4 Forms Your Small Business Should Consider Automating.

Introduction

To stay ahead in today's market, businesses need to get creative. As customers continue to flock to digital channels, small businesses have had to step up their marketing game across various digital platforms. With customers now expecting contact through email, social media, and all kinds of mobile apps, it can feel daunting to keep up. 

Forms represent one of many simple yet powerful tools that can be greatly enhanced through automation. In this article, we’ll discuss four forms that can be a game-changer for your small business, and explore how automating them can bring significant benefits to your marketing efforts.

Why You Should Consider Automation

From healthcare to manufacturing, automation is fundamentally changing the way we work. In particular, automation has significantly impacted how businesses conduct their marketing strategies. According to HubSpot (2021), marketing is the largest business category that uses automation technologies, with 76% more usage than sales and 131% more usage than finance. In fact, 58% of marketers use automation specifically for task management processes.

As operating costs continue to rise, large companies are responding by prioritizing automation and optimization for digital platforms. In contrast, small businesses have been slower to adopt automation technology, with cost, lack of expertise, and complexity cited as major obstacles. While large corporations have invested heavily in these areas, small businesses have largely overlooked the benefits of automation. Small businesses that neglect automation technology run the risk of lagging behind their larger competitors.

However, a recent survey by Zapier found that 88% of SMBs that have adopted automation technology report that it allows them to compete with larger companies by moving faster, reducing errors, and offering better customer support, and 66% say automation is now essential for running their business.

Thanks to new digital tools, including user-friendly form-building software, automation has become cheaper and easier to implement than ever before. 

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What are the Advantages of Automating Your Forms?

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So, why should you consider automating your forms? Let's break it down.

‍Advantages:

• Increased efficiency and accuracy in data collection
• Improved organization and management of customer information
• Reduction in human error
• Cost savings through automation of manual processes

‍Benefits:

• Better customer experiences through personalized communication
• Increased conversion rates through targeted lead generation
• Enhanced customer engagement through feedback and surveys
• Improved marketing ROI through data-driven decision making

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What Is Form Automation?

Form automation is a prime example of how automation technology can benefit small businesses, and an ideal first step worth considering for those looking to get started with automation. 

Before we dive in, let's clarify what we mean by "forms." We're talking about any document or process that requires data collection, input, and management. Forms can take many forms (pun intended), from contact forms to market research forms. No matter what type of form you may be dealing with, there's a good chance you could benefit from automating it.

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What Forms Should You Consider Automating?

While there are many varieties of forms, the following are some that may serve as a useful starting point. You’ll find the types of forms featured in this article exceedingly easy to compose, deploy, and manage with a form builder tool. Note that these forms can be further classified into particular use cases that cater to different requirements, providing ample room for customization and a wide range of possibilities for your small business marketing applications.

1. Contact Forms

In essence, a contact form is a simple yet effective mechanism by which your customers can reach out to your business. It collects basic information such as name, email address, phone number, and message.

These forms can be used for a variety of marketing purposes, such as lead generation, customer relationship management, and gathering feedback. Additionally, these forms can help you build a database of customer information that can be used for targeted marketing campaigns and personalized communication.

Contact forms can easily be automated using a form builder tool and can be integrated with a CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system. Automating contact forms can help you conduct better marketing strategies, quickly capture customer information, respond to inquiries more efficiently, and improve organization and efficiency.

If you're looking to expand your business reach and connect with potential customers, you might want to consider exploring different types of contact forms that can cater to your specific needs:

• General Contact Forms

Small businesses can leverage general contact forms to collect valuable data and connect with potential customers through a variety of channels. For example, contact forms can be placed on landing pages, social media profiles, blog posts, or even in email signatures. These forms can be used to capture potential leads and start the customer journey.

By using automated contact forms on various marketing materials your businesses can establish meaningful connections with your customers. Data collected by contact forms can help you gain insights into customer behavior, preferences, and interests, which can inform targeted email marketing campaigns, product development, customer service strategy, channel preference analysis, industry trend analysis, and ultimately drive growth and improve customer satisfaction.

Additionally, streamlining contact forms through automation can boost your business's lead-generation efforts. By automating the process, customer information can be swiftly incorporated into your CRM system, enabling you to handle leads more efficiently and respond to queries in a more timely manner.

• Customer Service Forms

Customer service forms can be a key component of your business's overall customer service strategy. They allow your customers to quickly and easily communicate their needs and concerns while also providing valuable information that can be used to improve your products, services, and overall customer experience.

Examples of customer service forms include online contact forms and email support forms. Online contact forms are typically found on a business's website and allow customers to submit their inquiries electronically. Email support forms work similarly but are typically sent directly to the business's support team via email.

Automating these forms can help you gather data on the products or services that your customers are inquiring about, the specific questions or issues they have, and their feedback on satisfaction and overall experience, all of which provide valuable insights for improving your marketing strategies.

