Hello everyone,
I need some guidance on creating a multi-step form with the following structure:
First Step: Basic Contact Details
- Just name and email fields to capture leads in our CRM system for follow-up campaigns, even if users abandon the form later
Steps 2-8: Detailed Questions
- Multiple fields and comprehensive questions
- Form submission triggers custom quote generation through our CRM
Steps 9-12: Application Completion
- Final steps to complete the entire application process
I’m thinking about creating three separate forms instead. However, this approach has a major issue - users would need to enter their email address three times. This creates a risk of them using different email addresses, which would break our CRM tracking and create duplicate records.
Has anyone found a solution for capturing lead information early while maintaining user continuity throughout a long multi-step process? Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
I deal with this workflow challenge all the time. Session storage works, but it’s fragile - users switch devices or clear browser data and you lose everything.
I skip that headache and use automation instead. Keep your multi-step form as-is, but set up a trigger that fires when step 1 completes. The automation grabs that contact data immediately and pushes it to your CRM as a lead, then keeps tracking them through the remaining steps.
Everything happens behind the scenes. Users have no idea their data’s being processed in stages. They bail after step 1? You’ve got the lead. They continue? The automation keeps updating that same CRM record with new data from each step.
I’ve built this for several lead gen funnels. It cuts out all the technical session management mess while giving you that early lead capture. Plus you get solid analytics on exactly where people drop off.
Check out the form automation workflows at https://latenode.com
We faced a similar challenge while developing our construction lead generation system. Our approach relied on utilizing browser localStorage combined with progressive data collection. The moment users finish step 1, we save their contact information to localStorage and immediately send it to our CRM as a partial lead. Each subsequent step then updates localStorage and provides incremental updates to the CRM record. It’s crucial to implement solid data validation throughout to maintain consistency. We also included a hidden field with a unique session ID to track users across all steps. This method eliminated the need for multiple entries, allowing for early lead capture. As a result, our conversion rates increased significantly, while the sales team appreciated having access to preliminary contact information, even from incomplete forms.
I encountered a similar issue while creating forms for our insurance quotes platform. What worked for us was implementing session-based persistence with a single form flow. After users submit step 1 with their contact information, we immediately push that data to our CRM as a lead. We then store the rest of the information either in session storage or in a temporary database table linked to their session ID. This way, even if they abandon the form midway, you still retain their contact details. If they complete the process, we simply update their CRM record with the full application. The key is to ensure that step 1 serves a dual purpose: it captures the lead and initiates the form, rather than treating these as separate steps. Most form builders can accommodate this through conditional logic and session management.