I don’t think anyone in history has ever thought of filling out forms as sexy, but it’s a necessary evil for many a business or organization. Still, there’s plenty of room for improvement, and that’s where a la mode inc. comes into play — their FormMobi app aims to simplify the process of creating forms and getting them into the field where they’re actually needed.
Seeing FormMobi in action is actually rather cool (never thought I’d say that about a service that makes forms) — after creating a FormMobi account, users can log into the service’s online Form Base and use drag-and-drop components (think fields for the date, address, costs, etc.) to build a form. From there, that form can be accessed by a team in the field so long as they’re running the FormMobi app on their Android or iOS device.
Once the form is stored on the device, that field team can go about their business even without a data connection. As soon as they’re in range of a connection though, the filled out forms can be uploaded back into FormMobi’s cloud for further review and analysis.
The team at a la mode has a long history in real estate (over 26 years, they claim), and that becomes apparent thanks to the inclusion of features like a CAD-friendly sketch mode that lets users draw precise figures on a graph paper-esque background. The app also packs a freehand drawing mode for when things require a more abstract touch, and users can record voice notes and store location data to boot.
Though the company’s roots are in real estate, I can imagine plenty of situations where having a system like FormMobi’s in place would make things a hell of a lot easier. Take marketing research, for example — I was a marketing student in a former life and had to conduct my fair share of impromptu surveys. The process of getting people to respond was one thing, but some of most headache-inducing bits came when it was time to manually input all of that data into a computer. It was a frustrating, error-prone process, but a service like FormMobi could have taken some of the pain out of it.
The app is available in the iOS App Store and the Google Play Store now, but (as mentioned before) you’ll need a FormMobi in order to actually use it. The pricing tiers start at $9.99/month for 100MB of storage and a single user, and balloon up to $99/month for 10 users and 1GB of storage. It seems a little steep to me, but it may just be worth it if you’re tired of meticulously drafting forms and waiting for the team to keep you updated.