Furthermore, automation streamlines the data analysis process, helping you to effectively identify common pain points and customer preferences, which can, in turn, inform future product development and marketing strategies. Automated customer service forms can also help your business identify areas where you are excelling, and areas where you need to improve, further advancing your marketing efforts and improving overall customer retention.

2. Customer Feedback Forms

Customer feedback is crucial to improving your products, services, and overall customer experience, and customer feedback forms are one of the most effective ways available for small businesses to collect this data.

A customer feedback form is used to gather insights from your customers about a wide range of experiences with your business. This information can include anything from their overall satisfaction with your products or services to specific areas where they think you could improve.

Customer feedback forms can be implemented on social media, email marketing campaigns, websites, landing pages, and mobile apps, offering a range of data collection options that can be tailored to your individual needs. Some examples include:

• Ratings and reviews of products or services
• Suggestions for improvements or new features
• General feedback about the customer experience
• Demographic information such as age, gender, or location. 

Customer feedback forms can be easily created and deployed through the use of a form builder tool that offers user-friendly templates, streamlined dashboards for organization, and analytics features to track performance. By automating the process of collecting and analyzing feedback, you can not only acquire a more comprehensive understanding of your customer's requirements and preferences but also save time and resources that can be better spent elsewhere. Equipped with accurate and reliable data, you'll be able to make data-driven decisions that lead to increased customer satisfaction and loyalty.

Consider exploring different types of feedback forms that can be tailored to your specific needs:

• General Customer Feedback Forms

Feedback forms can act as a barometer to quantify the health of your business, providing an efficient means to identify pain points and areas where customers are experiencing difficulties with your products or services.

The utility of these forms goes beyond the purpose of collecting basic feedback. With the right implementation, these forms can also help identify patterns and opportunities for upselling or cross-selling, measure customer loyalty, pinpoint areas where customers may be at risk of churning, collect feedback on marketing campaigns, and help identify areas for improvement.

This information can help your business improve user experience, prioritize retention efforts, and tailor marketing strategies to better meet customer needs and preferences.

• Product/Service Feedback Forms

Well-designed product/service feedback forms can provide a range of useful insights for your business. Examples include information on product/service quality, usability, feature requests, customer satisfaction, and price sensitivity. These insights can help your business identify areas for improvement, prioritize development efforts based on customer needs, measure customer satisfaction, and adjust pricing strategies as necessary.

Additionally, feedback forms of this type can inform product development and innovation in your business. By collecting feedback on desired improvements or new features, you can create products or services that better meet your customers’ needs and preferences. This can help you set yourself apart from the competition in a saturated marketspace, stay ahead of trends, and build a strong reputation for customer-centricity.

• Website/Social Media Feedback Forms

Feedback forms on websites and social media can reveal a range of useful insights about how customers perceive the usability of your website or social media page and help identify areas where your business can make improvements accordingly.

Automated feedback forms can help you track user navigation on your website, the quality and relevance of the content you produce, and the visual appeal and functionality of your website or social media channels. Additionally, feedback forms can effectively measure levels of engagement and interaction on your social media channels, allowing you to make improvements when necessary.

• Net Promoter Score (NPS) Surveys

Feedback forms are a great way to measure NPS, which is a metric that measures customer loyalty and willingness to recommend your products or services to others. Responses from these surveys can also help your business identify patterns and trends that can inform targeted marketing campaigns, product development, and customer service improvements.

3. Lead Generation Forms

According to HubSpot, lead generation is considered the most significant hurdle by 61% of marketers. Lead generation forms help overcome many of these challenges conveniently and effectively by helping small businesses tailor their marketing efforts to target specific groups, nurture leads through their sales funnel, and ultimately convert prospects into paying customers. 

Typically, a lead generation form asks for a prospect's name, email address, phone number, and other relevant details such as company name, job title, and industry. However, depending on your use case, these forms can be tailored to collect information pertinent to your specific marketing needs.

Lead generation forms can be hosted on a landing page, pop-up, embedded on a website, or integrated into email marketing campaigns, facilitating a convenient way for your business to collect leads and initiate conversations with potential customers through a variety of channels.

Automating lead generation forms can be accomplished via the use of a form builder platform that can streamline the process of creating, publishing, and managing these forms. By setting up effective rules and criteria, automated lead generation ensures accurate data collection and analysis, improved lead quality, and better ROI. Additionally, automated lead generation forms provide a hassle-free experience for potential customers, enabling personalized communication and follow-up emails.

By monitoring key metrics such as form conversion rates, your business can evaluate and refine marketing strategies on the fly. Additionally, automated feedback forms can be easily integrated with CRM (Customer Relationship Management) systems, providing real-time alerts to sales teams when new leads are generated, and enabling quick follow-ups. 

