Day: November 15, 2024

When I graduated with a marketing degree over a decade ago, I hit the scene thinking that marketing would always be its own thing. Something like “holistic marketing” seemed unnecessary to me. Marketers had their swim lane; I’d stick to mine.

Now, when I lecture marketing students at my alma mater, I couldn’t imagine not thinking holistically about marketing. The marketing function keeps expanding, as Deloitte’s Spring 2024 CMO Survey affirmed. And marketing must help other departments and the entire company accomplish its goals and objectives.

That’s one of many benefits holistic marketing offers. When we free marketing from swim lanes, we invite others to participate and own marketing’s principles and outcomes. Marketing then becomes a guide, directing customers, partners, and employees into a comprehensive, unified brand experience.

But first, you must understand holistic marketing’s history, application, and implications. Let’s chat about how this approach can help you accomplish more with your campaigns.

Table of Contents

• What is holistic marketing?
• Benefits of Holistic Marketing
• How to Apply a Holistic Marketing Approach
• 3 Tips for a Strong Holistic Marketing Strategy

For a long time, companies divided operations into discrete business units. Marketing, sales, customer support, product development: each department was accountable to the company in total but operated within their own walls.

But those departmental lines have been blurring, with marketing at the forefront of this process. No doubt many of you are familiar with the clarion call to align sales and marketing into smarketing.

But, other departments are leaning on marketing to help them:

• Attract more prospects.
• Inform and educate potential customers.
• Entice customers to renew and upgrade.
• Provide a consistent, high-quality customer experience.

Central to these needs? Serving the customer. And the key to “holistic marketing” lies in understanding how you, as a marketing leader, can influence the way your entire company interacts with customers.

The term “holistic marketing” gained popularity mainly from the efforts of esteemed marketing professor Philip Kotler (often referred to as “The Father of Modern Marketing”). He defines it as “shaping an experience for the customer that goes beyond the product.”

Kotler further defines holistic marketing’s key pillars:

• Internal marketing that gets everybody — from the intern to the CEO — embracing marketing principles.
• Integrated marketing that uses many channels and creative outlets to communicate your value proposition.
• Relationship marketing that champions your customers and marketing partners.
• Performance marketing that analyzes returns on marketing investment and contextualizes marketing activities amid legal, ethical, social, and environmental factors.

In this vein, you see how holistic marketing is part of the customer experience (CX) a company delivers. CX’s purview is the overall experience a customer has with a brand. A holistic marketing strategy focuses more on how marketing activities influence that experience.

What does holistic marketing look like in practice?

To answer this question, I talked with Allison Nordenbrock Brown, founder of Norden Marketing. She provides fractional CMO services to B2B technology and professional services companies.

“I would define holistic marketing as an approach that takes all potential marketing channels into consideration,” she said. “Instead of deeply focusing on one channel because it‘s ‘what’s been done,’ holistic marketers instead consider how all of these channels have performed historically within the company to guide future direction.”

Those potential marketing channels cover any place that could influence a customer’s brand perception, including:

• Traditional marketing like TV, radio, out-of-home advertising.
• Digital marketing like SEO, email, and social media.
• PR and earned media.
• Direct sales conversations and promotions.
• Customer support like call centers, chatbots, and social media support.
• Experiential and event marketing.
• Corporate social responsibility efforts.
• Internal marketing to employees.

Consider a brand like Apple from this holistic perspective. Maybe you bought an iPhone recently. No doubt you saw an ad on TV or reviewed a landing page through a sponsored link — that’s certainly marketing’s work.

But, what happens after buying the device?

Every post-purchase event also falls under Apple’s marketing umbrella. From the design of the device unpacking process to offering in-store Genius Bars for support, you can feel Apple’s brand. It’s a uniform, seamless brand experience. That’s the feeling you’re trying to emulate with a holistic marketing approach.

Benefits of Holistic Marketing

Look how many avenues marketers have to think about in a holistic marketing approach. Is all that work worth it? Let’s investigate holistic marketing’s benefits.

Improves Customer Experience

Customers crave a seamless experience like Apple provides. And they notice when you don’t deliver.

Salesforce’s latest State of the Connected Customer report found that “79% of customers expect consistent interactions across departments, yet 55% say it generally feels like they're communicating with separate departments rather than one company.”

A well-executed holistic marketing approach helps companies deliver a uniform brand experience. With a defined core message and approach shared across every business function, every customer receives an experience that accurately reflects your company.

Increases Company Revenue

Naturally, better customer experiences likely mean customers want to stay and spend more with you. The uniform brand presence a la Apple can help you generate more revenue. Brand management tool Marq found that “consistent brand presentation across all platforms can increase revenues by up to 23%.”

Increases Internal Team Effectiveness

A holistic approach offers significant internal benefits, too. Brown offers an example familiar to any marketer: sales asking marketing to quickly spin up a new deck to wow a large prospect.

In a traditional marketing setup, “marketing is annoyed,” says Brown. “They already made a deck. Why is this an emergency now? They become overwhelmed and frustrated that they didn‘t know about this need sooner. Why isn’t the existing deck good enough?"

