SurveyCTO is built to handle the world’s most demanding data collection environments with ease. We also know that truly impactful work can require customizing forms tailored to the exact realities of your project.
Field plug-ins represent the next level of SurveyCTO’s flexibility. Think of them as a way to customize respondent experiences and extend native field functionality whenever your project requires a unique solution.
In this webinar, SurveyCTO Customer Research Advisor, Mofya Phiri, shows you how to use these powerful extensions to build a more intuitive, efficient, and sophisticated data collection ecosystem. Watch to learn:
- How field plug-ins work
- How to find, download, and install them
- How to easily create and customize them—without any coding experience
- The debut of the official SurveyCTO AI agent skill, which can be used, among many other things, to create and customize field plug-ins!
Key webinar takeaways
- Understand what field plug-ins actually are: A field plug-in replaces the default appearance of any SurveyCTO field with a fully custom interface—sliders, clickable images, drag-and-drop rankings, to name a few—while the underlying data type stays exactly the same, keeping your exports clean for Stata, Power BI, or any downstream tool.
- Discover how the SurveyCTO AI agent skill greatly simplifies field plug-in creation and customization: With the skill installed on a desktop AI agent (like Claude Cowork or OpenAI Codex), you can describe a plug-in in natural language and receive a working, deployable file in minutes.
- Learn why the “junior collaborator” mental model is the most practical way to work with AI-generated code: LLM output is fast and capable, but it requires the same review you’d give any new team member before it deploys to a live deployment.
- If nothing else, apply this piece of advice: Always test your plugin on the exact physical device your data collectors will use in the field. Five minutes of device testing before deployment can prevent five days of debugging after data collection has already begun.
- Explore a catalog that’s already working for you: With over 50 ready-to-use plugins available—from WhatsApp message triggers and timed behavioral assessments to PDF generators—most teams can find and install something useful without writing a single line of code.
Time stamps
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2:45 – What are field plug-ins?
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4:41 – Why did we enable field plug-ins?
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6:51 – What can field plug-ins do?
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10:03 – Components of a field plug-in
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11:32 – Examples of popular field plug-in uses (like integrating with external apps, timing your surveys, inserting drag-and-drop elements, generating PDFs)
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17:23 – Demo pt 1: Find, download, and install plug-ins
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21:40 – Introducing the SurveyCTO AI agent skill and how you can use it to create/customize plug-ins
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23:23 – Brief introduction to AI agent skills concept
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25:32 – Demo pt 2: Create and customize plug-ins using the SurveyCTO AI skill
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37:24 – Best practices for using field plug-ins
Webinar resources
- Slide deck
- Get the SurveyCTO AI agent skill
- Register for our next live demo to see the entire SurveyCTO AI agent skill in action
If you have general questions or questions about our field plug-ins, our support team is available 24×7. Go to the Support Center and click on the link to “Submit a support request.” No question is too small!
New to SurveyCTO? Sign up for a free trial today to explore our solution and make use of our field plug-ins for a better survey experience. During the 15-day trial, you’ll have access to the entire platform.
