Google Forms vs. Square 9 Softworks

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Google Forms
Score 8.9 out of 10
N/A
Google Forms is an app for creating forms and surveys, and is part of Google Apps for Work. The product focuses on ease of use; the interface is similar to a document editor, with drop down lists of options and drag and drop question re-ordering. Users can embed images and video into surveys. Users can also program the question flow with custom logic. Google sends users basic summaries of the survey results automatically, or users can export the raw survey results data and analyze it via…N/A
Square 9 Softworks
Score 9.5 out of 10
N/A
For document-intensive companies looking to improve business efficiency, Square 9 Softworks develops solutions for process automation that aim to drive increased productivity across all business applications.
$50
per month per user (5 User Minimum)
Pricing
Google FormsSquare 9 Softworks
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
Square 9 Process Automation Essentials
$50
per month per user (5 User Minimum)
Square 9 Digital Transformation Essentials
$68
per month per user (5 User Minimum)
Square 9 Enterprise Essentials
$75
per month per user (10 User Minimum)
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Google FormsSquare 9 Softworks
Free Trial
NoNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeOptional
Additional DetailsOffered via a three-tier pricing model that allows customers to scale their solution up or down based on the changing needs of their organization. Pricing excludes professional services and implementation fees
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Google FormsSquare 9 Softworks
Features
Google FormsSquare 9 Softworks
Survey Format & Appearance
Comparison of Survey Format & Appearance features of Product A and Product B
Google Forms
7.9
Ratings
1% below category average
Square 9 Softworks
-
Ratings
Survey templates8.70 Ratings00 Ratings
Themes7.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Custom logo/branding8.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Survey Content
Comparison of Survey Content features of Product A and Product B
Google Forms
9.4
Ratings
10% above category average
Square 9 Softworks
-
Ratings
Changes to live survey10.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Question design help9.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Multiple question types9.20 Ratings00 Ratings
Survey Logic
Comparison of Survey Logic features of Product A and Product B
Google Forms
8.5
Ratings
3% above category average
Square 9 Softworks
-
Ratings
Survey logic flexibility8.50 Ratings00 Ratings
Survey Reporting & Analytics
Comparison of Survey Reporting & Analytics features of Product A and Product B
Google Forms
9.1
Ratings
11% above category average
Square 9 Softworks
-
Ratings
Response tracking8.90 Ratings00 Ratings
Data export9.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Standard reports8.80 Ratings00 Ratings
Custom reports9.50 Ratings00 Ratings
Analytics9.30 Ratings00 Ratings
Survey Administration & Security
Comparison of Survey Administration & Security features of Product A and Product B
Google Forms
9.9
Ratings
13% above category average
Square 9 Softworks
-
Ratings
Access controls9.80 Ratings00 Ratings
Compliance10.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Survey Distribution
Comparison of Survey Distribution features of Product A and Product B
Google Forms
9.1
Ratings
10% above category average
Square 9 Softworks
-
Ratings
Vendor-offered crowdsourcing9.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Respondent restrictions9.30 Ratings00 Ratings
Best Alternatives
Google FormsSquare 9 Softworks
Small Businesses
Square 9 Softworks
Square 9 Softworks
Score 9.5 out of 10
PowerDMS by NEOGOV
PowerDMS by NEOGOV
Score 7.0 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Qualaroo
Qualaroo
Score 6.1 out of 10
MSB Docs
MSB Docs
Score 9.4 out of 10
Enterprises
Verint Voice of the Customer
Verint Voice of the Customer
Score 10.0 out of 10
M‑Files
M‑Files
Score 8.9 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
Google FormsSquare 9 Softworks
Likelihood to Recommend
10.0
(0 ratings)
9.2
(0 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
10.0
(0 ratings)
4.9
(0 ratings)
Usability
9.8
(0 ratings)
6.5
(0 ratings)
Availability
10.0
(0 ratings)
7.3
(0 ratings)
Performance
10.0
(0 ratings)
7.3
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
8.0
(0 ratings)
7.9
(0 ratings)
In-Person Training
-
(0 ratings)
7.3
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
-
(0 ratings)
6.4
(0 ratings)
Ease of integration
-
(0 ratings)
4.5
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
3.0
(0 ratings)
7.3
(0 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
-
(0 ratings)
7.3
(0 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
7.3
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
Google FormsSquare 9 Softworks
Likelihood to Recommend
Appropriate Scenarios
  • Data collection
  • Formative assessment
  • Survey/questionnaire
  • File uploads (Can be limited to particular sizes or file types).