Holistic marketing allows marketers to operate more proactively. With this approach, marketing can communicate with sales, take ownership, and get things done.

“In a holistic marketing department, sales and marketing meet on a regular basis and talk about their goals and activities,” says Brown.

“Sales is targeting more large enterprise clients. Marketing asks about their needs in advance. Sales shares that the current deck isn't resonating as well with enterprise prospects. Sales and marketing develop a deck together while sales and ramping up their efforts. Once sales land a meeting, the deck is ready to go, and everyone is less stressed.”

How to Apply a Holistic Marketing Approach

Whether you’re a one-person marketing team or run marketing for a global enterprise, you can benefit from adopting a more holistic approach. How do you get started?

1. Set your goals and high-level strategy.

Before you dive into developing an incredible, highly detailed holistic marketing plan, ponder the basics:

• What do you want to accomplish?
• What do you expect to need to do that?
• Who should be in your corner to do it?
• How do you think you’ll integrate everything?

Write a memo to yourself detailing answers to these questions. You want to build buy-in before investing considerable time and resources into holistic marketing.

Create the high-level roadmap to achieve your goal, which will help others see the direction you want and where they can support you.

2. Align internal teams.

With a brief in hand, start building consensus among other departments. Sales is your first and most important champion. They benefit the most from your holistic approach, and you’ll want them on your team.

Just like how a salesperson builds a logical and emotional case for their prospects, you should approach them similarly. Demonstrate why they should care about a holistic approach. Find case studies and examples from other companies.

Lean on the benefits this will offer customers (and those prospects sales wants to close). It’s not about making marketing better; it’s about how marketing can make everybody better.

After convincing sales, consider other customer-facing departments like customer support or product development and design. Invite teams who influence how customers experience your company’s product or service.

3. Determine details like messaging, channels, and SOPs.

With buy-in on the plan’s goals and high-level strategy, you can then develop the details to bulk up your holistic marketing approach.

Within your plan, establish:

• Goals, objectives, and metrics.
• Core customer-centric messaging.
• Brand voice, tone, and style guides.
• Channels to use to manage customer relationships.
• Standard operating procedures (SOPs) on how to run holistic marketing campaigns.
• Clear lines of accountability and authority (consider building a RASCI matrix).

Pro tip: Make sure your messaging reflects your authentic voice. Customers can sniff out a phony. Social content marketing firm Stackla reports that “88% of consumers say authenticity is important when deciding which brands they like and support.”

Provide enough details so that your non-marketing peers can embrace marketing’s principles and act accordingly. For instance, user- or employee-generated content can be especially valuable in providing the authenticity customers crave.

A clear guide can help employees produce great content — and help you avoid mishaps like Chick-fil-A’s treatment of its employee whose food videos went viral on TikTok.

4. Monitor metrics and adjust.

Remember, a holistic marketing strategy touches upon more than a traditional strategy does. Accordingly, you’ll need to track more than the typical sets of metrics. Additional KPIs worth tracking include:

• Customer satisfaction.
• Brand awareness.
• Employee engagement.

These data points are more qualitative; get creative in how you gather and use these data. For instance, use post-purchase engagement surveys to determine Net Promoter Scores (NPS). This will help you benchmark customer engagement and track qualitative progress.

If you want extra help completing your plan’s details, check out HubSpot’s guide to building a high-quality marketing strategy and plan.

3 Tips for a Strong Holistic Marketing Strategy

You’ve seen holistic marketing’s benefits, and you’re working to integrate marketing operations and engage other departments.

As you execute strategy and build your coalition, Brown offers a few tips to nail this significant operational overhaul.

1. Question everything.

A holistic marketing strategy takes a broader way of thinking to execute well. You have to look past the regular channels, spot unorthodox opportunities, and act upon them. As a result, marketers cannot sit back and go with the status quo.

“Traditional marketing departments will often get stuck in a loop of ‘this is how it‘s always been, this is what we’ve always done,” Brown said.

“But, holistic marketers look at the marketing strategy from a lens of ‘Should we be doing this?’ and ‘Is this driving the right outcomes for our company?’ When your approach becomes holistic, you’ll take your marketing efforts from reactive to proactive.”

2. Always be communicating.

Building something new requires getting everyone bought into the concept and excited about potential outcomes. It’s a question of relationships within your company. And like growing any relationship, communication is key.

As marketing takes a more holistic approach, Brown reminds you to keep everyone apprised of progress.

“By communicating that marketing is testing multiple channels to determine how they can all work together simultaneously, departments will be more understanding when marketing is no longer as reactive to their needs,” she said. “Their needs are already being met with proactive planning and communication.”

3. Track a unified goal.

Holistic marketing generates lots of data, and it’s tricky to help everyone remember the most important insights.

UX designers may recognize this challenge as Miller’s Law: Longstanding research shows most people can hold about seven pieces of information in their minds at once. UX designers have tried many ways to circumvent this limitation, such as “chunking” content to make it digestible and memorable.

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Like designers, marketers need to chunk data into high-level, manageable insights. Cross-department communication gets complicated quickly.

