Typeform: Transformando formulários em conversas humanas

Making things a little more human

A faísca para o Typeform surgiu quando os fundadores estavam criando um formulário de lead que seria usado em um espaço de exposição. Você sabe, essas coisas que capturam seus dados.

They wanted to make it better than what they’d ever seen before. Instead of just building a standard form, they wanted to create something that would really jump out at people and engage them.

They detected a lack of empathy in the way most companies were asking for data. Going from face-to-face conversations to online forms seemed a very big step. People were still writing in boxes and clicking little buttons, which didn’t feel like a very human experience. 🙄

Inspired by the movie “War Games”, where the main character has a typed conversation with a mainframe computer, they figured they could create a form that feels more like a conversation.

Eles se propuseram a criar algo mais agradável do que preencher algumas caixas. Eles queriam remover a barreira entre humanos e computadores.

Years later, they summarized this in Typeform’s vision statement:

Make things a little more human.✨

Typeform believes that forms are not only about collecting the data you need, but also about controlling the impression you leave. Or as they tend to say: “How you ask is everything”. 🤯

Typeform puts human experience over data

A company’s DNA most often starts with its founders.

In Typeform’s case, the co-founders’ favorite way of spending a day is designing. That’s when they really get their energy flowing. 🤩

Its biggest competitor and the market leader, SurveyMonkey, is by DNA a data analytics company. Typeform is different. It’s a user interface company.

Of course the team does care about data. Otherwise they wouldn’t be creating software that collects data. But they very much have a “people first, data second” mentality.

They believe in being “data-informed, rather than data-driven”. Which means that they recognize the power of data, but will never completely let go of their gut feeling either.

It’s a matter of blending customer perception with conversion rates. Balancing feelings and facts. Gut feeling and metrics.

A Typeform coloca o design empático acima do design orientado por dados.

A equipe da Typeform às vezes diz que trabalha com HX, não com UX. Experiência humana, não experiência do usuário.

A experiência do usuário consiste em levar uma pessoa de A a B com sucesso. A HX vai além disso. Ela faz a seguinte pergunta: eles chegaram ao ponto B com uma conexão emocional?

A equipe da Typeform pensa em seres humanos. Pessoas reais. Quais são suas necessidades? Suas emoções?

It requires thinking about who the user really is. Getting close to them. Understanding them. 🤗

To this purpose, Typeform does a lot of customer research. And it’s not only the product team who constantly tests new ideas on customers. The go-to-market team as well is working on trying to get closer to customers, to understand where the value for Typeform really lies, what they really want.

In the end, emotional connection is what makes people fall in love with a product. ❤️

Typeform’s design is the result of relentless focus

Parece que esses caras da Typeform são gênios, não é?

While some of the software’s success could be attributed to intelligence and smart choices, it’s probably more the result of extreme focus. It’s the relentless investment of time and resources in a clear goal.

O que você vê hoje quando preenche um Typeform é o resultado da obsessão por centenas de pequenos detalhes durante um longo período de tempo. A equipe trabalhou incansavelmente em várias iterações, cuidando das menores partes da interação do formulário, uma a uma.

Ao se concentrar constantemente na usabilidade, no toque humano e no belo design, a Typeform reinventou algo que já existia há décadas. E eles continuaram aperfeiçoando e expandindo-o continuamente para manter sua exclusividade.

And it has served Typeform well. In a saturated market like form software, competing by copying what already exists would have been fruitless. Instead, Typeform produced something people wanted and weren’t getting yet: a beautiful way to build engaging forms.

They give us forms that don’t feel like forms

Put your hand in the air if you like filling out forms…

Yeah, I didn’t think so. 😏

We all need to communicate about data, but we don’t like forms. We want forms that don’t feel like forms.

Here’s how to make forms more human.

Taking one at a time

Typeform breaks the form’s interface up into smaller components. You don’t see a big list of questions, but only one at a time and it then has a natural flow of things coming.

Isso o torna mais gerenciável, mais motivador e mantém as pessoas mais engajadas.

Fontes maiores para conversas mais humanas

One question at a time means there’s more screen estate that can be used.

E, ao usar fontes muito maiores do que a média dos formulários, os criadores de formulários também são incentivados a criar perguntas mais diretas e mais humanas. E as pessoas que o preenchem dão respostas mais humanas.

No boxes, less buttons

Writing in boxes and clicking little buttons doesn’t feel very human. That’s why Typeform works with one line of text and a cursor. A question and a possibility to answer. That’s it.

Really like buttons? They’ll show it. But if you don’t want to touch your mouse and just use your keyboard, that’s entirely possible. Just hit “enter” or one of the shortcut keys indicated next to the answer.

Além do texto

Um formulário comum é uma folha de texto grande, solicitando mais texto.

O Typeform permite que você crie facilmente formulários com ícones, imagens, gifs e vídeos. Isso torna as coisas mais visuais. E, mais uma vez, mais humano.

Typeform cresce por meio de viralidade e integrações

Like all products that grow at the speed of light, its growth mechanisms are special and inherent to the product’s core use.

1. Viral growth: every form sent out is an ad for Typeform

People send people forms. These forms are beautiful. And they contain a subtle ‘Powered by Typeform’ mention.

Simple as that, but this button amounts to 50% of Typeform’s signups. 🚀

2. Integrations: people stay if Typeform is part of a workflow

Integrations are great for Typeform’s retention. If you just send a survey once, you might not need Typeform after that. And you might end up stopping your subscription. 🛑

As soon as you embed forms in a workflow, that all changes. You can’t just stop using Typeform. That would require replacing the form or even stopping the entire flow.

That’s why Typeform spent a lot of time on building out its integrations with MailChimp, Google Sheets, Zapier, … and why it allows you to embed forms in any website.

3. Branding: people only choose Typeform if they feel it’s different

A equipe da Typeform gastou uma quantidade enorme de tempo e recursos para entender e redefinir sua marca. E depois refizemos todos os designs.

They want to make sure that people understand the human side of the company and how they make forms more human. In that way, they want to grow beyond being just a software company. 🦄

E eles também querem começar a se comunicar claramente sobre o outro aspecto que o Typeform quer superar: ser apenas sobre formulários.

Typeform aims to grow beyond forms

From the very beginning, Typeform’s founders had a vision that was about making communication more human.

Eles começaram com formulários e se chamaram Typeform. Agora eles querem ir além disso.

Eles estão tentando deixar de ser vistos como uma ferramenta de formulário ou um construtor de pesquisas e passar a ser percebidos como uma ferramenta de comunicação. Em direção a uma comunicação humana em geral.

At this moment, you can use Typeform to organize surveys, feedback forms, quizzes, interactive stories, … but they’re aiming way bigger. 🔭

O Typeform permite que você tenha uma conversa por meio de uma interface. Você pode fornecer dados e conectar dados com o Typeform. Você pode criar fluxos de trabalho.

People will always have to collect information from other people. The question is how they’ll do that. It won’t always happen through a browser or a form. Among other things, the team is already looking at using AI, VR, and voice technology. Automatically organizing and transcribing conversations.

Typeform is all about creating conversational interfaces and figuring out how they’re going to replace the traditional point-and-click interfaces.

And they won’t stop until they reach their full potential. 🙌

Bonus: Typeform… what’s in the name?

Ever wondered what the name Typeform is all about? 😏

De acordo com seu cofundador, David Okuniev, refere-se a:

1. A capacidade de simplesmente digitar o formulário sem tocar no mouse
2. The fact that it’s a different type of form
3. A importância da tipografia em seu produto

Deseja conferir mais produtos icônicos? Leia a série completa aqui! 📲