Insert links in your generated docs to files uploaded via Google Forms

If you add a file upload question in your Google Form, Form Publisher can add a hyperlink to the Google Form-generated document automatically.

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Goal: add a link in Google Form - generated documents automatically

With Google Forms, you can add a File Upload item as a question type.

Like the other question titles of your Form, if you have included a marker for this File Upload question in your template (from Docs, Sheets, or Slides), Form Publisher will be able to replace your marker with the answer from this File Uploaded button.

Specifically, in the generated document, Form Publisher will fill your File Upload marker from your template with the URL of the file uploaded from your form.

What you'll learn

The following tutorial will show you how to add links in Google Form-generated documents to uploaded files automatically with Form Publisher.

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Time to complete

Between 15 min & 30 min to set up.

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Prerequisites

Before beginning this tutorial, you should feel comfortable using Google Forms and have experience with Form Publisher's basic configuration (template, destination folder, notifications, etc.).

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Running a simple example

In our example, we are working in the Marketing department. We want to collect business cards from our Sales team (so within the same organization) on the different leads that they previously met on Sailair, a fictional B2B trade show about surface treatments in the sailing industry.

1. Create a Google Form with a File Upload item

Add in your form all the essential information you want to collect from the company and the lead (name, function, department, email address etc.).

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Include a File Upload item to let your Sales colleagues attach files to the Google Form in the form of images or docs of the leads' business cards. You can indicate the Maximum number of files (up to 1, 5, or 10), the Maximum file size (from 1 MB to 10 GB), and select which file types are allowed.

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2. Create your template in Google Docs, Sheets or Slides

Design it the way you want (or get inspired by the pre-designed templates from Google Docs) and add the markers in your template. They have to match precisely your question titles, as Form Publisher is case & space sensitive.

Our template (from Google Docs) looks like the following.

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Notice the marker <<Please upload your business card>> at the bottom, which refers to the File Upload item's question title from your Google Form.

Note: If you are using a Google sheet template, add the marker that will contain the link in a dedicated cell. Due to technical limitations, if you add other markers in the same cell, Form Publisher will remove them and only the link marker will be generated.

3. Configure Form Publisher

Select your template in Form Publisher, and set up the add-on on your Google Form as you usually do. If you need help in configuring Form Publisher, check our documentation.

4. Share the Google Form

Once it is ready, share the Google Form with the file upload item with your colleagues, and ask them to fill it out and upload the business cards. They can either upload it from Drive or their computer.

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5. Collect the leads information and business cards

Once your Sales colleagues submitted their form, Form Publisher will automatically generate the document with their answers, as well as the PDF (if you enabled this option):

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done That's it! You can now click on the link to open the file/business card.

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Note: All the uploaded files will automatically appear on a new folder in your Drive so that you can retrieve them easily.

A link to the file will be added on your responses spreadsheet as the answer to the File Upload item. As usual, you will also get the generated files URL (Docs + PDF) from Form Publisher.

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Side notes: What if my template is a Google Sheet or Slide?

In your spreadsheet

In the following example, we are dealing with internal orders for various IT facilities within the same company. We want to be able to download internal order summaries directly from the invoice.

To do the above, add on a specific cell in your template the marker that matches your file upload question in your Google Form.

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Once done, configure Form Publisher. Employees can then upload their order summary (in PDF format, for example) on your Google Form.

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In the generated file, the marker is replaced by a hyperlink of the file uploaded to your Drive, and you'll be able to click and download it.

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In your Slides presentation

In the following example, we send forms for job applications. In this form, we ask for information coming from the CV, and we also ask to upload it, and a photo to have a summary of the candidate's resume with a link to download it.

To do the above, add in a text box in your template the marker that matches your file upload question from your Google Form.

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