form-cro

Overview

What is form-cro?

form-cro is a specialized conversion rate optimization skill focused on forms that are not signup or registration flows. It is designed to help you audit and improve:

• Lead capture forms (gated content, newsletter, lead magnets)
• Contact forms
• Demo and sales request forms
• Application forms
• Survey and feedback forms
• Checkout and quote request forms

The core goal of form-cro is to increase form completion rates while still capturing the data that matters for your business.

Who should use form-cro?

form-cro is a good fit if you are:

• A marketing manager or demand gen lead responsible for lead form performance on landing pages and campaign funnels.
• A product marketer who wants forms to align with value propositions and sales workflows.
• A growth or CRO specialist running experiments on form length, field sets, and messaging.
• A founder or solo marketer trying to figure out why “nobody fills out our form.”

You will get the most value from form-cro when you already have:

• One or more existing forms embedded on landing pages, product pages, or checkout flows.
• At least some basic analytics (impressions and submissions) so completion and abandonment can be compared over time.

When form-cro is and is not a good fit

Use form-cro when:

• You need to improve lead form conversions on a landing page or campaign.
• You suspect there is form friction due to too many or poorly chosen fields.
• You want to evaluate field cost vs. completion rate and decide what to keep, move, or remove.
• You are planning tests on form length, questions, or order and need a structured approach.

Do not use form-cro for:

• Signup or registration flows (user account creation, onboarding). For those, use signup-flow-cro.
• Popups or modals where the main optimization concern is trigger, timing, or display behavior. For those, use popup-cro.
• Full-page UX or layout redesigns unrelated to form performance.

Key optimization principles used by form-cro

Based on the guidance in SKILL.md, form-cro works from a few core principles:

• Every field has a cost: Each additional field increases friction and typically reduces completion rate.
• Value must exceed effort: The perceived value of submitting the form (e.g., a demo, quote, or resource) must clearly outweigh the work required to fill it out.
• Business context matters: Fields are evaluated based on what actually happens with the submission and what data is truly necessary at this stage.
• Form type informs strategy: A short contact form, a detailed application, and a checkout form each have different acceptable levels of friction.

These principles are applied systematically, so the skill does more than suggest “make the form shorter”—it helps you decide which fields to ask for now and which can safely be deferred.

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How to Use

1. Installation and setup

To install the form-cro skill from the marketingskills repository, use:

npx skills add https://github.com/coreyhaines31/marketingskills --skill form-cro

After installation:

1. Open the skills/form-cro/ directory inside the marketingskills repo.
2. Start with SKILL.md to understand the full workflow and expected behavior.
3. Review evals/evals.json to see example prompts and how the skill is evaluated.

This setup gives you a clear reference for how form-cro should respond to real-world form optimization requests.

2. Provide product and marketing context first

form-cro is designed to factor in your product and audience, not just generic best practices.

If your project includes a file such as:

• .agents/product-marketing-context.md (current setups), or
• .claude/product-marketing-context.md (older setups),

the skill will look for that context first. Make sure it contains:

• Your core product or service description
• Target customer segments
• Primary value propositions and positioning
• Key funnel steps (where the form sits in the journey)

This allows form-cro to:

• Align form questions with actual sales or support needs
• Avoid cutting fields that are truly critical to qualification
• Tailor copy and value framing to your audience

3. Describe the form you want to optimize

When you invoke form-cro, provide as much detail as you can about the form:

• Form type: e.g., demo request, contact, survey, application, checkout
• Location: e.g., main pricing page, campaign landing page, in-app checkout
• Current fields: list every field, including optional/required status
• Performance metrics (if available): views, starts, submissions, completion rate
• Device split: desktop vs. mobile if you have it
• Known issues: e.g., users drop at a specific step, complaints about length, spam volume

Example prompt:

We have a demo request form on our main pricing page. Current fields: First Name, Last Name, Work Email, Phone Number, Company Name, Company Size, Job Title, Industry, Current Solution, Budget Range, and a "Tell us about your needs" textarea. Conversion rate is 3.1%. We mainly sell to mid-market B2B SaaS. Help us improve completion rate without flooding sales with bad leads.

4. How form-cro will analyze your form

Based on SKILL.md and the example evals, form-cro will typically:

1. Confirm context

   • Check for product marketing context files.
   • Clarify form type and where it sits in your funnel.

2. Apply the "every field has a cost" principle

   • Use field count impact data (e.g., a short 3–4 field form as a baseline; 7+ fields often causing a 25–50% drop in conversion) to frame trade-offs.

3. Evaluate each field

   • Ask: Is this field essential for the next step (demo scheduling, quote creation, support triage)?
   • Can it be:
     • Collected later (e.g., during a call or in a follow-up form)?
     • Inferred (e.g., company size from domain, industry from website)?
     • Made optional instead of required?