Marketers should take the lead and focus teams’ attention on what’s most important with a unified goal.

Brown agrees with this strategy. “All channels should still be measured individually, but a successful holistic strategy will move the needle for the unified goal,” she said. “That goal should be understood across all departments. Whether it's to grow recurring revenue in a single line of business, or drive new subscribers, a holistic strategy will drive toward the unifying goal from all angles.”

Pro tip: Use HubSpot’s marketing plan template to lay the foundation for your holistic marketing approach. You’ll receive templates to set your strategies, channels, and technology.

Take Proactive Steps to Incorporate Holistic Marketing

Consumers are picky about their brand relationships. If they don’t find what they’re looking for with you, they’ll go elsewhere. And the best brands that consumers stay with offer a fulfilling, seamless brand experience.

I teach marketing students about marketing’s discrete operations like email, social media, and direct marketing. But, the successful future marketer will need to not only think holistically but also develop cross-department relationships to grow marketing’s influence.

A holistic marketing approach can help you tap into the various resources scattered throughout your organization.

With a proactive mindset, deep appreciation of your customers, and strong interdepartmental relationships, you can bake a clear vision into every marketing campaign and accomplish unified organizational goals.

You’ve heard it before — forms are the gold standard for capturing leads, tracking industry trends, or gathering customer feedback. But to create that conversion or feedback, you need a form builder tool.

I’ve reviewed the 11 best online form builders so you can find the best one that fits your needs.

I’ve used forms to collect leads on a marketing team, to generate event feedback, and to create surveys, so I understand what’s useful for different scenarios.

I’ll also cover what to look for in a form builder tool and how to get started.

Table of Contents

• How to Create Online Forms
• Form Builder Software Tools: What to Look For
• 11 Online Form Builder Tools

Form builder tools are an easy, no-code way to create web forms such as a contact form, event or mailing list signup, or survey. You can customize your form with multiple form fields, different formats, and design customization.

Once your responses start coming in, most forms will also import each entry into a spreadsheet or centralized database and send you notifications when people complete them.

Regardless of the form builder you choose, I’ve found there are a few key steps you'll want to follow when creating a form for the purpose of lead generation.

1. Identify the goals of the form.

Are you aiming to generate sales leads, or are you merely planning to add contacts to your email list?

Once you identify what you’re looking for from your prospects, you’ll be able to determine what information you'll need to get from them on the form. If you need some ideas, check out HubSpot’s Ultimate Guide to Web Forms.

2. Pick a form builder tool.

There are free online form builders available, but they might not have all the features you need. I’ve run into this frustrating scenario many times!

For example, some might not embed well onto the site you use because of your CMS. I recommend using a form builder that connects with your CRM, like HubSpot's Free Form Builder.

Start building forms for your website for free.

3. Include name and contact fields.

This step is pretty self-explanatory. Unless you are creating an anonymous survey, you’ll want to get your visitor’s first and last name.

Ask for needed contact information, such as an email or phone number. Keep in mind that your request should be appropriate for the context.

I’m always a little reluctant to hand over my information on a form. To avoid form abandonment, I recommend making non-essential contact fields optional and sharing how the contact details will be used.

4. Add additional demographic information as needed.

Along with the standard name and email details, it may be valuable to gather more demographic information about your prospect like job title, company location, and company size.

This will give you insights into your audience and a contact's buying or decision-making power.

5. Figure out which fields are must-have vs. nice-to-have.

Now, here’s where I often struggle to find the right balance. If you want to add people to your email list, you probably don’t need much information beyond name and email.

But if you're sending out a form to generate leads or learn more about your target audience, you might want to ask a few more specific questions, such as age, gender, or location, to get a feel for who your prospects are.

While you may be tempted to add more fields to cover all your bases, asking too much at once may actually deter leads and lower your conversion rate.

I suggest asking only for what you need or using a form builder that auto-fills information using market intelligence.

6. Set up an automated follow-up email that's triggered once the form is submitted.

After someone takes the time to fill out your form, it's standard to send a “thank you” or “welcome” email letting them know the next steps.

For instance, if it's a newsletter, let them know how often to expect the email, which topics are discussed, and include a peek into previous emails.

If it's a “Contact Us” form, the follow-up email should confirm receipt of the form along with an estimated response time. The more clarity you provide, the better the experience for the user.

Form Builder Software Tools: What to Look For

Confused by all the options available? There’s a huge variation in the features, prices, and value you get from each one.

Here are the criteria I look for to find the best tool.

1. Ease of Use

Every tool claims to be easy to use, but not all are intuitive. Look for things like drag-and-drop reordering, question banks, and robust documentation to help you learn the platform.

I’ve discovered that some of the nuances don’t become clear until you use them, so don’t be afraid to demo different tools and see which you prefer.

2. Customization

Look for a solution that gives you a wide range of form field options, from multiple choice to free response to check boxes. Another feature to consider is visual customization.

It’s important to match the color and style of your form to your brand to create a cohesive customer experience.

Some tools hide customization behind paid tiers, so I recommend you decide ahead of time if brand customization is a must-have for you before you begin searching.

