It seems like every day Google comes out with new applications. Suffice to say that it can be difficult to keep track of them all.
For instance, people are often confused about the difference between Google Forms and Google Surveys. After all, on the surface, it appears that these tools serve the same purpose.
Nevertheless, these applications certainly have different use cases and numerous different features as well. Before using either application, it’s good to understand what distinguished the two applications.
In this post, you can discover the most important differences between Google Forms vs Google Surveys so that you can use the appropriate application for your organization.
Google Forms vs Google Surveys: The Key Differences
Google Forms is a form builder that you can use to collect information from customers, leads, employees or practically anyone else. It’s extremely versatile in that you can create many different types of forms and then either embed them on your website or send them out with a direct link, like through an email.
Google Forms is free to use and has a selection of form templates that you can choose from if you don’t want to create a form from scratch. The forms can be customized in terms of color schemes, fonts, and of course, the questions themselves.
Google Forms’ editor is easy to use for beginners but advanced enough for expert users who want to tweak a form to perfection. It also has a conditional logic function, which is pretty much par for the course as form builders go.
It allows you to change which questions show up to respondents based on a wide variety of factors. For example, you can make it so certain questions only show up when a previous question gets a specific response.
You can also take payments with Google Forms, and it’s free to use as long as you have a Google account. With a paid Google account, you can access their customer support team.
Google Surveys is much different. While you can put together a survey with Google Forms, you can only show it to people on your website or on an email list — basically, to people you already know.
Google Surveys comes with a built-in audience that Google will show your survey to (for a price). While you will have to pay for the survey (you pay for each response), you’re guaranteed to get responses. Google uses a wide network of news and entertainment websites to put your survey in front of a target audience.
How Do Google Forms Work?
To access Google Forms, you first need to create a Google account, which is free. Once you’ve done that, you have access to all of Google’s apps, including Google Drive, Google Docs, Google Surveys, and Google Forms, among others.
Once you’ve navigated to Google Forms, you can immediately put together a form. You can either choose to create a blank form, or you can browse the template gallery to find a pre-made form that’s close to what you’re looking for.
For example, you might want to create an order form that accepts payments that you want to put on your website. There is an order form template ready to use that you can choose as a base for creating your own form.
Once you’ve chosen a template or created a blank form, you need to edit both the questions and the design of the form. At the top of each form, there’s a space where you can put an image (though you don’t have to have one). You can also change the background colors and the fonts through the theme options button at the top of the form.
Unfortunately, you can’t get super granular with the design, but you can choose a basic theme pack and font.
Once you’ve got your design set up, you’ll want to edit each question (or add new ones). There are many different options for each question, including the type of question, images or videos you want to add into the question, and conditional logic, where you choose if the question will be shown or not based on previous responses. You can also change the order of the questions, delete questions you don’t need, or make questions required.
The settings tab is used to add additional features, like a progress bar, the ability to collect email addresses, how many responses are allowed, etc. Finally, you use the “send” button at the top to either send the form to someone’s email, embed it in a website page, or created a link that people can click to take the form.
Related: 17 Google Forms Examples For Inspiration
How Do Google Surveys Work?
Once you’ve created a Google account and logged in, you can navigate to Google Surveys to create your first survey. You can view a number of example surveys or create a survey from scratch. The example surveys can be copied and used as a template.
The next step is to create the questions for the survey. You can add up to 10 questions, and the questions have a variety of formats that you can choose from, from multiple-choice questions to questions with multiple images to choose from to open-ended questions and more. Each question type shows you an example of what the question would look like and explains how the question type works.
Once you’ve chosen the question type, you’ll need to edit it to suit your needs. You might need to add and label images, select an order answer, and more. You’ll then need to save the question.
Once you’ve got all your questions put together, you’ll need to choose your audience. This is important because it plays a huge role in how much you’ll pay for each response. Responses can range from costing a few cents to a few dollars each, so it will determine your budget. If you need to survey a very specific audience, you’ll pay more. The same happens if you have screening options — those add to the price.
Once you’ve got your audience set up, you can choose how many responses you want, how often you want the survey to be given (the frequency), and then you have the ability to use a coupon.
Finally, you can start the survey.
Final Words: Choosing between Google Forms vs Google Surveys
In summary, Google Forms is the more versatile of the two options, but it is limited by the fact that you don’t get to choose a premade audience — you have to provide your own audience.
Google Surveys on the other hand allows you to create surveys and present them to a particular audience of your choice for a price.
That being said, if you are doing research and want first-hand data on a particular target audience and you don’t mind spending a little, Google Surveys is an excellent choice. However, if you would like to distribute a form or survey to people you know or an email list that you own, Google Forms is the way to go.
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