Inappropriate Scenarios
  • Lessons where you need instant feedback to answers rather than waiting for the whole form to be completed.
  • File Uploads where not all of the users have Google accounts.
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Square 9 Softworks is well suited for unique needs within companies. We have built, renovated, and optimized custom workflows within our archives, designed highly specific interfaces with our ERP platform, and Square 9 Softworks has answered the bell through it all.
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Pros
  • Capture of information from clients and/or consultants for real-time analysis.
  • Knowledge evaluation for our work team, the predefined templates allow the creation of tests and knowledge tests that are very didactic and easy to grade.
  • The acquired data is cleanly integrated with google spreadsheets allowing for fast and accurate analysis.
  • The form completion notifications are customizable and do their job well.
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  • The software is very flexible, and the technicians were great at implementing our customizations for the PO project.
  • While indexing fields in Global Search, the Key Free tool works great.
  • Global Search is well-organized. It's easy to navigate and find your documents.
  • The process for completing your project was well done. Communicating with individuals at Square 9 who were responsible for different aspects of the project was easy.
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Cons
  • Edit view limits the questions as seen by viewers. The view function is nice to toggle between to see what the question will look like, but the edit view of some questions (like checkboxes) is confusing for the editor.
  • It would be wonderful to be able to assign responses to go to specific users. The user needs to go into the responses section and select the option to receive notifications, versus the owner of the form being able to do that.
  • Having a dependency feature for questions (in addition to sections) would be very helpful, so that if a question is answered a certain way, another question appears.
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  • Overall, it is not as stable as other software. Some errors could not be fixed, such as a form going forward without approval because a user pressed "enter" twice in a row.
  • I probably only use 20% of the functionality. Beyond that, I'd have to pay for development. We did that once, and the project that we paid for never was implemented. They allowed us to request a design before my time that was so complicated that they never got it to work. Once I came on board, I implemented a much simpler solution.
  • Our upgrade took much, much longer than expected, and was disrupted by so many software issues.
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Likelihood to Renew
I will definitely renew my use of Google Forms because I really like the ease of use and the number of tools that Google forms provide. I also love that I can administer a test in real-time and get results in a timely manner
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We are definitely renewing our SmartSearch. This is the only place all of our companies contracts and regulatory filings are kept. Our company would lose track of all expiring contracts if we did not renew. We would also need to spend many hours figuring out a new organizational system for all of our files, as well as savings the documents from SmartSearch onto the computer.
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Usability
The interface is simple and intuitive. The first time you use Google Forms, it has a built in tutorial that goes through all the basics. Most people can pick up how to use it with minimal support. There are some advanced features that require a bit more work but there are plenty of videos and directions online. Google has a great support section that is easy to follow
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The items I am searching for are easily found. They are found in at least 95% of the searches. The failure rate generally is related to another employees user error or a template error set up by our Square 9 team in house.
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Reliability and Availability
In the years I've used GoogleForms I've never ran into any issues with the reliability or availability. Google is a gigantic company with essentially limitless resources which makes it very easy to trust that I will continue to be able to enjoy the same reliability I've come to know and expect from GoogleForms
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Square-9 can get this product out to you in almost the same hour your order it. We got ours very fast.
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Performance
One of the things that comes as a benefit of the lack to create complex logic branching and truly custom design is that there isn't lot of room to bog down the software. GoogleForms has always loaded just as fast as my internet service and device would allow it. I'm not sure about front end integrations or integrations into the form itself, as I've never explored it, but on the backend, I've never had any issues with integrations channeling from GoogleForms from the GoogleForms's end of things.
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With the PDF projected viewer, the document retrieval-to-display can drag for a second more than some systems, and the capture workflow if you overload a server array can also drag, but those are the only two issues we've ever seen with this product, and they are not serious issues at all.
