5 Google Forms Tips Every User Should Know!

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Google Forms is a great way to create easy contact forms, quizzes, samples, surveys, and so many other things.

So in today's video, I wanna share with you five of my favorite tips to get the most out of Google Forms.

Hello, everyone, Scott Friesen here at Simpletivity, helping you to get more done and enjoy less stress.

Email notifications for new Google Forms responses

And let's dive right in with tip number one, and that has to do with our responses.

Now, once you've set up a form and you've shared it with others, you can always come up here and click on the Responses tab.

And it gives you a great summary, whether it's a chart format and telling you how individual users or the group as a whole has responded.

But what if you can't wait or what if you want to reply to that individual as soon as they send the form? This is especially helpful if you're setting up a contact form.

Well, over here under the Responses tab, we wanna select these three dots. We've got this option to Get email notifications for new responses.

Now this is essentially just a checkbox. If I click on this, it has been unchecked, but if I come back and click on it, you can see that it has been checked.

Meaning now for every time that this form is submitted, someone submits this form, I'm gonna receive an email notification.

Now just make sure that you know that this notification is gonna be sent to this email address. Wherever you have created this form, that is where that notification will be sent.

You don't yet have the opportunity to customize or change the email address, but by selecting this, you will get an immediate response whenever someone completes your form.

Add Google Forms to your website

Now, speaking of completing their form, what about if you want to share this form in a different format?

One of the most common ways to share our form is to come up here and select Send, and we can either send an email directly, but probably more frequently, we are sharing this link.

And don't forget to hit the shortened URL option here. So you can share this via social media or it just looks a little bit cleaner.

So you can copy and paste this link and send it to those who you would like to fill out the form.

But what if it's something that you'd like to include on a web page, such as your website? This is very useful, especially if you're creating a contact form.

Well, the third option here is to actually embed your form. You can embed the HTML of your form.

Now, if you need to, you can try some trial and error with the width and height here to see what best suits the page that you're gonna paste this.

But all you need to do is select Copy, which is going to copy this piece of code and then bring it into your website editor or wherever you would like to include it.

So let me just delete this for a second. I'm just using a quick and easy HTML Code Editor to show my example here.

So I'm gonna paste the HTML here on the left-hand side, and we're gonna get a preview on the right-hand side.

So if I paste this, here you can see my form the way I've designed it. It's gonna be displayed just the way I like, everything from the formatting, the colors, and the behavior of that form.

So instead of creating a button on your website and instead of just creating a link, you can actually embed the form itself.

So they don't have to click anywhere else or go to a new page, they can fill out your form. All you have to do again is come up to Send, choose that last option, and copy this piece of code and place it on your website.

Create an auto-grading quiz in Google Forms

Now tip number three is especially for teachers or for those involved in training, or maybe you just want to quiz the people that you've been speaking with or who have been taking some of your training or reading some of your content.

You can turn any form into an auto-grading quiz, and this is all you need to do to make use of this. Here, I've created a quick and easy sample quiz with just a few questions based on this video.

So in order to do so, what I need to do is come up here to the Settings, and I'm going to choose the third option, which is Quizzes.

And I can say, "Make this a quiz." If I select this option, I get a number of different options down below. Number one, do I want to release the grade or release the scoring immediately after each submission? Or do I want to wait until I see it and then tell them when I've reviewed it and released their score?

Down below, we also have a few options in terms of what the respondent can see. Can they see the missed questions? Can they see the correct answers? And can they see the point values? You can determine what you want to allow those who are participating in the quiz to see. Make sure you hit Save before leaving this page.

Once you’ve saved this setting, come back to your form. Now, remember, I haven’t actually set this one up as a quiz yet. So now what I need to do is click on these questions, and down in the left-hand side, you can see, I want to click on the "Answer Key."

If I click on the Answer Key, I’ve got two options here. One, I can say how many points this question is worth. I’ll say that this question is worth five points. And next, I’m going to say that Yes is the correct answer. If they want to get the five points, they have to click Yes.

Come down here and say Done. Now I can see the point value here and this little check mark indicating what the correct answer is.

Let’s go down to this second question, which is different. It’s not multiple choice. I’m going to click on this, again click on the Answer Key, and I’m going to give this one, oh, I don’t know, I’ll give this 10 points because it’s not multiple choice.

Here I can add one or more answers as the correct answer. So in this particular case, I’m the one who created that video. So I can say it’s Simpletivity.

If you want to add other variations, maybe you think they’re going to have trouble spelling the name or if it's the first and last name or just the first name, you can choose to add multiple correct answers and say, "Mark all other answers incorrect."

I’m going to check that box and say Done. So here I can see the answer key when I’m previewing, or if I’m wanting to add more questions to this form, I can do that as well.

Now I can send this as a quiz, and after it is submitted, the person who has filled it out will receive that feedback immediately. They’ll see how many points they received and what the correct answers were.

Give specific questions based on Google Form answers

Now, tip number four is something that many of you have been asking me over the last several weeks and months, and that is, "Scott, can I use logic branching within Google Forms? Can I give someone some special questions depending on how they've answered an earlier question or something else in my survey?"

And the answer is absolutely yes. Let me show you how to do this.

Here, I've got a sample survey. The key to logic branching, or presenting other questions based on their earlier answers, has to do with sections.

So a reminder, on the right-hand side, the very last option is to add a section. You can add as many sections as you want. This is often used to break up your quiz or form into more manageable or digestible chunks. For example, maybe they answer three questions per page, and then they go to the next section.

To use logic branching, you need to create sections for the different places you may send respondents based on their answers. Here I have section one of two, which is the main quiz with a simple yes or no question. I want to send them to section number two if they answer No. If they answer Yes, the quiz or form is complete, and they can go on with their day.

Here’s how to set it up:

1. Add Sections: Create a new section by selecting the last option on the right-hand side.
2. Set Up Questions: For the main question in section one, click the three dots next to the question and select "Go to section based on answers."
3. Choose Actions:
   • For the answer “Yes,” select "Submit form" to end the form.
   • For the answer “No,” select "Go to section [number]" to direct them to the next section where you can ask additional questions.
4. Configure Subsequent Sections: After each section, you also need to choose what happens next. In this example, you can choose to submit the form after section one, but ensure the logic still applies if they answer “No.”

Let’s see it in action:

1. Preview: Click on the Preview button.
2. Test Responses:
   • If "Yes": The form will end after showing a thank you message.
   • If "No": It will direct them to section number two with additional questions.

By using logic branching, you can create dynamic and responsive forms that adapt based on the answers given, making your surveys or quizzes more engaging and tailored to the respondent's input.

Add video to Google Forms

Now, the last tip I want to give you today is about adding something that can really enhance your forms: embedding videos. Adding a video can often spruce up your forms and make them more engaging.

Here's how you can do it:

1. Add Video: On the right-hand side of your form editor, select the fourth option down from the end, which is "Add video."
2. Search for Video: You can do a video search directly within the form. For example, search for "Google Forms tutorial" if you're looking for a specific tutorial.
3. Select Video: Once you find the video you want, click "Select." The video will be added to your form.
4. Position the Video: You can drag and drop the video to the desired position on your form. For example, you might want it to be the first thing respondents see.
5. Add Instructions: While the video itself isn’t a question and can’t be graded, you can add instructions above or below it. For instance, you can write, "Watch this video and then answer the following questions."
6. Preview: Click the Preview button to see how the video will appear to respondents. They can watch the video directly within the form and then proceed to answer the questions below.

Embedding videos is a great way to provide context, instructions, or additional information, making your forms more interactive and informative.

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