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19 Comments

All those survey forms suck, don't they?

Hey.

My name is Alex and I hate forms.

I don't feel comfortable filling all those endless inputs, checkboxes, fight with input formats and required fields.

I believe forms must be re-invented.
We live in a fantastic pre-cyber-punk post-informational meta-industrial century.
In a century, where users switch their attention at the speed of light. In a century which is going so fast, it will end in ~10 years, not in 100 as normal centuries do.
So why do we still have to
fill
in
those
damn
inputs?

๐Ÿ˜ญ

I want to ask perhaps the most innovative and forward-thinking community in the Universe two questions:

  1. How do you see the future of survey forms? Any crazy ideas are welcome.
  2. Which industries need the forms of the future most of all?
  1. 2

    What's wrong with typeform or surveymonkey?

    1. 1

      I think they both offer old boring inputs in a new fancy way ๐Ÿ˜…
      I'm looking for something like Video Contact Forms by Typeform or MetaSurvey.com.

      Something fundamentally fresh!

  2. 2

    Healthcare, especially NHS for UK probably needs better ways to fill out forms

    1. 2

      I thought this Video Contact Forms by Typeform was good

      I missed Video Forms by Typeform. Thanks for the link! I'm gonna dig it deeper.
      I already love the concept.

      I think voice based could be good, but it's not usable in a silent library setting or loud bus..

      Speech input sounds promising ๐Ÿ˜Ž But only if a user is able to say whatever he wants. And then a smart algorithm decompose users' speech and fills the form automatically.

      Healthcare, especially NHS for UK probably needs better ways to fill out forms

      Bureaucratic organizations will adopt the new surveys approach last of all ๐Ÿ˜…

      1. 1

        Bureaucratic organizations will adopt the new surveys approach last of all ๐Ÿ˜…

        ๐Ÿ‘Œ๐Ÿฝ๐Ÿ‘Œ๐Ÿฝ๐Ÿ‘Œ๐Ÿฝhaha spot on

  3. 1

    found this post to be very well executed. Caught my attention from start to finish

  4. 1

    If I see one more badly designed Google Form I'm gonna lose it :)

    https://www.indiehackers.com/post/this-survey-is-what-we-used-to-sell-everymon-before-it-was-made-651e60320f

    Bad forms, like bad websites, like bad anything, will never go away.

    People can already do this better, they just choose not to.

    It's like when major brands use NPS scores, everyone knows NPS is broken but its a "metric" so that is what gets used.

    1. 1

      It is great idea you shared. We should start improving our skills in building forms today.

  5. 1

    I hope we see a movement around standardizing information, and a standard protocol of transmitting this info from tool to tool. A big reason why forms suck is because they ask redundant information. How many times have you been emailed a survey, and the first question on the survey asks you โ€œwhat is your email?โ€. This redundant gathering of information kills UX.

    This usually happens because we use 3rd party tools that donโ€™t talk together. Or maybe they do talk together, but you as a business took the easy way out and gather the information twice vs. integrating the tools.

    My big hope is that there is a standard way to get these 3rd party tools to pass this info along.

    However, with GDRP and other privacy acts this problem is probably going to get worse instead of better.

    1. 1

      However, with GDRP and other privacy acts this problem is probably going to get worse instead of better.

      There could be a button "Use my email ale******ra@gm.**m". Not sure if it is GDRP-compatible though.

  6. 1

    Great post Alex. Just wondering what would you use as an alternative to collect that info?

    I totally agree that a lot of the inputs aren't necessary. Often they're collected just for the sake of collecting info and aren't used for any particular purpose.

    My background is qualitative research and I love forms! But only well-written, well-thought-out ones.

    They're rare to find.

    They should have a good flow and almost make you feel like you want to provide the info. (We're talking unicorn rare ๐Ÿฆ„)

    So, how else to collect this data?

    1. 1

      Can you give an example of the Unicorn Rare Perfect Form? I'd love to see it. :D

      1. 2

        ๐Ÿคฃ Nice one! I certainly will when I come across one. ๐Ÿคฉ

        1. 1

          I would love to see a "unicorn rare" form too, please :)

          1. 1

            ๐Ÿ˜‚ Now I REALLY have to find one!
            Got my binoculars ... ๐Ÿ‘€

  7. 1

    Kind of agree with you Alexander, but I think forms are not really a problem.

    They're easily filled in by the user when the promise is strong ("why do I have to fill in that form in the first place").

    For example, I've just filled a quite long quiz on https://www.provenskincare.com/ , #2 on PH yesterday, the promise is good! So the UX is good overall, especially if the result is satisfying.
    What do you think?

    Maybe future of forms is simply our data directly bound to the system/product... with just a consent from ourselves. It's already the case today

    1. 1

      What do you think?

      Filling in my name gave ~20% of the progress, whereas the other answers gave ~3%. I got confused instantly.

  8. 1

    Despite on bad UI experience, I often see forms requires me to share information I don't want to share, and I just close it without finishing

    No any text or personal information fields should be required

    1. 1

      Agreed. Sometimes you do not want to fellowed up, but want to give some feedback.
      If an email or a phone is required, you don't have any options to finish a survey

      ยฏ\(ใƒ„)/ยฏ

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