3. Conditional Logic

Conditional logic is when a form shows specific questions to a respondent based on their previous responses.

For instance, if I ask, “Which products are you interested in trying?” in a market research survey and the person selects “shirts” instead of “shoes,” my next question may ask for their shirt size, but not their shoe size.

Conditional logic creates more relevant, concise forms for better engagement.

4. Integrations

One major factor in the form builder tool you choose should be integrations. If the tool will be embedded on your website, for instance, does your form builder integrate with the CMS?

If you manage leads through a CRM, can you connect the form data to feed in automatically and avoid a lag? Consider which systems are most important and look for a compatible form builder.

5. Analytics and Reporting

There is a wide range of reporting capabilities offered by the different form builder tools. Some give you visual dashboards with many different metrics.

Others, like Google Forms, will simply give you a spreadsheet that you’re on your own to analyze.

Decide what kind of analytics and reporting tools you need for your purposes, and review what each form builder offers before committing to one.

6. Mobile-Responsiveness

Have you ever had to complete a tiny form on your phone?

Trying to select a field and type in information isn’t worth the effort to many when the form isn’t mobile-friendly. Mobile-responsive simply means that a form is designed for a mobile device and follows best practices.

7. Accessibility

Many forms aren’t accessible for individuals with low vision who use a screen reader. This doesn’t just exclude people — you could be running afoul of ADA regulations.

Make sure your forms use high contrast in their design and follow the four design principles for accessibility: keep all information perceivable, operable, understandable, and robust.

8. Data Security

There’s one more very important consideration to look for when researching form builders. If you collect any sensitive personal information like medical information or financial details, you must be able to trust that your customers’ data is secure.

If you are a healthcare provider, you need a form builder that can ensure HIPAA compliance with patient data.

If anyone from Europe accesses your form, you need to comply with GDPR regulations. California, the U.K., and Canada have similar regulations.

I recommend looking for form builders that have a reCAPTCHA option and certifications like SOC 2 and ISO that represent excellence in cybersecurity. The costs of a data breach would far outweigh the cost of a high-quality, secure tool.

11 Online Form Builder Tools

Researching tools may seem intimidating, but I’ve made it easy for you. I tested 11 form builder tools in depth to help you pick the best-fit one. Ultimately, there’s a form-building software for your business’s needs and goals — let’s find it together!

1. HubSpot’s Free Online Form Builder

HubSpot’s online form builder is one of the most powerful form builder tools available.

The tool combines the foundations of form creation with cutting-edge technology to give you much more capability than a normal online form builder can — and it’s also free.

Pricing: Free CRM and Marketing Hub with paid plans starting at $15 a month.

Pros

• Easy drag-and-drop interface, no coding required
• Integration with HubSpot's CRM and marketing tools for lead management
• Customizable forms to match your branding
• Analytics to track form performance
• Ability to target form pop-ups based on customer segments or behavior
• Automatic email notifications for submissions

Cons

• Premium features (e.g., advanced reporting) may require paid plans

What I find amazing is that, even though it’s one of the more advanced form builder tools, you don't need any technical expertise when you use HubSpot’s form builder.

You can quickly create forms with the drag-and-drop form builder and convert anonymous website visitors into leads with unlimited forms, fields, submissions, and custom forms that all connect to your contact database.

I was able to create a simple form in about five minutes. I could choose from an embedded form, a standalone page, or a pop-up with a few different options for where that appeared on my homepage.

My favorite feature is that I can enable a form pop-up to appear in a very targeted way. I can choose a customer segment, which page I want the form to appear on (and after how long). I can also target by location, days since last visit, and various engagement metrics as conditions for a form pop-up.

That way, I can send a customized message, demo request, or relevant content at exactly the right time.

Once someone fills out your form, they’re automatically added to HubSpot CRM. In the system, you can set reminder tasks, call them, and send them personalized emails, letting you better manage and nurture relationships with your contacts.

What I like: HubSpot’s form builder also has data enrichment for contact profiles, Breeze Intelligence form shortening, and deep integration with HubSpot’s Marketing Hub, making it a good option for teams who want a single system for contact management.

Form shortening works by pulling in public data from the web and LLMs to auto-populate details like company size, industry, and website — only asking your contact to complete a few short fields. This decreases the chance your lead will abandon the form halfway through.

2. HubSpot's WordPress Plugin

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Have a WordPress site but still want to leverage HubSpot tools to generate leads?

With HubSpot's WordPress plugin, you can create forms, assign them within a workflow, and use them to generate landing page leads. Contacts generated with your forms can also be stored in your HubSpot CRM.

Pricing: Free plugin, though you may need a paid HubSpot plan or WordPress plan for certain features.

Pros

• Seamless integration with WordPress and HubSpot for easy lead capture
• Tracks visitor behavior, including page views and form submissions
• Automatically syncs data with HubSpot CRM for better lead management
• Free to use with basic lead-tracking features

Cons

• Limited functionality in the free version
• Customization options might be more basic compared to other form plugins

What I like: The tool makes the form creation process easy. Although it‘s powered by HubSpot, you don’t need to leave your WordPress dashboard to get the same form-building experience that you can find in Marketing Hub.

