Guide Design and content
Request-a-quote forms that get answered
By Studio Swing
A request-a-quote form should ask for the few things you need to answer with a real price, and nothing else. For most B2B and service businesses that is four to eight fields: how to reach the person, what they need, how much of it, where it goes and by when. Mark which fields are required, put a phone number beside the form for people who would rather call, and say on the page what happens next. Before any of that, decide whether you need a quote form at all, because a buyer who could have seen a price and ordered will often go to a competitor who shows one.
On this page
- 01A packaging supplier with a long form and thin enquiries
- 02Do you need a request-a-quote form at all?
- 03What do buyers need before they will fill it in?
- 04How many fields should a quote form have?
- 05How should the form be laid out?
- 06Should people be able to upload files?
- 07What should happen after the sender presses the button?
- 08What a quote form will not fix
- 09Checklist: your quote form
- 10Next steps
- 11Sources
A packaging supplier with a long form and thin enquiries
This guide is for businesses that sell to other businesses, and for service firms whose price depends on the job: manufacturers, distributors, contractors, trades, agencies. It is about the form and the decision around it. How to show a large catalog is in our guide to putting a B2B product catalog online, and the wider list of what a trade site needs is in what a manufacturer or distributor website needs.
Say you supply cartons and mailer boxes to small manufacturers. Your quote form has fourteen fields: name, company, job title, email, phone, address, how they heard about you, budget, deadline, a message box that needs at least 100 characters, and four drop-downs. Ten are required. You receive a few requests a month. Half say "need boxes, please send prices", with no size, quantity or material, so you phone each one to ask what you could have asked on the form.
This business is hypothetical, and the pattern is common. The form asks for things that do not change the price (job title, address, how they heard of you) and omits the things that do (box size, quantity, material, print, delivery date). Visitors give up on the first kind, and skip the second.
A better form for the same business asks: email and phone, company, what kind of box, rough size, quantity, whether printing is needed, where it ships and when it is needed, with an upload for a drawing and a note field. That is eight fields, each one changing the quote. It is not shorter by accident. It is shorter because every field has to answer "what do we do with this?"
Do you need a request-a-quote form at all?
A quote form is the right tool when the price depends on something the website cannot know: a specification, a volume, an installation, a site visit or account terms. It is the wrong tool when the price and availability are known, because it adds a step.
Nielsen Norman Group's research with business customers found that prices were the most needed piece of information on B2B sites, and that people go to competitors when a site does not show them. They report that "request a quote" can deter visitors because it adds an extra step to finding a price. That research is from 2013 and 2006, and the buying behavior it describes, comparing suppliers before contact, has not obviously changed, but treat it as evidence about what business buyers say they need, not a measurement of any one site.
The practical choice has three parts.
1. Show the price and let them order for products with standard prices and availability. This is what people usually mean by B2B ecommerce: business buyers ordering online. Shopify's documentation describes its B2B tools as features for selling to businesses through the online store, including companies as customers, catalogs and customized pricing, payment terms and draft orders. A shop for trade customers can often handle this directly.
2. Show typical prices, and quote the rest. Nielsen Norman Group recommends showing representative cases with their prices, or price ranges, rather than hiding everything or building a calculator that asks for precise inputs, because simple examples let people narrow their shortlist.
3. Quote only. Fair when every job is truly different. Make up for the missing price by showing everything else a buyer needs to decide whether to ask: specifications, lead times, minimum quantities, certificates, how the quote process works.
Many sites need a mix: ordering for the standard range, a quote form for custom work and large volumes. Say on the page which route fits which situation.
Nielsen Norman Group's B2B research also points out that business purchases often involve several people, such as a decision maker concerned with cost and a user concerned with specifications. A useful quote form lets the sender include a colleague's email or download the request, so the quote can be shared.
What do buyers need before they will fill it in?
