation as to why you need that information and how you will use it. You can provide that information in the text area above your form or within the form itself near the form fields in question.

Use Microcopy Correctly

Microcopy refers to short-form textual information that can assist visitors in form completion.

For example, if you prefer that visitors enter their last name first in a field, then the label might read "Full Name (Last, First)." The text in parentheses is an example of microcopy.

Only include microcopy when necessary. Do not include microcopy instructions on common form fields. For example, on a field labeled "Full Name," you would not include "(First Last)" as microcopy since most visitors will already provide their name in that order.