4. Prioritize fixes and experiments

   • Present findings in a structured format, for example:

     • Issue: 11 fields in a top-of-funnel demo form
     • Impact: Likely 25–50% reduction in completion vs. a shorter 3–5 field form
     • Fix: Reduce to essential fields (e.g., Work Email, Company Name, one qualifier)
     • Priority: High

   • Group recommendations into:

     • Quick Wins
     • High-Impact Changes
     • Test Ideas

5. Implement changes and run tests

Once you have recommendations from form-cro:

1. Decide your minimum viable set of fields

   • Keep only what you need to act on the submission.
   • Move nice-to-have questions to later in the journey.

2. Adjust your form implementation

   • Update your frontend or form builder (e.g., in your CMS or landing page tool).
   • Ensure validation, error states, and mobile layout still work after changes.

3. Track the impact

   • Compare conversion rate before and after changes.
   • If possible, run A/B tests on:
     • Short vs. long form
     • Different qualifier questions
     • Asking for phone number vs. not

4. Iterate with form-cro

   • Feed new performance data back into the skill.
   • Use it to design the next round of experiments as you move toward your target completion rate.

6. Example use cases from the evals

The evals/evals.json file shows how form-cro is expected to behave.

• Overloaded demo form: When given a long demo request form with many fields and a low conversion rate, form-cro should:

  • Check for product marketing context.
  • Explicitly apply the "every field has a cost" principle.
  • Reference field count impact data.
  • Recommend a significantly shorter, more focused form.
  • Provide structured findings plus quick wins, high-impact changes, and test ideas.

• Simple contact form with spam issues (partial example in the repo):

  • Instead of just adding more fields, form-cro will consider other ways to control spam while preserving high completion—such as adding light qualification, better messaging, or backend filters.

These examples illustrate the level of depth you can expect when using form-cro on your own forms.

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FAQ

What types of forms is form-cro best for?

form-cro is best for any non-signup form where the primary goal is to collect information and get a submission, including:

• Lead capture and newsletter forms
• Contact and support request forms
• Demo or sales request forms
• Application or intake forms
• Survey, feedback, and research forms
• Checkout and quote request forms

If the main goal is creating an account or registering a new user, you should instead use signup-flow-cro.

How is form-cro different from general landing page CRO?

While general CRO might look at the entire page (hero copy, layout, CTAs, etc.), form-cro concentrates on:

• The fields you ask for
• The effort required vs. the perceived value
• The structure and order of questions
• How those choices affect completion rate and lead quality

You can pair form-cro with other skills or processes that optimize headlines, sections, and layout, but this skill is specifically tuned to form performance.

Does form-cro help me design forms from scratch?

form-cro works best when you already have a form or at least a draft set of fields. It can:

• Audit your current form and recommend changes
• Help you decide which fields are essential for your goals
• Suggest how to shorten or restructure a form

If you are starting with no form at all, provide your:

• Form goal (e.g., book a demo, get a quote, gather feedback)
• Where it will live (e.g., pricing page, post-purchase, campaign landing page)

and form-cro can help you propose a lean initial version that you can then refine.

How much can reducing fields really improve conversion rate?

The exact impact depends on your audience and offer, but form-cro is built around the documented idea that more fields almost always reduce completion rates. In the skill’s guidance, a short form of around 3 fields is a baseline, and forms with 7 or more fields can often see 25–50% lower conversion versus a streamlined version.

form-cro uses this principle to:

• Flag when your form is significantly longer than it needs to be
• Prioritize which fields to test removing or making optional
• Balance conversion rate against lead quality and sales requirements

Can form-cro help with spam or low-quality leads?

Yes, especially for contact and demo forms. While the main focus is reducing friction, form-cro also considers lead quality and operational realities. It can suggest:

• Minimal but effective qualification questions
• Better use of optional vs. required status
• Changes to wording that discourage non-serious submissions

For advanced spam filtering (CAPTCHAs, backend validation, IP blocking), you will still need your own technical implementation, but form-cro can help you avoid overreacting by adding unnecessary friction.

What information should I prepare before using form-cro?

You will get better recommendations from form-cro if you can provide:

• A full list of current fields and their required/optional status
• Any analytics you have (views, starts, submissions, completion rate)
• Device breakdown (desktop vs. mobile) if available
• A short description of what happens to a submission (who handles it, next steps)
• Your tolerance for lead volume vs. lead quality trade-offs

The more context you share, the more tailored and practical the optimization recommendations will be.

Where do I find the main configuration for form-cro?

Inside the repository, the main reference for how form-cro should behave is:

• skills/form-cro/SKILL.md

For examples of how the skill is evaluated and what good responses look like, review:

• skills/form-cro/evals/evals.json

Use these files as a guide if you want to understand or extend how form-cro operates within your own setup.