Optimizely Forms

Optimizely Forms is a powerful tool that you can use to create web forms for event registrations, job applications, customer surveys, and so on. The submitted data is stored, and you can export the data in different formats.

Form containers

You create a form by first creating a form container. This container contains information regarding your form, such as if visitors can submit forms without logging in or multiple times from the same IP address if a thank you page is displayed when the visitor submits the form, and so on.

Form elements

You also need to add form elements to the form container. The form elements, which you can configure to suit your needs, define the fields, buttons, text, and so on used on the form (form elements can be both visible to and hidden from the visitor). When you have defined a form element, you can reuse that on multiple forms or use it as a template.

Optimizely Forms comes with predefined form elements, such as text boxes, drop-down lists, radio buttons, checkboxes, and CAPTCHAs. Some of these form elements can have a dependency on other form elements. This lets you create a form where different form elements depend on how the visitor fills in the form. See the Example: Create a customer satisfaction survey for an example of achieving this.

Optimizely Forms also supports file uploads which can be useful for visitors to provide additional information in the form of files (such as a resume in PDF format).

You can add tooltips, labels, and validators (to ensure data is entered correctly) to the form elements, setting form elements as mandatory or optional, and so on. Using form elements, you can create a multi-step form where the steps differ depending on the user's input.

Marketing Automation connectors for Forms

If you are using one of Optimizely's Marketing Automation connectors, you can connect your form fields to your Marketing Automation connector database by using the Optimizely Forms connector. This way, when a user fills in your form (created with Optimizely Forms), user data such as name, email address, and title is automatically stored in your Marketing Automation connector database.

Form workflow

When the form is defined, it can be dragged and dropped into a page on the website and reused.

A possible workflow with forms can be seen like this:

1. A form is created by dragging and dropping predefined form elements into a form container. The elements are labeled, defined with validation, and mapped to a Marketing Automation system through the user interface.
2. The form is dragged onto a page on the site and presented to a visitor.
3. The visitor fills in and submits the form. Data is captured in Optimizely and the mapped Marketing Automation system.
4. Submitted data is exported and analyzed.
5. Content is created based on personalized information received through the form.

Access Optimizely Forms

Optimizely Forms is managed through two gadgets, Forms and Form Elements. You may have to manually add these gadgets to your navigation or assets panel. Click Settings in the panes and then Add Gadgets. Select Forms and Form Elements to add them to your panel.

The Forms gadget shows a folder structure where you store forms. The Form Elements gadget shows available form elements, and you can drag and drop elements from the gadget onto a form container.

Forms documentation videos

• Create an email sign-up form
• Create a multi-step form
• Post-processing with form metadata   
• Create a form with form field dependencies