KIWANIS INTERNATIONAL HOW TO Google Online Fillable Forms for Kiwanis Club Websites Publish via email, website or blog Mandy Grover User instructions for creating free online fillable forms with Google Docs form tools.
Contents Get started with Google Docs form tool... 3 Sign up for a Gmail account... 3 Locate Google Docs... 4 Create a form... 6 Publishing options... 8 Email a link to the form... 8 Embed a form on a website or blog... 10 Embed a form on your Club Management website... 10 View a form report... 15 2
Get started with Google Docs form tool Would you like a quick and easy way to add a poll to your website or to collect simple data from members about a project without resorting to a tangle of email messages? Google has a solution! Within the Google Docs feature is a powerful forms tool, and it allows you to embed a form into your site or gather data via email. Either way, the tool collects the data in a spreadsheet which you can access to view and manipulate or you can display results in an attractive report. To begin, you must have a Google email account (Gmail) to use Google Docs and the form tool. This is required only for the person creating the form the people who use your form do NOT need a Google account to participate! The Gmail account enables you to act as the administrator of the form building and data collection process. You can use your existing Gmail account if you already have one, but you may want to create a separate account for general club use only. Sign up for a Gmail account From your Web browser, navigate to http://mail.google.com and click Create an account to set up your new Gmail account it should only take a few minutes: 3
Locate Google Docs If you happen to be in your Gmail account already, click on the Documents link in the top left corner. But if you just opened up your browser, navigate to http://docs.google.com and enter your Gmail login and password: 4
This is the Google Docs landing page. First-time users of Google products may be overwhelmed at all the available features. Fortunately, there are many bite-sized learning tools to bring you up to speed fast. If you ve never used Google Docs, click the Help menu link: Explore these great items: Take a Tour (on-screen tour) Videos from the Google Docs community (YouTube channel for Google Docs) Printable guide to Google Docs (PDF) 5
Create a form Click the Create new dropdown list and select Form to open a customizable form template: This is the basic template and related tools that open for you to begin building your form. Basic components to note above: A. Click the Add item dropdown list to insert your next question or to add a section divider. B. Type a unique title for your form so that you can distinguish it from others you may create. The title you enter will be displayed in the subject line in your email and confirmations. 6
C. Type a brief explanation of your form or general instructions for your users (during testing, this field held more than 1500 characters). This information will also be displayed in the body of your email distribution of the form. D. These tools allow you to edit, duplicate or delete the question and are found in each question block. These tools are only displayed for the question block you are currently editing, but scroll other blocks in the top right corner to reveal them as needed. E. Click Done to display your form in its present state. Scroll and click the editing tools to make changes. F. The URL (Web address) for the published form is displayed immediately each time you create a new form. Note: To change the order of the questions in your form, simply hover and click in a question block, then drag-and-drop it to the desired location, either up or down in your form. The mock form below displays an example of each question type you can create: Remember to save your form as you build it and after you are finished! 7
Publishing options Your options for publishing the form include distributing a link to it via email message or embedding it directly on your website or blog. Email a link to the form To send a link to your form, click the Email this form button: A pop-up box opens so you can enter individual addresses or select addresses from your Gmail contact list: A. When manually adding multiple email addresses, use only a comma followed by a space to separate them. 8
B. We recommend that you do NOT embed the actual survey within the body of the email. So clear this box! C. Click send and your email will be delivered to your recipients inbox and Google will populate a link to the form s spreadsheet in your Google Docs list so you can access the data as it is collected: D. Google also sends you a confirmation Gmail message when you email the form to someone: a. Click this link to quickly access your form s spreadsheet and data. b. Indicates who you sent the form to via email; you ll receive a confirmation like this any time you send it to another user. c. Click this link to quickly send the form to another user. 9
Embed a form on a website or blog Click the More actions dropdown list and select the Embed option: A pop-up window opens. Copy and paste the code provided into your website or blog. This code is unique for each form you create: Embed a form on your Club Management website 1. Log on to your Google Docs account and open your form s spreadsheet. Set it aside for a moment. 2. Also open another window in your browser to the KiwanisOne website. Next, open your Club Management public website s editing tool: A. Navigate to the Club Management tab B. Click the Administration menu link 10
C. Click the Public Website Content menu link D. Click Edit Public Website link option from the center of your screen 3. We recommend you create a separate page for your Google form. Click the New Page link: 11
4. This creates a new page for you to edit: A. Type a Page Name (use something similar to the name of your form) B. Type a Page Description C. Check the Publish Immediately box (you can edit later, if needed) D. Select a dropdown option to indicate where you want the page to appear on your menu (you can re-position it later, if needed) 5. Click back to your Google Docs form spreadsheet. From the menu bar, click Form, then select the Embed form in a webpage option: 12
6. This opens a new popup window. Right click your mouse to copy the code as indicated (hover your cursor over the highlighted bar and use Ctrl+C to copy): 7. Click back to KiwanisOne and the new page you created for your club s website. At the bottom left of the page editor, click the <>HTML link to switch to the HTML view of the tool: 13
8. Double-check that you are in HTML view (the link looks like a gray button when it is the active view). Paste the code you copied from the Google Docs form into the body of the editor near the top. Click the Save Page button (bottom right of the page editor s body). 9. Check for your new page on the appropriate navigation link: 14
10. Open the page to confirm it looks good. Note that on longer embedded forms, your user will need to scroll down to reveal and click the Submit button: View a form report Open up the link to your form s spreadsheet and click Form from the menu and select Show summary of responses: Based on the sample survey, here are some screenshots of the summary report: 15
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You can t prevent users from submitting a form more than once the same person may have submitted multiple responses (so don t use this for super-serious response collections example: voting for club officers). Users who complete the form will receive an on-screen confirmation once they ve submitted the form. Additional information about Google Docs forms can be found at http://docs.google.com/support/bin/topic.py?topic=15166 18