Creating a customer response form

[KelliInCali]

Hi... I am new to Outlook and need to create an email template which contains
a form with entry-boxes which allows the recipient to reply with required
info. Some of those fields will be pull-down list boxes, the rest will be
text-entry fields.

I currently have an Outlook template which has a pdf attachment showing
option images, and the required text is listed below as part of the message.
I want defined entry fields to replace the body-text entry format.

I tried creating a message form with control fields added, but when I send
it to myself I only see the message box, not the entry boxes or pull-downs.

I cannot find any decent tutorial on forms and templates. Any help?

tia,
kelli

 

[Sue Mosher [MVP-Outlook]]

This isn't going to work unless you are sending only to people who have Outlook and are in the same organization and you can publish the form to the Organizational Forms library on the company's Exchange server.

See http://www.outlookcode.com/article.aspx?ID=35 for general form design references.

 

[KelliInCali]

Ah, I see. Oh well, I guess I'll have to stick with the body text reply.
Thanks anyway!

Kelli

 

[dch3]

I'd look at doing something with Adobe Acrobat. I've haven't worked with it
personally, however I do know that its possible to set up form fields in a
*.pdf file, send the file and then when it comes back scrape the information
off. My organization is actually looking at using the technology to
automatically create orders from the forms.

David H

 

[dch3]

That said since Outlook can send HTML, you should also be able to create a
web page to create the information and then imbed the actual page in the
email message if its formated as HTML. You'd also want to include a link to
the online page in the event that the user's email isn't setup to
receive/view HTML content. Haven't actually done this, but it should be
entirely possible.

1) Create the page on your company's website to capture the information and
save it to a database or generate an email with the supplied information.

2) Once created, send out the page as HTML in the body of the message and
include the hyperlink to the actual page.