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Support Rating
I have not had to use Google Forms support - it's always worked as expected. However, with other Google products, I've always been able to find a plethora of resources for answering questions or dealing with issues. The benefit of Google is how widely adopted its products are and how robust its support is.
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Support is always extremely helpful and responsive. Whenever we have a question, it is simple contacting them and also setting-up an appointment, if necessary. Scheduling the appointment is easy and they are willing to talk on the phone, which is not always true with software companies. Their report support tools are also really east to use.
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In-Person Training
No answers on this topic
It would have been higher, but the training is a bit muted for the lesser qualified office equipment vendors who signed up as partners to sell and support it. The more experienced ECM vendors and customer end-users will find the training very good, but a bit slow.
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Implementation Rating
No answers on this topic
I think the implementation could have gone a little smoother than it did. Now that I know how to use the software, I could do it myself. I feel that as an organization, we could have been a little better prepared. If the consultant was more aware of what we were looking for, they could have assisted in setting up some workflows for us as per the contract. But because we were not prepared, the initial implementation process was a little painful. That said, adding a document management system to ANY business kinda means everyone has to re-think the way they do their work which can be difficult for some staff.
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Alternatives Considered
Google Forms is easy to use and affordable. The biggest benefit, however, is that our organization already uses other Google products heavily. Because of this Google Forms was our top choice. Some smaller departments in our organization still use other solutions, such as SurveyMonkey, but as a whole it has been helpful to standardize on a single product.
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SharePoint and Square 9 Softworks are similar in some ways and totally different in others. They both do workflow, although Square 9 Workflow gives administrators more options. They both have a repository, although Square 9 GlobalSearch is more structured in terms of customization. Using field values allows for more exact search capabilites. Square 9 AI tools allows administrators to get the correct data off the page more precisely with less effort.
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Scalability
GoogleForms lacks the ability for complex logic branching and the ability to truly design it in a custom manner. It's pretty obvious when you land on a GoogleForm that it is in fact a GoogleForm. This rating solely reflects the lack of flexibility which in turn makes it something that wouldn't usually be scaled. That being said, if needing to scale a simple solution, GoogleForms would be up for the job.
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The scale-ability is quite good actually, but you need competent sales/support folks providing it to you, so the scale is set right for the demands of your system use. Some resellers are not good at doing this, some are fantastic. If you are scaled correctly at first implementation, you'll be very happy with this system.
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Return on Investment
  • Google Forms provides us a vehicle to gauge faculty and student response to our online courses and their features in real time so that we can keep our courses updated for students and faculty who facilitate them.
  • Since Google is free, provides storage space, and provides Shared Drives (at least in our institutional account), using Google Forms helps us manage our data. We support over 400 courses with thousands of sections so Google Forms helps us manage the data coming out of these courses, mostly student and faculty feedback about what is working and what is not.
  • We encourage our faculty to use Google Forms to survey their students for prior knowledge, for interest inventories, and the like. It's incredibly nimble and useful for collecting data quickly and presenting results in easy-to-understand charts and graphs.
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  • Reduction in human error through manual data entry process now being automated
  • Reduction in cost due to automation allowing the function to not require a full time employee
  • Reduction in time spent performing the previous manual tasks. Example: on our consolidated shipment days, it could take doc clerk 2-3 hours to prepare master document package. This has been reduced to 30 minutes or less (depending on size of shipment and time needed for OCR to complete)
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ScreenShots

Square 9 Softworks Screenshots

Screenshot of GlobalSearch, which allows users to organize and sort documents based on extracted dataScreenshot of automated data extraction from documents using Square 9's AI-powered extraction tool, TransformAI.Screenshot of GlobalCapture, which is used to build workflows and automatically assign tasks to users.Screenshot of a front-facing Portal for new hires and applicants. This lets them fill out important employee documents such as job application, Direct Deposit and W-4 forms.Screenshot of the hiring and onboarding portal, where new hire documentation is completed.Screenshot of GlobalForms, which has new hire government forms such as I-9 and W-4 forms.