Nielsen Norman Group's B2B research states that companies must establish credibility before people will give out contact information, and that people are reluctant to complete lead forms. Put the evidence a buyer needs before the form:
- the specifications and sizes they would compare;
- a price indicator, such as "from" prices or typical orders;
- lead times and minimum quantities;
- who you serve, and what you do not make;
- how the process works: what you will ask, what they receive, how long a quote stays valid.
A visitor who has read this arrives at the form with a better request, which shortens your reply as well.
How many fields should a quote form have?
There is no magic number, and the honest answer is that it depends on what changes your price. A few reference points help.
For a general contact form, Nielsen Norman Group's guidance is to restrict it to three to five fields. A quote form legitimately needs more, because a quote depends on specifics. Treat that as a reason to add fields that change the price, not as permission to add the ones you would like to know.
Baymard Institute's benchmarking of ecommerce checkouts found the average checkout contains 11.3 form fields against about 8 that are needed, which is well above what most checkouts need. That is checkout, not enquiry forms, so it is evidence about the cost of unneeded fields, not a target.
Sort every candidate field into three groups.
| Group | Examples | Rule |
|---|---|---|
| Needed to quote | How to reach them, what they need, quantity, size or specification, delivery location, date needed | Ask on the form. Keep each answer short. |
| Useful but not needed yet | Company size, budget range, how they found you, job title, purchase order requirements | Leave it for the first reply, or make the field optional. |
| Never ask | Anything you will not use, a full postal address for a digital service, an account | Cut it. |
A few specific calls:
Budget. It helps a service firm propose the right scope, but it also puts some people off. Make it optional, and say why you ask.
How did you hear about us. Your analytics can often tell you. Our guide to tracking leads from your website shows how.
Phone. Some buyers would rather talk. Nielsen Norman Group reports that most users prefer to speak to a real person, and recommends forms supplement phone numbers and email addresses, not replace them. Show your number next to the form.
Account creation. Do not require it. Nielsen Norman Group lists it as a barrier that visitors avoid.
How should the form be laid out?
Most of this is the same as any form, and it matters more here because the form is the point of the page.
One column, labels above the fields. Nielsen Norman Group's form recommendations call for a single-column layout, related labels and fields grouped visually, and short forms. A CHI study they cite found 78 percent one-try submissions for forms that followed their guidelines against 42 percent for forms that violated them.
Real labels, not placeholder text. Placeholders vanish when someone types, strain memory and cause errors; Nielsen Norman Group recommends clear, visible labels outside the field. The W3C's accessibility tutorial adds that every field needs a label connected to it in the code, so screen readers announce it.
Mark required and optional fields. Baymard's testing in checkouts found that when only optional fields were marked, 32 percent of users hit a validation error from missing a required field. Mark both, with an asterisk for required and "(optional)" for the rest.
Hide the second-tier questions. Nielsen Norman Group describes progressive disclosure as showing the most important options first and offering the rest on request. In a quote form, "Do you need installation?" can reveal the site details only for those who answer yes.
Accept messy answers. Baymard found that users enter numbers in many different ways, with 89 percent entering them in several formats in its test. Accept spaces, hyphens and brackets in a phone number, and "500" or "500 units" in a quantity.
Let browsers help. WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.3.5 (level AA) asks that the purpose of fields collecting information about the user can be determined by software, which is done with the HTML autocomplete attribute for fields such as name, email and telephone. It also saves everyone typing.
Make it work on a phone. Many buyers will send the request from a phone on site. Use the right keyboard for email and phone fields, and test the form on a real device. Our guide to mobile design decisions covers more.
Should people be able to upload files?
Often, yes. A drawing, a spec sheet or a parts list can replace twenty fields and gives a better quote. Allow common formats, state the size limit, and offer an email address as a fallback. Also ask yourself where files are stored and who can see them, because uploads can contain commercially sensitive details. Tell the sender how you handle them in your privacy page.
What should happen after the sender presses the button?
