Forms 2.0 - Better forms without code

[Anonymous]

[Please add your comments below to help build a strong case]

Since the FORMS 2.0 idea from Glen Lipka has long been lost, it's time to bring it back and get it on the agenda.  It only been raised as an issue for 3 years and more than 2 versions of this community.  Even one of recent ideas from the community for the Amazing Race Idea was for form improvements: Form Widgets!.

Basically Forms need to be come way easier without manipulation through code.  There are a lot of small improvements that could be made to the form functionality that would be a great benefit to clients without access to a web developer skill set.  

At one time or another, I have had marketers request most of the following list of form improvements:

• support for HTML5 form elements
• allow pre-population on a field by field basis as a form designer attribute
• allow text fields to optionally concatenate the new value with the existing data
• field masking for phone, sin number etc.
• add real-time (onblur) validation, validation test conditions and  contextual error msgs
  • email regex,
  • min and max for numbers etc. 
  • phone with or without extention
  • domain name for spam exclusion - i.e. mickmouse@example.com a@a.com
  • alpha-only for names/text fields
  • Automatic formating for proper case including whitespace trimming
• better positioning of the field label and error msg
• more form layouts in terms of 2-3 columns layouts as well as fields that can span the columns
• more control over the submit button:
  • its style/image
  • dynamic button text both before and after click text to make the form reusable on more that one landing page within the landing page editor
  • enable/disable submit based upon required fields/validation
• provide more advanced type of controls:
  • date pickers,
  • sliders (range),
  • dropdowns (combobox) with icons, option groups etc.
  • better support for checkboxes/radio with multi-select 
• dependant selections or skip logic i.e. country/state and surveys
• geo-ip support for country/state
• automatic detection and support for iframes to get parent parameters, adjust the form's target = _top etc.
• better (dynamic) follow up options - new windows, dynamic redirect based upon other form fields, parameters or cookies
• Allow fields from SFDC objects other than contact and lead

Forms have been one of the least attended to areas of Marketo; it has literally been years since any significant improvements have been made while the competition has not been standing still waiting.

Below is a small list for just from this version of community:

• Multi Select in the Values Drop Down

• Better design of Forms!
• Form Widgets!
• Better Usability for forms
• Prefill country and state fields
• An easier way to set up 2 column forms

• Can certain form fields span columns?

• Check Boxes on Forms
• Conditional Logic for Forms

• Customizing Submit Button

• Links In Form Labels

•  

  Forms - Need A Multiple Select Check Box Option

• Forms - Need A Multiple Select Check Box Option

[Anonymous]

We are planning to release by the next quarter! As the date gets closer I will update in this forum. Thank you 🙂

[Margaret_Addiso]

Fingers crossed this actually gets released by early Fall....it is badly needed.

[Anonymous]

Saw the new release today and no Forms 2.0.  sigh.....

In case you are desperate, I've got the process down to fairly straight-forward now for adding forms directly to our website, not in an iframe.  Happy to share the code and instructions with any one in the community.

Rus

[Anonymous]

Saw the new release today and no Forms 2.0.  sigh.....

In case you are desperate, I've got the process down to fairly straight-forward now for adding forms directly to our website, not in an iframe.  Happy to share the code and instructions with any one in the community.

Rus

[Anonymous]

I would love so much if these updates were made to the next update! The Marketo forms are not flexible enough for the needs of my company so we don't use them at all. We had to go outside and hire a developer to make new forms for us from scratch. Getting the custom forms integrated with Marketo to automatically pre-populate, properly transfer data, etc. was a real pain. It took us about 6 months to get the forms functioning properly. 

I must say that the forms was the most disappointing part of our Marketo experience. We use a lot of forms, for temporary events to sign ups for product samples and demos. Marketo just can't handle our needs. It was a major stumbling block in implementing our instance of Marketo and we are very very disappointed with the functionality provided. 

Please make this update soon! We don't want to have to keep going to a third party developer every time we need a new form. Marketo is supposed to deliver the whole package. 

[Anonymous]

I swear, we are engineering it now.  🙂

There are 2 releases between now and the end of the year. One around Halloween (Scary!) and one before the holidays (Presents, Yay!).  The new form editor will be in one of them, probably the second.

The end (of the old form editor) is near. I promise.

Just because I like you guys, here is a sneak peak.  Don't show it to anyone!  It's a secret.  Just between us.  I'll get in trouble.  The ghost of Steve Jobs will get me.

[Rafael_Santoni1]

Glen,

Do you know if we will have the ability to set what is the default type of fields when we are adding them to forms? I am creating a bunch of forms, each with a bunch of hidden fields to leverage a data augmentation service (over 30 in total per form), and it is a royal pain to change them all from their default type, which is "text" to "hidden. I have to do each one by one.

If not set up a default type for dropping them on the forms, at least it would be nice to select them all, and change the set to a different type on a single punch.

Makes sense? Sounds good? Please, pretty please.

[Edward_Masson]

@Rusty,
Happy to share the code and instructions with any one in the community.

Hi Rus, would very much like to see what you have done. Can you please share?

[Anonymous]

@Rus @Edward Simply from a curiousity perspecitve, I wouldn't mind a peak too.  

Cheers,
Eric

[Anonymous]

@Rafael: We don't have that feature planned.  But what about a keyboard shortcut.  Like you click on the field and then ALT-H (for example) and it makes it hidden.  At least you could do it quick that way.  Would that suffice?