What do your lead web forms look like and how much information do you ask of visitors? Did you know that the amount of information you request to be completed on a form can directly impact the quality and volume of those leads?

MarketingSherpa.com recently posted results of their survey of 1,745 B2B marketers in which they asked, “Which of the following tactics do you use to balance quality and quantity of leads?” The following chart reports the answers:

 

We all should be conscious of how detailed lead forms should be. These are the trade-offs that happen:

  1. Lower Volume/Higher Quality Leads – To obtain these kinds of leads, all of the several demographic fields are marked as “required.” This discourages casual leads from requesting information.
  2. Higher Volume/Lower Quality Leads – For this, you would only ask one or two questions, such as the lead’s name and email address. This encourages more leads to request information, but they are probably less motivated than those that were willing to fill out the longer forms in #1.
  3. Medium Volume/Varying Quality Leads – This is the middle ground between the two types of forms. In this, you ask all of the questions from #1 but you do not make all of them required. This way motivated leads have the option of providing more information, while you still can glean other leads who don’t want to fill out the entire form. You can target the more detailed leads first.

Now you can see how information request forms can have a big sales impact. Take a look at the forms on your landing pages and website to see where they can be improved to suit your needs and campaign results.


For more helpful marketing tips and information on effective marketing strategies for your business, go to www.lookingglassmarketing.com or visit the Marketing Know-How blog.