Help A Newbie Out Please

I am brand new to Word Press and Gravity forms. My limited knowledge in web design comes from working in Wix & Shopify.

I work for a law firm trying to build a form to complete an intake process for a charity initiative. I have few hurdles I am trying to overcome.

  1. Dynamic Population/Merge Tags. I have a couple fields where I would like user information from another field to pass through to another as a default response in a few different places in the form. How do I make this happen? I’ve searched and read multiple articles, but none of the solutions I’ve tried have worked. With the merge tags, when there is a drop down list to choose from, none of my fields are there as an option if the Merge Tag drop down is available at all. (This is my biggest hang up.)

  2. I have a field that asks for the user SSN. Figured out how to hide the input, but I would like option for the user to be able to see what they are typing and the data to change to asterisks after they click out of the field. Is this possible? If so how?

  3. Custom CSS styling. I am trying to do some basic formatting. Left half/right half kind of stuff. Is that formatting supposed to show up in the form preview?

  1. Is there way to embed the form shortcode into a button so it opens up as a new window/page rather than being directly on the page. Our initiative involves a couple of in depth forms and I would like to not overwhelm site visitors.

Any help is appreciated. I have watched almost all of the Kori Ashton Gravity Forms series (all of the relevant stuff, should probably rewatch) and have also completed a class through Udemy.

Also if it makes a difference we are on a Pro License.

Thank you in advance!

Hi Louis,
I can help with some of these at least.

  1. Take a look at Gravity Wiz perks. They have some good add-ons and good support to help you achieve this more advanced sort of functionality.

  2. Probably looking at some custom jQuery/javascript to accomplish this. You would google something like ‘jquery field input mask’. It is not available out of the box afaik.

  3. I believe so, but not sure, but should be easy enough to test, just put the form on a test page
    and see if it matches the preview.

  4. Yes, you can put a button on any page and link it to a different page with a form inserted. You could set that button to target="_blank" to open a new page. This has nothing to do with Gravity Forms, but I think you’re asking if you can link directly to a form. You cannot. You can only link to a location where the form is inserted, so a page or even a popup.

Thank you for your response Simon! It is appreciate.

We are reviewing Gravity Perks, trying to see if the cost is worth it for us.

Really dumb question…how do I customize the script?

Testing isn’t matching, so I don’t know if I am doing something wrong or what.

With button, build the main page where I want the button or link and then build a nested page that the button links to have the form there? Is there a way to have page only accessible via the link or button?

Sorry for the additional questions. Like I said I had some very low level experience from personal interests, and my employer was like here you go, you can do this.

Not so sure lol.

  1. Gravity Perks is excellent and their staff are very knowledgeable and creative. I would highly recommend them.

  2. It’s not a dumb question but it is definitely more advanced. Based on what you’ve told me so far I think it will be a bit too advanced for you. It requires some more knowledge about WordPress and javascript and is not just an easy plugin you can install. Sorry.

  3. I tested preview and it does apply column styling like ‘gf_left_half’. I recommend the free wordpress plugin GravityWP - CSS Selector. It lets you add css classes through the admin and works in preview.

  4. For each form you want, build a page and insert the form. It doesn’t have to be nested, it just has to exist and have an address you can point to.
    Then build a page with buttons/links to all those pages. It’s basic internet linking - nothing special about wordpress or gravity forms, but maybe I am misunderstanding. I think you are expecting wordpress or gravity forms to connect multiple forms for you, but it will not. You need to build the individual forms and the individual pages and then make links between them. Does that help?

Thank you the help is very much appreciated. I have found plenty of resources on script edits/customizations, just not sure how to get there to do it.

I’ll keep working on the styling because I used gf_left_half and it didn’t work.

Yes that helps and it makes sense. I will figure it out. It’s just trial and error at this point. I’ve never used WP let alone GF.

Yep, you’re trying to do some stuff that requires a few levels of knowledge.
Here’s a guide on including your own custom js

For the styling, I’m guessing you have some other styles overruling your gf_left_half. Again this will require knowledge of CSS to fix. I can take a look if you share a link.

Thanks! Ill take a look at the link.

I don’t have the form published yet, so I don’t have a link for you. Unless you just mean the site I am working on. Which is pignatellilaw.com

Yeah I’d have to see the form to give any feedback.