Forms that Work: Designing Web Forms for Usability (Interactive Technologies) (Paperback)

~ (Author), Gerry Gaffney (Author), Steve Krug (Foreword)
Key Phrases: social exchange theory, form look easy, privacy errors, Making Questions Easy, Persuading People, United States (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review

"The humble form: it may seem boring, but most of your website's value passes through forms. Follow Jarrett & Gaffney's guidelines, and you'll probably double your online profits." - Jakob Nielsen, Principal, Nielsen Norman Group

"This book isn't just about colons and choosing the right widgets. It's about the whole process of making good forms, which has a lot more to do with making sure you're asking the right questions in a way that your users can answer than it does with whether you use a drop-down list or radio buttons." - Steve Krug, Foreword author and author of the best selling Don't Make me Think

"If your web site includes forms, you need this book. It's that simple. In an easy-to-read format with lots of examples, Caroline and Gerry present their three-layer model -- relationship, conversation, appearance. You need all three for a successful form -- a form that looks good, flows well, asks the right questions in the right way, and, most important of all, gets people to fill it out." - Janice (Ginny) Redish, author of Letting Go of the Words -- Writing Web Content that Works

Book Description

A great source of form design information for web designers, most important in the new age of web services.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 199 pages
• Publisher: Morgan Kaufmann (November 26, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1558607102
• ISBN-13: 978-1558607101
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.4 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #143,686 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Instant insights, design forms that will work immediately!, November 26, 2008

By	M. Niederberger "Matthew" (The Hague, Netherlands) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

As a web analytics consultant I often need to dive into the world of Usability in order to see the big picture. Measuring shopping cart or sign-up form abandonment rates is only 'my' side of the story, trying to understand which checkout process are stopping a visitor from completing your form or process is the other half.

Caroline Jarrett's and Gerry Gaffney's book "Forms that Work: Designing Web Forms for Usability" gave me instant insights into the inner workings of forms. Using three layers of understanding "Relationship", "Conversation" and "Appearance" Caroline and Gerry explain in a very fluid style of writing how to design an effective form.

The books reads very easy, but don't be fooled. Even though it is not heavily filled with often worthless specialist jargon, it is filled to the brim with important definitions, visitor's perspectives, design techniques and case studies. Just like "Don't make me think" by Steve Krugg, this book is an utter joy to read! I highly recommend this for anyone wanting to get the most out of their online forms.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This missing chapters on forms from every other design book you've read!, March 7, 2009

By	Benjamin S. Boyle (Queensland, Australia) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Forms that Work are fantastic - both this book, and the forms you'll create after reading it! If you've ever read a book on web design and thought "I wish it had more advice about forms" this book will fill in all those blanks.

Caroline and Gerry write exceptionally well, and evidently practice what they preach. This book is a concise and enjoyable read, and absolutely packed with useful and practical approaches to form design, beautifully illustrated with examples and backed by the years of research they have conducted into how people really use forms.

It gets straight into explaining effective techniques to approach the design of forms - it's all about the conversation between a form and a person. But it doesn't shy away from sticky design details. Do you wonder about placing colons on the end of labels or not? Do you ponder whether to put your labels above or next to fields, right aligned or left aligned? Read this book. Caroline and Gerry's straightforward advice not only answers those questions (and more), the answers relate back to the customer and the conversation in a way that truly will make better forms. Forms that work.

Why are you still reading this review? Buy the book.
n.b. buy it here and you'll get to fill out some forms during the purchase! ;)

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Comprehensive demystification for forms on the web, August 1, 2009

By	Jessica J. Enders - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

The web design world has been lacking in a books focusing on forms for a long time, then along come two: "Forms that Work: Designing Web Forms for Usability" and Luke Wroblewski's Web Form Design: Filling in the Blanks. Both books are truly good but if you had to choose just one, I would recommend "Forms that Work", for two reasons.

Firstly, while Wroblewski comes from a general web interface design perspective, Jarrett has a forms background. This is important because as anyone who's read texts like Asking Questions: The Definitive Guide to Questionnaire Design -- For Market Research, Political Polls, and Social and Health Questionnaires and Measurement Errors in Surveys (Wiley Series in Probability and Statistics) will know, the exercise of collecting quality data is not a trivial one. In my opinion, someone with data collection expertise can apply that to the web medium more easily and effectively than someone with expertise in the web medium can learn the complexities of collecting data.

Secondly, in addition to specific advice about key aspects of a form's design, "Forms that Work" gives clear overall models for thinking about forms. These models enable the reader to make informed design decisions for cases beyond those covered in the book. This makes "Forms that Work" so much more than a reference.

Add to this the fact that "Forms that Work" is written in a conversational tone, has loads of real life examples (of both what to do and what not to do) and goes into just the right amount of detail, and you've got a extremely valuable resource for anyone who has to design forms for the web.