If you're looking to generate more leads and grow your customer base, it's worth exploring the various types of lead generation forms that can be customized to suit your unique requirements:

• Personalized Product Recommendation Forms

Personalized product recommendation forms can give you a great understanding of your customer's preferences and buying habits. They can help you gain a better understanding of which products or services are most popular among your customers and which ones are not performing well. This information can then be used to tailor marketing campaigns to specific customer segments, create targeted promotions and incentives, and identify areas for new product development or innovation.

Additionally, insights derived from personalized product recommendation forms can help your business improve customer satisfaction and foster customer loyalty through the provision of tailored experiences, promoting brand affinity and customer retention.

• Online Registration Forms

An online registration form allows customers to register for events, programs, memberships, or other offerings provided by your business. These forms typically capture personal information, contact details, and other relevant details needed to complete the registration process.

Online registration forms can help you streamline the registration process for your customers, making it faster and more convenient for potential sign-up prospects. This can lead to increased registration rates and a better overall customer experience with registration.

Furthermore, by integrating online registration forms with CRM (Customer Relationship Management) systems, your business can automate lead generation, track registrations, and manage customer data conveniently and efficiently.

• Newsletter Sign-Up Forms

Newsletter sign-up forms can be implemented on your website, as well as through email marketing campaigns. These forms can help collect email addresses and other relevant information from interested customers who want to receive regular updates and promotional content from your business.

Newsletter sign-up forms can also be integrated with CRM (Customer Relationship Management) systems, which can help your business collect and manage subscriber data with ease. CRM integration can also help you track subscriber engagement with your newsletters, measure the effectiveness of your campaigns, and personalize the content you send to subscribers based on their preferences and behavior.

4. Market Research Forms

Market research is the cornerstone of any successful marketing campaign, and market research forms provide a practical and effective way to gather key marketing metrics such as demographics, preferences, behaviors, and opinions about a particular market or product. 

Specifically, market research forms can help your business conduct brand research, measure campaign effectiveness, gauge customer satisfaction, direct data-driven product development, and conduct competitive analysis. These insights can help you identify trends and patterns that can inform your business decisions, and help you identify new growth opportunities, such as potential new products or untapped markets.

Market research forms can be effortlessly automated and implemented using a form builder platform that provides easy-to-use templates and form management options. Automation of these forms allows for the collection of data from a large pool of respondents quickly and efficiently. Form builder tools also make it easier to analyze the data you collect and generate reports, which can help you to identify key trends and insights with little effort. 

If you're seeking to gain insights into your target audience and improve your business strategies, you might want to consider exploring the different types of market research forms that can cater to your specific needs:

• Product/Service Research Forms

Product/Service Research Forms are a type of survey that allows businesses to collect data and feedback from their customers about their products or services. These forms typically ask customers about their experiences, satisfaction levels, and suggestions for improvement.

Product/Service Research Forms can be used to collect information on your customers' needs, preferences, and opinions about your offerings. Analysis of this data can help you identify areas for improvement, refine your product/service offerings, and better target your marketing efforts.

• Competitor Analysis Forms

A Competitor Analysis Questionnaire can be used to gather information about your competitors and their strategies to help improve your own business. This type of questionnaire could collect data about your competitors' products, pricing, marketing tactics, target audience, customer engagement, and overall industry positioning. Its goal would be to provide a comprehensive overview of the competitive landscape in which your business operates.

By analyzing the data you gather through a competitor analysis questionnaire you can gain practical insights into the strengths and weaknesses of your competitors. This information can then help inform your own marketing strategies and gain a competitive edge in your industry. For example, you can leverage this information to refine your product offerings, adjust your pricing strategy, and tailor your marketing tactics to better target your audience. Additionally, you can identify gaps and new opportunities in the market to differentiate your business from your competitors.

• Customer Needs Surveys

By analyzing the data you gather through a competitor analysis questionnaire, you can gain valuable insights into the strengths and weaknesses of your competitors. This information can then help you to inform your own marketing strategies and gain a competitive edge in your industry.

For example, a survey might ask customers how frequently they use your product or services, their satisfaction level with your customer service, and what features they would like to see in future products. 

Insights from these surveys can be used to tailor your marketing messages, create more targeted advertising campaigns, and improve product offerings to better align with customer needs. By regularly conducting customer needs surveys you can stay up-to-date on your customer’s evolving needs and preferences.

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Conclusion

If you're sold on the benefits of automation for your marketing efforts, you may be wondering how to take the first step. With so many tools available, finding the right fit can be overwhelming. As a small business owner, you need a platform that addresses your unique challenges and simplifies the automation process. You also need a platform that accommodates your level of experience while providing room to grow and expand your capabilities.Bconic empowers small business owners with simplified automation services. Tailored for small business use, Bconic offers easy automation of online forms with popular form-builder platforms such as Typeform and Mailchimp. Plus, with seamless integration with all the other software you're using, it's never been easier to get more done, quicker.Ready to take the first step toward automation? Start experimenting with our platform now for free, or connect with a consultant to find out more about how we can help you get more done.