Ascend Strategy + Design is an award-winning growth marketing agency based in Valdosta, Georgia. Ascend’s mission is to provide the best strategies and tools to help clients reach their growth potential.
We sat down with Anne Shenton, Ascend Strategy + Design’s CEO, to learn how Jotform is helping them serve two of their clients while staying true to their mission of being your brand’s best ally.
Making business goals a reality
“A number of our clients are in the healthcare space and we started going deeper with Jotform when it came to one of our clients, Chancy Drugs,” says Anne. “They needed customers to be able to make COVID vaccine appointments through their website. And they needed it set up fast.
“Their site is hosted on HubSpot, and we needed to keep their existing platform in place. Because HubSpot isn’t HIPAA-friendly, we had to figure out another solution for the form and appointment scheduling.
“With the options that help with HIPAA compliance and feature-rich capabilities of Jotform, we were able to integrate Jotform with HubSpot and get the best of both worlds: Pull in contacts and select data for marketing purposes while protecting sensitive information.
“It’s a no-brainer to bring up Jotform’s capabilities, especially when we’re talking to clients in industries, such as financial services, healthcare, and tech, that have more strict data privacy and compliance regulations.”
An appointment scheduling solution in a short time window
Initially, Anne noticed that one of Ascend’s healthcare clients was using Jotform to collect new patient registrations.
She dug a bit deeper and learned that Jotform’s capability to help with HIPAA compliance, an essential data-collection feature for healthcare organizations, was a key differentiator for the platform.
“We started using it internally to gather billing information when onboarding new clients,” she says. “As our familiarity with the tool increased, we joined Jotform’s Solutions Partner Program.
“Chancy Drugs is a local independent pharmacy with multiple locations throughout South Georgia. Last year, they were receiving shipments of COVID vaccines on their doorstep without notice, because everything was happening so fast when the vaccine rolled out initially. Our challenge was to get a HIPAA-friendly vaccine appointment scheduler up and live on their site in a very short time window.”
Getting a HIPAA-friendly vaccine scheduler off the ground
An elegant appointment scheduler allows you to customize details like appointment durations, time zone and date flexibility, holiday and general time blocking, limits on the maximum number of appointments, reminder emails, and more — all within one form.
Such features allowed Ascend to meet the vaccine scheduling needs of Chancy Drugs and their customers.
“After some back and forth configuring the conditional logic and email confirmations, the implementation was smooth and very quick,” Anne says. “Since Jotform is so easy to use, and full featured, we were able to get their forms set up within a day.
“It’s been a game changer in terms of efficiency because I’m not sure what we’d have done if we didn’t have Jotform.”
Helping to make tax filing services accessible to all
Another one of Ascend’s clients needed sophisticated appointment scheduling to integrate with HubSpot. Tulsa Responds helps connect Tulsa, Oklahoma, residents with free tax-filing services, among other programs.
They looked to Ascend to build a workflow where community members could book a free appointment and answer sensitive financial questions in one form. Appointments are available remotely, as well as at 12 locations throughout Tulsa, each with its own custom schedule and reminders.
All form submissions needed to flow to and integrate seamlessly with HubSpot, creating both contact and deal records. This allows the Tulsa Responds team to track and update information as needed during appointments.
The versatility of the scheduling features within Jotform allows Tulsa Responds to adjust appointment schedules quickly if there’s a weather event, resource constraints, or a new location becomes available.
Powerful forms get it done
Working with Tulsa Responds allowed Anne’s team to flex their form-building muscles so the nonprofit could properly serve the community in time for the 2022 tax filing season.
“We got pretty fancy with the calculator properties and conditional logic for tax filing,” she adds.
“We set up a query that, based on the form submitter’s response, would select the specific tax document(s) they’d need to bring to their appointment. So for example, if you had a full-time job, you would need to bring a W2. Later, a text field would display those values. At the bottom of the form and in the confirmation email, the form submitter would have one list that told them ‘These are the forms you need to bring.’
“Filing your taxes can be complicated; this was all about making it as easy as possible for both the Tulsa Responds team and the community members they serve.
“It was an easy and elegant solution that I wasn’t expecting prior to the build.
“With just a couple of projects, we’ve learned a lot about the appointment scheduling capabilities. It’s a lot of fun to keep learning ways we can use the tool and expand our ability to serve our clients.”
In the end, Ascend launched the tax-consultation appointment form very quickly. It has resulted in hundreds of appointments made through the Tulsa Responds website.
Competitive viewpoint
Other, more expensive form tools might seem more sophisticated on the surface but don’t measure up to Jotform in terms of capability, security, and ease of use.
Anne Shenton, CEO, Ascend Strategy + Design
Conclusion
For an agency like Ascend Strategy + Design, getting data collection right is critical for their clients. After all, properly secured data has value that goes well beyond the initial appointment for the customer.
When organizations have a streamlined workflow for collecting, managing, and reporting on data, they can better understand customer data trends and improve efficiency.
All of that adds up to a better experience for their customers — a fact that isn’t lost on Anne and her team.
“For our clients, having a well-managed data trail is important. For instance, Chancy Drugs can follow up with customers who now need their booster shots, and Tulsa Responds can follow up with tax filers year after year because they have their records in place to continue to be a resource to those folks.
“Jotform has saved our clients days of work when it comes to handling data manually. It’s massive.
“The scope of the solution also gives them the chance to digitize a big part of their business that instead would’ve likely been done by hand. So Jotform is a huge solution win in that respect as well.”
Are you looking to solve a data-collection or workflow automation issue while enhancing your data management capabilities? Are you searching for a full-featured and easy-to-use tool to handle jobs big and small?
With data-collection and management solutions that support any type of organization, Jotform can be the most important tool in your toolbelt.
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