Collecting data through email

Does anyone know a good way to collect data through email? I wanna send emails to my clients asking them to rate products and receive the answer trough email. But I don't want them to have to write. I tryed to achieve this building a form, but when answering, the form came empty.

I'm thinking about placing a link in the email body, but I really would like them not to have to open a new window.

Anyone have an idea?

Thanks a lot, as always.

you will need to use a form.

you could have the form submitted w/out opening a new window though, by using javascript.

if you tried a form already and it didnt work, you must have done it wrong. forms in html email certainly work, we have all used them at one point or another.

im not too familiar w/ using html in emails, ive always stuck to plain text mainly, but id imagine w/ the enourmous amount of "security" software out there, and built into email clients, that some might disable forms in html email, and they definately limit javascript, which could make your forms unreliable.

i think it might be best to simply provide a link to a page on your website.

you could do

example.org/collect.php?form=price_quote&id=dfj654f5vsfv4sd

or something to that nature if you need to use different variations of the form for diff customers.

I couldn't agree more! There is no need for HTML in the body of an email message. If you need anything else than plaintext to be sent in an email, use attachments or links. HTML emails can (and IMO should) be considered as a security risk.

Hmm, enough ranting for today, I think.

One thing i would like to suggest is ... request him to send you formatted email. if your reply address is pop/IMAP there are lot of codes which will help you to read pop/Imap mails but assumption is he will reply your mail.

i made an html email with a form. when you open it, you can see the form and radio buttons working. the problem is after filling the form, you must reply the email to send the data and at this point the form resets to blank. I don't know if a submit button can be placed inside the email.

the problem with using links is that some of my clients can't access to my site because, in their offices, the proxy servers have it blocked. so i thought it was a good idea to collect their opinion using an email.

Just email them a link and have them fill out a form on the server. It's the best route to go for oh so many reasons!

-Tim

if you were trying to submit the form by having them reply to the email, that is why it did not work. you will need to use a submit button.

but again, that wont get around some users being blocked from the whole internet. if they cant follow a link to your website, they also cant submit a form to it from thier email.

you could just preformat the email nicely and leave spaces for thier questions/answers, but then if you want to automate things, youll have to parse the email, which is a lot of work, and will ultimately be unreliable.

i say, either read the emails manually, or use a link to your website. those are going to be the only solutions that reliably collect the info.

yeah, it seems like it. thanks to everyone for your help.