3. ClickUp Forms

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ClickUp is an all-in-one project management and collaboration tool built to help teams of all sizes manage all their work and centralize communication.

ClickUp Forms comes with tons of configuration options to let you easily create your ideal form for any use case, add important questions, and collect insightful responses together.

Pricing: Free plan includes one form, with paid plans starting at $7/month.

Pros

• Customizable forms that integrate with ClickUp tasks and workflows
• Automates task creation and team assignment from form submissions
• Offers unlimited form views in paid plans and rich reporting tools
• Collaboration features allow teams to work on form responses directly in ClickUp

Cons

• Free plan limits you to just one form.
• May require learning ClickUp's interface, which can be complex for beginners
• Some advanced features are locked behind higher-tier paid plans
• Less integration with external CRM and CMS systems
• May require third-party integrations

The first thing I noticed about ClickUp is that it has a lot of options.

I think this is a strength, but it can also be a drawback since too many options make it harder to choose one. You’ll also encounter a learning curve when setting everything up if you aren’t already a competent user.

What I like: The form builder tool has drag-and-drop features to move task fields into the form and create new ones via custom fields to build your ideal form.

Customize it further by selecting a primary theme color to match your brand, adding an image or logo as an icon, and listing a description at the top of the form to give your recipients more context and instructions on how to proceed.

Easily share your form with anyone by copying the direct link or embedding it on a web page with HTML. You may also export your form responses as a CSV file or find them in your task list.

Because it’s integrated with task management, you can turn form submissions into a to-do item and even use the form tool as a simple ticket management system. For that reason, I believe this tool is best for internal data collection or user feedback instead of large-scale lead collection.

4. Forms.app

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If you’re searching for a form builder tool, I think forms.app is a great option to consider. It’s a user-friendly platform that allows you to create forms, surveys, and quizzes without any coding.

I was able to browse their extensive form library and create my first form without creating an account.

If getting started is a sticking point, you can choose a template such as order forms, customer satisfaction surveys, job applications, consent forms, and signups.

Pricing: Free plan, with paid options starting at $15/month.

Pros

• Intuitive drag-and-drop form builder — no coding required
• Offers a wide range of templates and customization options
• Integrates with third-party apps like Google Sheets, Slack, and Mailchimp
• Provides conditional logic and payment collection features

Cons

• Free version has limitations, including fewer form responses
• Some advanced customization and analytics require a paid plan.
• Less robust reporting compared to some competitors

I think one of the great things about forms.app is that many of its advanced features are available for free. This includes conditional logic, calculators, product baskets, file uploads, multiple question types, payment collection, signature collection, and advanced analytics.

Forms.app offers an AI form generator feature that can help you create forms and surveys even faster. You describe what you want to create, and the AI will take care of the rest. It also suggests rewrites to your questions to help you write the best survey questions possible.

What I like: Once your form is done, you can share it in various ways, such as embedding it on your websites, sharing it as a QR code, or publishing it on social media. Integrations for popular tools like Google Drive, HubSpot, AirTable, and Meta Pixel help you send the data where you need it.

While the tool offers payment forms and medical treatment forms, proceed with caution. Do your research first to make sure it meets your company’s data security and regulatory standards.

5. WPForms

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WPForms is a beginner-friendly WordPress form builder that makes it easy to add beautiful forms to your website with just a few clicks. It’s used by over six million users who love it for its easy WordPress integration and wide variety of templates.

Pricing: WPForms Lite is free, with paid plans starting at $49 a year.

Pros

• Easy-to-use drag-and-drop builder, suitable for beginners
• Wide range of pre-built templates for quick form creation
• Integrates with popular platforms like PayPal, Stripe, Mailchimp, and more
• Offers advanced features like conditional logic, multi-page forms, and file uploads

Cons

• Free version has limited functionality and form fields
• Lacks advanced reporting and analytics compared to dedicated form tools
• Reports of occasional plugin conflicts with other WordPress features

WPForms Lite has the same interface as the premium version but limits users to only a few pre-selected form fields and formats.

What I like: All plans include a GDPR agreement option, reCAPTCHA security, mobile-responsiveness, and secure payment options like Stripe and PayPal.

6. Visme

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Like others I reviewed, Visme offers a drag-and-drop form builder that integrates with Zapier, Mailchimp, HubSpot, and others.

But Visme has one big differentiator: animations. While you may not think your form needs custom animations, their research found it can lead to 40% more conversions and 34% more form starts.

Pricing: Free basic plan, with paid plans starting at $12.25/month.

Pros

• Design-focused, allowing for beautiful, interactive forms with customizable design options
• Integrates with Visme's other design tools, making it easy to create branded forms
• Provides real-time analytics and data collection
• Ideal for presentations and reports, with easy embedding options

Cons

• Being design-focused, it may not suit those looking for advanced form features
• Limited access to templates and features on the free version
• Lacks deep integrations with CRM systems

With Visme, you can create appealing, animated, and interactive forms with its easy-to-use built-in templates and drag-and-drop functionality. The animations stand out from static lead generation forms that can quickly lose a viewer’s attention.

