What Is A Smart Field Form?

Quality Control Through Responsive Data Collection

Someone has come onto your website and has clicked a Call-to-Action, now they are directed to a landing page with a form that asks them information. But what information is important to your sales team to help them talk to this prospect?

What is this prospects persona? You want to ask them valuable questions and get unique information. What if this prospect has already filled out a different form? You want to ask them new questions, right? To do this, use smart fields.

Smart Fields

Smart form fields react to past behavior by reading the user’s cookies. The cookies are persistent throughout the user’s relationship with your brand. They know what information this prospect has already given and will change the questions based on rules you set up with the smart field.

By responding to cookies, smart fields simplify data collection:

They eliminate form fields the user previously filled out.
They help pre-fill information so the user can update it.
They are helpful in personalizing and customizing forms.

Architecting Your Forms for High Conversion Rates

The main purpose of most “bottom of the funnel” forms is to qualify visitors. This is done by sharing information they want – typically, content that answers the questions they were searching about!

To make a form an effective prospecting tool, remember:

Questions should be relevant to both sales and marketing teams.
Questions should be appropriate to the level of trust you’ve built.
Questions should clarify a prospect’s needs so you can help them.
Questions should facilitate the development of customer personas.

Once basic forms convert well, custom forms with persona-focused questions can be used. With analytics, it’s possible to view conversion rates, generate mailing lists, and even create landing pages based on this data – connecting your form to your inbound marketing campaign's strategic picture.

Inbound marketing is a holistic, conversation-focused way to turn visitors into prospects and prospects into buyers. In the real world, of course, most conversations are two-way! Instead of talking “at” prospects, the inbound marketer must speak to them.

That means every site should have a means of getting vital information from users.

What is “vital,” exactly? Lots of sites provide ways for visitors to leave feedback. This might generate goodwill, but it’s unlikely to help you reach conversion goals. Instead, you need to gather information relevant to sales and marketing.

At the bottom of the funnel, a brand’s standing is recognized – it’s time to overcome final objections and launch a buying relationship. Here, the questions asked by your form can be more robust and probing without causing a prospect to abandon you.

At the top of the funnel, be precise and circumspect about the data you hope to collect. At the bottom, be bolder: You may never have a better chance to gather key demographic information!

Cookies, Privacy, and Your Business

Smart forms require you to collect cookies. Many users don't understand cookies and may be nervous about them. Still, they're vital to any data-driven inbound marketing campaign.

To make sure your use of cookies doesn’t drive customers away, have a clear, easy-to-understand privacy policy. Your policy should include: Jul-Creative-Smart-Field-Forms-Cookies

How cookies are used on your site;
What information they may collect;
How the information will be used;
Whether and how users can opt out.

Transparency can turn this thorny issue into a win for you.

Not only will your brand be seen as responsible, but you’ll also be able to adapt more easily to global jurisdictions where explicit warnings about data collection are required. Some search engines even give you a little "extra credit" for a privacy policy.

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