The confirmation matters as much as the form. A message saying "Submitted successfully" says nothing useful. Say what happens: who reads it, when they will reply and what the reply contains.
Promise only what you can keep. Nielsen Norman Group notes users expect email replies within 24 hours. If you cannot meet that, state the time you can.
Send a copy to the sender, so they have a record of what they asked for.
Route requests to an inbox someone reads. Forms break quietly: an old address, a spam folder or a plugin update can stop messages arriving. Submit a test request every month, as our guide on why a website is not bringing in enquiries explains.
Count successful submissions as a key event, separately from clicks on the phone number, so you know which pages lead to quotes.
Stop spam without punishing real buyers. The W3C's note on CAPTCHA and accessibility explains that traditional CAPTCHAs can lock out people with disabilities, and recommends non-interactive methods such as spam filtering and honeypots where possible.
What a quote form will not fix
A slow reply. A buyer who waits a week for a quote has probably sent the request to three other suppliers.
An uncompetitive offer. A form can collect a request, and it cannot make your price or lead time attractive.
A catalog buyers cannot understand. If visitors cannot work out what you make, they cannot ask for the right thing.
Low traffic. With few visits, a better form converts a larger share of a small number.
Measure for several months before drawing conclusions, and ask new customers how they got in touch.
Checklist: your quote form
Checklist
- You have decided which products can be ordered or priced online, and which need a quote.
- Price indicators, specifications, lead times and minimum quantities sit before the form.
- Every field changes the quote, or has a reason you can state.
- Required and optional fields are both marked.
- One column, visible labels, no placeholder-only fields.
- The form works on a phone, and fields use autocomplete.
- A phone number and email address sit beside the form.
- A file upload is available if drawings or lists help.
- The confirmation says what happens next and by when.
- A test request reaches a monitored inbox every month.
- Successful submissions are counted.
Next steps
If your trade or service business needs a form and the pages around it, our B2B website design page covers the pages that lead to a form. For the catalog behind the form, read putting a B2B product catalog online. You can also discuss your project with us; no technical brief is needed to start.
Sources
Nielsen Norman Group, article author, "'Contact Us' Page Guidelines" (2019; three to five fields, forms supplement phone and email, no account requirement, 24-hour email expectation): https:/
Nielsen Norman Group, article author, "Pricing Information Gives B2B Sites a Competitive Advantage" (2013): https:/
Nielsen Norman Group, article author, "Show Prices for Common Scenarios" (2006): https:/
Nielsen Norman Group, article author, "B2B Usability" (2006; credibility before contact, reluctance to complete lead forms): https:/
Nielsen Norman Group, article author, "B2B vs. B2C Websites: Key UX Differences" (2016; several decision makers, representative pricing): https:/
Nielsen Norman Group, article author, "Website Forms Usability: Top 10 Recommendations" (2016; includes the CHI study figures): https:/
Nielsen Norman Group, article author, "Placeholders in Form Fields Are Harmful" (2014, reviewed 2018): https:/
Nielsen Norman Group, article author, "Progressive Disclosure" (2006): https:/
Baymard Institute, "E-Commerce Checkouts Need to Mark Both Required Fields and Optional Fields Explicitly" (checkout testing): https:/
Baymard Institute, "Checkout Optimization" (2024; average 11.3 form fields, about 8 needed; ecommerce checkouts): https:/
Baymard Institute, "8 Recommendations for Creating Effective Input Fields" (input formats): https:/
W3C Web Accessibility Initiative, "Forms Tutorial: Labeling Controls": https:/
W3C, "Understanding Success Criterion 1.3.5: Identify Input Purpose" (WCAG 2.2, level AA): https:/
W3C, Working Group Note on CAPTCHA and accessibility (non-interactive alternatives): https:/
Shopify Help Center, "B2B on Shopify" (selling to businesses through the online store, companies, catalogs, payment terms, draft orders): https:/