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What I like: Visme’s AI feature allows you to design interactive and professional forms with less hassle and best practices. Once created, Visme generates a link, QR code, and HTML code so you can embed the form on your website.

Once you collect data through signups, leads, and registrations, it populates the platform. From there, you can view, filter, or easily export data. Visme’s integrations let you set up a data flow between platforms.

7. JotForm

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Jotform is an online form builder with an intuitive visual editor, known for making form-building faster than ever.

Pricing: Free plan available, with paid plans starting at $34/month.

Pros

• Intuitive drag-and-drop form builder with a wide variety of templates
• Supports payment processing, conditional logic, and form automation
• Integrates with apps like Salesforce, Google Drive, PayPal, and Dropbox
• Extensive customization options and form analytics
• Option for HIPAA compliance on some plans
• Ability to create no-code mobile apps to collect and share information

Cons

• Plans have limitations on the number of form submissions and file storage
• Advanced features, like HIPAA compliance, custom branding, and larger submission limits require paid plans

The tool has all the standard form-building capabilities, as well as unique fields and tons of integrations. I like that I can play around with their form builder before creating an account. The free plan caps out at five forms, with up to 100 entries per month and 100 MB of file storage.

I find Jotforms’ capacity caps frustrating, but they make up for it with other features good for larger companies. Jotforms has a workflow integration to turn data into action. It integrates with Salesforce, which many competitors don’t.

What I like: Jotform also offers HIPAA compliance, a valuable feature for any healthcare provider. Other useful security features include user access control, SSO integration, and local data residency to keep user data safe.

8. Google Forms

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Google Forms’ unique selling point is that it’s fast, free, and easy to use, with unlimited forms and entries. It’s also built into Google Workspace, so it automatically pulls your data into a Google Sheet for you to analyze.

Pricing: Free with a Google account.

Pros

• Completely free, with no limits on form creation or responses
• Seamlessly integrates with other Google services like Google Sheets
• Simple, intuitive interface with real-time response tracking
• Supports collaborative form building and sharing

Cons

• Limited customization options for branding and design
• Poor data security for sensitive information
• Lacks advanced features like conditional logic and payment processing
• Fewer integrations with external platforms compared to premium form builders

What I like: I like how simple to use this tool is without limits on responses or number of forms.

Google Forms has limited design customizations, so forms created on it look less professional. This form builder tool is best for quick surveys or quizzes, rather than a lead capture form on your website.

Avoid gathering medical or financial information via Google Forms, since it isn’t created to securely store personal information.

9. Typeform

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Even if you didn’t know it came from Typeform, you will likely recognize the tool’s innovative approach of serving up just one question at a time. This approach is mobile-friendly and reduces cognitive load, increasing the chance of completion.

Pricing: Free plan available, with paid plans starting at $25 per month.

Pros

• User-friendly forms with a conversational, one-question-at-a-time format
• Customizable design options
• Integrates with many apps like Google Sheets, Slack, and Zapier
• Supports conditional logic and payment collection

Cons

• Free version is limited in terms of responses and features
• May require a learning curve for users unfamiliar with the conversational format
• Customized branding and advanced analytics are hidden behind higher-tier paid plans

I’ve used Typeform to create simple surveys for my book club and found it easy and fast. It’s easy to outgrow the free version, though, which caps you at just 10 responses a month.

What I like: Typeform has excellent logic and branching features that make it great for customer surveys and user research. If you want to create a form with an engaging and straightforward user experience, this tool is a solid option.

10. Formstack

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Formstack has built a SaaS platform focused on doing one thing well: forms. The tool’s best features include intelligent forms, built-in workflows, and seamless integrations with Amazon S3, Stripe, PayPal, Microsoft, and Salesforce.

Pricing: Plans start at $83 per month.

Pros:

• Versatile form builder with advanced features like conditional logic and calculations
• Strong integrations with CRM, payment, and marketing platforms
• Robust data collection and analytics tools
• HIPAA-compliant forms for healthcare use
• Security features, including compliance with SOC 2, GDPR, and credit card fields
• Designed for accessibility, with Section 508 and WCAG compliance

Cons

• Pricing can be high for smaller businesses or users needing basic features
• Steeper learning curve compared to simpler form builders
• Some users may find the interface less intuitive than competitors

While pricier than other alternatives, Formstack brings robust data security with a SOC 2 certification and HIPAA compliance. Powerful features include signature collection, saving form drafts, and data routing.

What I like: Formstack’s A/B testing tool compares different versions of your form to see which performs better. The tool also offers electronic signatures and payments, and users can save their form drafts and return to finish them.

11. SurveyMonkey

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SurveyMonkey is an online survey platform that lets users create and distribute surveys, collect responses, and analyze data.

It’s popular among businesses, educational institutions, and nonprofits for gathering insights and improving decision-making.

Pricing: Free plan available, with paid plans starting at $25 a month.

