From education to managing businesses, every sector in this world has undergone significant (r)evolution. Thanks to the internet, the greatest invention ever, and extensive digitalization, people enjoy a high degree of comfort and convenience.
Amidst this digital transformation, even the way companies and institutes carry out surveys and studies are changing. With online surveys, quizzes, and forms, companies gather essential data easily and leverage them to boost their marketing efforts.
It is tools like Google and Microsoft Forms Pro that are changing the game. While eliminating the need to physically distribute survey questionnaires and forms to the audience, which sometimes gets a bit embarrassing when people refuse to fill, these tools let organizations gather valuable data.
Google form is a common term used by people who use online forms and surveys, but there is another platform that deserves to be brought under the spotlight. When it comes to online forms, surveys, and quizzes, Microsoft form is a tool that one must not overlook.
Understanding Microsoft Forms
Microsoft is not a name unknown in the corporate sector. Microsoft Office is the most popular tool in this sector, and no other company has been able to provide such a comprehensive package. But the contributions of Microsoft to the tech world do not stop here.
This company also stepped into the domain of online forms and surveys in 2016. Even though it hasn’t gained much popularity compared to Google Forms, it is on its way to make a huge name for itself.
Microsoft Forms is an online tool that allows survey and form creation. The forms created through this tool can be distributed digitally through link sharing and uploading on portals. The feature that sets it apart from others is automatic marking. Not only this, but Microsoft creates forms that can export the gathered data to excel. Manual data entry is no more a struggle for organizations.
This tool is included in Microsoft 365 and does its job really well. From creating forms to tracking responses, Microsoft forms are one of the valued additions to this platform. Multiple-choice questions, text questions, ranking, rating, date, Net Promoter Score (NPS), and Likert, there is a wide variety of question formats that this form creation tool offers.
Not only this, this form creation tool by Microsoft lets users share their surveys and forms through multiple different channels. Sharing links with a selected group of people, enabling QR code activation, uploading it on the web portal, and inviting the audience through email. All these options make sharing of online forms easy for the companies and convenient for the survey participants.
Another amazing feature of this tool is reviewing analytics by data gathering in real-time. The creator of the form can easily view the responses in real-time without any delays or hindrances. To make things super easy, Microsoft 365 allows users to download the responses in excel.
Pondering Over the Need to Use Microsoft Forms
If the features discussed above are not enough to convince people of the power of Microsoft forms, there is another long list of reasons that will compel one to start using this tool.
Convenience in Gathering Data
The companies have depended on data since the beginning. Data is what helps companies make logic-based decisions. Gathering valuable data also helps organizations expand their reach and step into new markets.
One of the best features of Microsoft forms is their capability of connecting with other apps by the company. This really helps companies carry out their operations without any delays while gathering and organizing data from these forms.
Employee Training
It is important to work on the training of employees in every company. There is no denying there; employees are a company’s greatest asset. The more well-trained the team is, the higher is the productivity and the better are the results.
How can these forms help companies train employees? Well, managers and team lead and quickly prepare quizzes and surprise the team. Definitely not a pleasant surprise, but this can help an organization evaluate the level at which the team stands. In addition, it will help employees work on their skills.
Considering all the benefits that come with the integration of Microsoft forms, it is critical for companies to incorporate this tool into their business operations. There is nothing more important for a company than data, and this tool makes gathering data easier than it ever was!
Acing the Game: Learn to Perfect Use of Microsoft Forms
Gone are the days when people had to take hours to create simple quizzes and surveys. Wander around the city to distribute them among the public. This is the modern age where tools such as Microsoft forms rule. This form creation tool by the tech giant makes the hours-long process of creating and sharing surveys, questionnaires and forms a matter of few minutes.
While there are countless benefits of creating forms by Microsoft, one can only enjoy them if one uses them the right way. Even though this tool is super easy to use, it is best to first understand the basics before diving deep into the world of online forms with Microsoft.
Locating Microsoft Forms
Users can find this app on the homepage of Office 365. It is usually enlisted with all other Microsoft 365 apps. If a user doesn’t see Microsoft forms app listed there, they can click on the ‘explore all your apps’ option, available on the bottom-left corner of the homepage.
Creating a Form
Once located, users can proceed with the creation of their form, quiz, or survey. The first thing after opening the app a user will see is the homepage. This page has two options, ‘new form,’ ‘new quiz.’ A user may choose the option as per their requirements.
Once a user selects, they can easily use the ‘add question’ option to add their entries. When adding questions, users will find multiple question formats. Again, a user may choose this as per their needs. There is also a facility to provide the participants of the survey to choose multiple answers.
To facilitate the respondents of the form, companies can also add the ‘text option. The respondents can use it to provide a detailed response to a question asking for a one-word response.
After the content is ready, the next phase is to work on the aesthetics. The way a form appears in front of a respondent determines how ‘serious’ a respondent will be while filling it. There are various themes a user can choose from, based on the type of audience they are addressing.
Sharing a Form
This is how simple creating a form is using Microsoft forms. Once this is done, it is time to understand the many ways of sharing this platform allows. There are multiple ways to go about this. As discussed earlier, a company can restrict access to the form to a specific group of people or choose the option of ‘anyone with the link’ option.
Users can copy a link and share it through their social media and emails.
