How to Create a New Form with Jotform

Jotform's main dashboard.
Image: Jotform

Data is everything for so many companies. Regardless of the size of your business, you probably need to collect information from customers, clients, or even internal employees, but how do you go about it?

One of the easiest ways to collect data is through the form. A form is a questionnaire that you fill out that allows users to answer questions and send those responses to you, where you collect the data to better understand your audience and make more informed business decisions. Or you can use a form to collect payment for products and services. However you use them, forms are a great tool for your business. Jotform is a great way to handle this process.

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What is Jotform?

Jotform provides conditional logic, save and continue, form translation, ACH payments, Google Analytics form tracking, offline forms, drag-and-drop creation, custom CSS, embedded forms, response piping, customer relationship management integrations, Google reCAPTCHA, Forms management, email validation, recurring donations, e-signatures, pre-filled forms and more.

Jotform offers four pricing tiers:

  • Free: 5 forms per month
  • Bronze: $19.50 per month for 25 forms per month
  • Silver: $24.50 per month for 50 forms per month
  • Gold: $64.50 for 100 forms per month

Now that you’re interested, let’s take a look at how easy it is to create a form with Jotform.

What you need to create a form in Jotform

All you need is a valid Jotform account. Sign up for the free Starter plan to see if this service is right for your business.

How to create your first form in Jotform

Log in to your Jotform account and click CREATE FORM ( in the top leftFigure A).

Figure A

Jotform's main dashboard.
Figure A: Jotform’s main window is where you manage your forms.

In the resulting window (Figure B) you can either create a form from scratch, use a template, import a form, or create a signable document.

Figure B

The Jotform window for creating a form.
The Jotform window for creating a form.

I suggest that you select Use template for your first form. Not only does this make the platform easier to learn, but it also gives you some great ideas on how to use forms for your business.

Browse through the templates (Figure C), find a template that best suits your needs, and click Use Template. I select the customer registration form.

Figure C

Jotform template options.
There are over 10,000 templates to choose from.

One of the first things asked for in the customer registration form is to upload your organization’s logo (Figure D).

Figure D

Upload organization settings in Jotform with the field organization logo filled out.
Uploading an organization logo will probably be the first thing you do for your first form.

After adding your logo, click Save.

Now that your logo is in place, you can start customizing all the elements within the form and even add some of your own. The first thing I could do with the customer registration form is change the phone number requirement. By default, phone number is a required option for this form. To change this, click the Phone number item and then click the gear icon (Figure E).

Figure E

The phone number element in jot form.
The Phone Number element can be edited like any other element in the form.

A new sidebar will open (Figure F) where you can change every aspect of the element. For me, I remove the requirement option by clicking on the associated ON/OFF slider until it is in the OFF position.

Figure F

The element properties sidebar in jot form.
The element properties sidebar in jot form.

You can also add new elements to the template form. To do this, click Add form element (Figure G).

Figure G

Add form element option in jot form.
The Add Form Element button on the form template page.

A new sidebar will open (Figure H) where you can choose from a large number of items to add.

Figure H

Jotform form elements menu.
Adding a new item to the form.

Click on the new element and drag it to the correct position on the form. You can then customize the new item as needed (Figure I).

Figure I

Enter the Jotform highlighted question with standard fields filled out.
Customize a new element for the form.

When you are done with all the items, click on the SETTINGS tab at the top, give the form a title and select the status (Figure J).

Figure J

Jotform form settings with visible title and form status fields.
Customize the settings for the new form.

Clicking SHOW MORE OPTIONS gives you access to alerts, language, translations, password protection and encryption.

You can click the Preview form slider at any time to see what the published form will look like. When you’re happy with that, click the PUBLISH tab, which gives you four different ways to share the form:

  • shortcut
  • E-mail
  • social network
  • Create app

Share the form with your customers, clients, employees or whoever you need to collect data from. Then sit back and wait for the answers to come.

Choose Jotform for easier data collection

Jotform is a great way to collect data from people who use your business, might use your business in the future, or work for your business. Whoever you need to collect data from, Jotform can help.

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