Pros:

• User-friendly interface with a wide variety of customizable templates
• Robust survey logic features, including skip logic and branching
• Strong analytics and reporting tools for data analysis
• Integrates with many apps, including CRMs and email marketing platforms

Cons

• Free version has limited features and responses per survey
• Advanced features require a paid subscription
• Design options are less flexible compared to competitors

What I like: SurveyMonkey provides a variety of templates and question types, including multiple-choice, open-ended, and rating-scale questions.

The platform integrates with many other tools, including CRMs, email marketing services, and productivity apps. A question bank and AI features help you to create a survey quickly and confidently.

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I was also impressed with SurveyMonkey’s analytics and reporting. Dashboards visualize your data in real time, and the platform tells you the average completion rate and time to completion.

Your Form Builder Tool Options Are Endless

Most form builders offer all the essentials needed to make a basic form, but not all offer customization, data security, and deeper data analysis. Ultimately, for you, the best form tool depends on your team’s purpose and particular business needs.

I’d like to call out Formstack for enterprise businesses. A little pricier but with lots of design options and security features, I think it’ll meet your needs and provide lots of value.

And I’d highlight HubSpot’s form builder because it offers lots of features and can scale with your business. Startups and small businesses can start with the free plan and move up as your business needs grow.

With the right form, you can collect leads, prompt feedback, and grow your business.

Editor's Note: This post was originally published in April 2019 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

With Christmas just around the corner, it’s the time of the year to create a beautiful greeting card design for friends and family. We’ve collected the perfect Christmas card templates to help you create a stunning Christmas card design in Photoshop.

Most people usually just tag everyone on a Facebook post to wish them a Happy Christmas. But nothing beats a good old-fashioned Christmas card you can post to everyone to show how much you care (and appreciate the important people in your life). A thoughtful greeting card says a lot about a person!

There’s no need to buy Christmas cards in bulk. You can actually make your own using a simple Christmas card template. We’ve collected a bunch of amazing Christmas card templates you can easily download and customize with Photoshop to personalize the design as your own!

6 Simple Christmas Card & Holiday Card Templates

Show off your festive spirit with these six beautiful Christmas card templates. Easily customizable with Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop, these templates offer a simple layout, editable text, image and color, and include a print-ready 300 DPI CMYK. Choose your style, pop in your favorite photo via smart object, and spread some holiday cheer!

Festive Christmas Photo Card Templates

This Christmas card template pack offers you five unique and modern designs for your holiday greetings. Easily customizable for color, text, and image, it comes with high-quality vector files compatible with Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop. Sized at 5×7 inches with a bleed option, the templates are print-ready at 300 DPI CMYK.

Elegant Christmas Photo Card Templates

A wonderful way to send seasonal cheer. With five different modern layouts, you can easily edit text, images, and colors of these Christmas card templates. They are provided in AI CC and PSD format files, boasting impressive 300 DPI CMYK print-ready quality.

Retro Christmas Card Templates PSD

Express holiday cheer in a unique style with these two retro Christmas card templates. Influenced by the mid-century aesthetic, they showcase delightful vintage-based illustrations of Christmas ornaments. These ready-to-print, A5 templates at 300 dpi, come in both CMYK colors, and formats including AI, EPS, and PSD. E

Christmas Family Greeting Card Template

Experience the joy of the festive season with this modern Christmas card template. Available in AI, PSD, and EPS formats, this template is perfect for customizing holiday invites, photo postcards, or festive flyers. Whether it’s a family reunion or a holiday gathering, add a personal touch and capture the spirit of Christmas with this card design.

Cute Christmas Card Templates Set

These cute and adorable Christmas cards will definitely help you create an amazing card that stands out from the crowd. The creative designs in these templates are not only colorful and beautiful but also help put a smile on your face. The bundle includes 4 different designs and comes in print-ready Photoshop and Illustrator formats.

Christmas Photo Cards Templates

Create a more personalized Christmas card using these photo card templates. This bundle comes with 2 different Christmas card designs. You can easily add a photo of your family into the design using Photoshop smart objects and print it out in landscape or portrait layout. As a bonus, there’s also an Instagram post template as well.

Modern Christmas Card Template

This Christmas card template features a bold and an elegant design that will surely attract anyone’s attention. It comes with a dark color theme featuring lots of Christmas-themed ornaments. You can edit the template using Photoshop and print in A4 or A5 sizes.

Cute Christmas Greeting Card Set

The Cute Christmas Greeting Card Set is a delightful pack of cheerful, cartoon-like designs perfect for the holiday season. Its versatile elements are great for scrapbooking, crafting, and party invitations. The set is available in EPS, AI, and JPG formats. Remember to keep an eye on our store for more charming illustrations!

Christmas Greeting Card Vector

The Christmas Greeting Card Vector is a charming collection of four gold and silver festive card designs. Featuring traditional imagery of baubles, holly, and ivy, these entity-editable vectors come in AI, EPS10, and SVG formats. They offer great flexibility, allowing for customization in color, size, and shape to suit your personal preference or purpose.

Christmas Toys Greeting Card

The Christmas Toys Greeting Card is a charming collection of hand-drawn elements presented in a modern color scheme of pink, blue, and gold. Its versatility shines through its endless application – from greeting cards and stationery to textiles and packaging. Included are fully editable, easy-to-use vector files in EPS10 and AI formats along with a seamless pattern. Contact the provider for any queries.