There is another way of sharing it – QR code – respondents can scan the code through their mobile device and access the form. Alternatively, users can leverage the ‘embed’ option, use the generated HTML code, and put it on their website.
Business and Microsoft forms: A Powerful Combo
There are plenty of ways businesses can benefit from online forms. Saying that business and Microsoft forms make a powerful combo won’t be an exaggeration.
Truth be told, customer satisfaction is one of the primary goals of businesses. A satisfied customer boosts referral marketing and even helps improve revenue generation. With Microsoft’s form creation app, companies can, within minutes, create customer satisfaction surveys.
How? Microsoft forms offer pre-built forms for this purpose. Just a few clicks and a complete survey to gauge customer responses are ready to provide the company valuable insights.
Employee Training is also possible with the online forms created with Microsoft. Companies can easily create quizzes to see where the team stands in terms of skills. Also, a company can take input from their employees about a certain policy or change in the operations before launching it. Employee satisfaction is also very important
All in all, Microsoft forms have proved very beneficial for every business and institute.
The Comparison: Microsoft forms vs. Google forms
Designing and Aesthetics
When it comes to online forms and surveys, Microsoft forms and Google forms are the only two names in the market. At first sight, both these tools look very similar. If we look at the features a functionality, both are designed to create online forms and offer templates to enhance the overall look with customization. They also allow background image addition with the freehand to play with colors. To add to the similarities, the underlying design can’t be changed in both tools.
But, how are these apps different?
The difference lies in the number of options offered for questions. With Microsoft forms, users can integrate radio buttons, text entry, and features like Likert input. The Likert option is a unique feature to gather subjective responses.
Google, on the other hand, doesn’t offer any features such as Likert. It does offer options such as multiple-choice grids and pickers that are scale-based.
Also, both these forms don’t help much when it comes to crafting the right set of questions.
Analyzing the Results
When it comes to processing the gathered data, both Google Forms and Microsoft offer a certain degree of convenience. While Google Forms allow users to add responses on the spreadsheet through Google drive or sheets, Microsoft forms let users compile responses in Excel.
The point where Microsoft takes the lead is its integration with Power Platform, Power Automate, to be specific. It allows users to create a link between form and flow. This helps generate an event when the form is submitted. Users can turn a form response into a trigger to create a flow.
One simple form can help drive multiple flows, leading to the automation of several processes.
Of course, the best feature of Microsoft forms is its integration with Office 365. From OneNote and Outlook, users can link their forms with any of the Office 365 apps. Google forms have not been able to provide the users with this kind of functionality. Especially the way it allows users to embed forms in productivity tools without any changes to the context.
Top 4 Microsoft Forms Tips and Tricks for 2022
There is no denying there; Microsoft forms are changing the way companies or individuals create quizzes, polls, and surveys. From the education sector to the business world, these forms have benefitted every industry. Microsoft creates forms by leveraging Microsoft Stream and real-time integration with Excel. These, along with a plethora of other features, make forms creation efficient and super effective.
While these forms make things easy and simple, one can enjoy the benefits fully when using these forms the right way. Ease of use is one of the many reasons people choose Microsoft forms, but having some smart tricks and tips at hand can really change the game.
A little hack that makes life easy does no harm, right?
The Progress Bars
The sense of being close to a destination or a goal feels amazing. Those special moments when one realizes they are just a few steps away from their desired destination – priceless – one wouldn’t trade that for the world, right?
Considering this very feeling, why not make filling lengthy forms not-so-boring with Microsoft forms? Yes, you can give the same feeling to a survey or a quiz participant by adding a progress bar at the top.
Let’s not deny it; filling lengthy forms, quizzes, and surveys can sometimes be too boring. Companies or individuals can easily break these long forms or surveys into sections and include the progress bar. With every question they answer, they come close to completion – a priceless feeling!
Know the Stats
Distributing (emailing) forms, surveys, and quizzes around an organization, be it educational or corporate, is a common practice. Getting responses from a certain number of participants can help companies and institutes give access to major insights.
Using forms pro by Microsoft can help companies or institutes know exactly how many forms are being filled. The forms activity report feature was introduced in March 2020.
Automatic Phishing Detection
Losing data is quite common through phishing forms. People today fall victim to these malicious activities. There is a way Microsoft form users can provide the consumers with a highly safe environment to participate in online quizzes, surveys, and forms.
Microsoft allows users to protect the sensitive data of the survey participants through its automated phishing detection feature. This feature lets companies and institutes easily create a safe and secure form of service.
Collect Only Relevant Responses
One of the biggest problems organizations have to deal with is sorting the responses when they distribute forms and surveys. Getting these forms to only the target audience can sometimes be a hassle. Sorting out the responses can turn into an exhausting and overwhelming process.
Microsoft creates forms that allow users to choose the audience for their forms or surveys to address this issue. There is an option to share the created forms on the top right corner of the page. Through this option, people can select the audience for a specific survey, form, or quiz.
The audience can be restricted to an organization. If the form or survey is not for those in the organization, there is an option to customize the audience. Users can simply head to the ‘only people in my…’ option and select ‘Anyone with the link.’
These are some hacks that people using Microsoft forms can try and benefit from. Creating and sharing forms, surveys, and quizzes have become easier than ever with these tips and tricks.