Classic Christmas Cards

The Classic Christmas Cards collection features a set of nine beautifully crafted, vintage-inspired designs. With gold foil styling, delightful variations in color, and icons depicting Christmas toys, trees and snowstorms, these cards will surely spread holiday cheer. They can be used for various purposes, including postcards, posters, holiday backgrounds, banners, invitations, and much more. The collection includes nine EPS and JPG files, which can be opened and edited with Illustrator 10 or above.

Modern Xmas Card Template

Add a modern touch to your holiday greetings with the Modern Xmas Card Template. Featuring navy, red, and white hues along with engaging snowflake and present designs, it provides four Christmas card layouts in AI, EPS10, and SVG formats. Fully editable, it offers flexibility in color, size, and shape customization, making your festive communications truly unique.

Navy Christmas Cards

The Navy Christmas Cards are a festive mix of navy blue and red designs featuring a snowglobe, Christmas trees and decorations. Available as digital vectors with 4 different card designs, these files are completely customizable – easy to edit in color, size and shape. Formats include AI, EPS10, and SVG to give you total flexibility. These cards are a great way to send your holiday greetings.

Cream & Brown Christmas Cards

The Cream & Brown Christmas Cards are a collection of festive designs featuring abstract patterns in warm shades of brown, cream, and pink. Offered in AI, EPS10, and SVG formats, these fully editable vector files make customization a breeze, allowing you to play with size, color, and shape. With four distinct designs, this set brings a chic and unique touch to Christmas greetings.

Colorful Christmas Card Template

This Christmas card is appropriate for all audiences. Which means you can send it to everyone in your family and friends. It features smart objects to let you easily customize the design, text, and colors however you like.

Minimal Christmas Card Template

A quite an original Christmas card template that features a minimalist and a dark color theme. The minimalism certainly adds a more elegant look to this card design, making it best for sending to your co-workers, employees, and even to your boss.

Red Christmas Card Template

This template is also available in A4 and A5 sizes. The bright red and colorful design makes it certainly more attractive than most other cards. It can be easily customized with Photoshop as well.

White Christmas Card Template

If you’re preparing to celebrate a white Christmas, this template will be perfect to spread the same feeling and the season of joy with your friends and family. It comes to you as an editable PSD file.

Fun Christmas Card Template

This unique Christmas card template features an attractive design that makes it almost look and feel like a design out of a Christmas sweater. It’s available as a fully layered PSD file featuring smart objects.

Reindeer Christmas Card Template

This Christmas card template will definitely grab the attention of the younger audience. The adorable reindeers on the front give it a fun and entertaining look to the card design.

Simple Christmas Card Templates

A set of minimal and simple Christmas card templates featuring different styles of designs. The templates are available in 4 x 6 size and in both Photoshop and Illustrator formats. You’ll be able to customize the design, colors, and shapes to your preference.

Elegant Christmas Card Template

An elegant and a beautiful Christmas card template that will make your card stand out from all the other cards out there. This template is perfect for sending season greetings to all kinds of audiences while also showing off class.

Unique Christmas Card Template

Another minimalist and creative Christmas card template that features stylish cutout design. All of the objects, shapes, and colors in the design are fully customizable with Photoshop.

Christmas Cards Templates Collection

This pack comes with 3 different card designs featuring unique illustrations, shapes, and colors. The template can be customized with either Photoshop or Illustrator and it’s available in A5 size.

Editable Christmas Card Template

An elegant Christmas card template that features a minimal design with a creative letterpress-style illustration. The template features smart objects and available as a fully-layered PSD file.

Pixelated Christmas Card Template

This card design comes with a modern layout featuring a creative and pixelated background. The template is easily customizable with Photoshop and it’s available in A5 and A4 sizes.

Creative Christmas Card Template

This creative and colorful Christmas card template comes with lots of Christmas-themed objects and ornaments all over its design. The template is fully customizable with Photoshop and includes free fonts.

Clean Christmas Card Template

A clean and a unique Christmas card template that features an unordinary design. This template is also fully editable and comes with smart objects, free fonts, and multiple sizes.

Christmas & Happy New Year Card Template

Get two birds with one stone by using this Christmas card template. This card will allow you to send greetings to both Christmas and the new year at the same time with one card. That’s smart thinking.

Joyful Christmas Card Template

Another colorful Christmas card template featuring seasonal designs, colors, and patterns. The template is easily customizable with Photoshop and its available in A4 and A5 sizes.

Kids Christmas Card Template

This fun and attractive Christmas card template is perfect for making cards for children. The design is simple and fun enough to attract a kid’s attention. You can edit it with Photoshop.

4 Vintage Christmas Cards Templates

If you’re a fan of vintage designs, you can use these unique templates to create a vintage-themed Christmas card that stands out from the crowd. The bundle includes 4 different templates in editable PSD files.

10 Christmas Cards & Backgrounds Set

This is a collection of Christmas-themed designs that can be used as both Christmas-cards or backgrounds for your various other designs. It includes 10 different customizable PSD templates featuring modern designs.