As a B2B lead generation company, we talk a lot about leads in all our various blog posts, so it makes sense to discuss what information you are after, when you are collecting information from your leads.

Your lead generation forms can really make all the difference in your conversion goals. If it’s too long and you want too many details filled out, leads might not want to spend so much time on you. If you collect an email only, you are missing out on understanding your target group better. So what is the rule of thumb in this important question? Read on to find out.

The lead generation form is considered very important, as it’s the entire point of a landing page. Once you have information from leads, you can cater to their needs much easier and sub-segment your marketing campaigns better. Having a much higher conversion ratio equals more flesh-and-blood customers who actually want your product or service.

Of course if you’d like to follow up on more visitors apart from the ones that fills out your contact form - especially high-level decision-makers who will never opt-in to your email list - a clever tool as Leadberry can come handy. In this blog post, we aim to concentrate on lead forms themselves.

So what information can you and should you be asking for in your lead generation form?

Research shows that readers spend roughly six seconds gauging whether or not a website is valuable for them and hence whether or not they want to opt in with their contact details to receive newsletters and offers from your company. So make sure you take a look at your landing page with a fresh pair of eyes to eliminate anything unnecessary that might be confusing, distracting or cause stress among your visitors. Anything that might make them abandon your page.

Also, if you can put something into hyperlink format within your form, that saves time for your reader and avoids unnecessary distractions.

Research also shows that the best conversion rates come from forms that contain between 3 and 7 fields of information. If you want higher quality marketing leads, apply more fields; if you want higher lead volume, shorter forms are recommended. Asking more information however makes the qualification process better so higher quality leads will come in.

Information you may want to collect

The main purpose of collecting information from leads is to inform your sales and marketing strategies. It’s good practice to have a basic compulsory set of fields, and allow your leads to share information on a voluntary basis. You can do this nowadays with the ease of drop-down menus, radio-buttons or check-box opt-in fields. In terms of what you are asking for in these fields, the information should be coming from your findings on your market, based on research you have done with your potential customers.  E.g. you should test your assumptions and then include the answers as options in such a field, to validate your findings with the larger lead (target) audience.

So, for example, if you want to solve a marketing challenge and think your target audience is open to sharing this information with you, ask them on the ‘street’, and then include such an optional, open-ended question in your lead generation field.

Technically, the only real information you MUST have is contact details (email usually) for your leads. Beyond that, it’s really up to your goals to evaluate what else you are asking your leads to share with you. Ask yourself and your target group: “how valuable my offering and content is to you?” The more valuable it is, the more pieces of personal information they will be willing to share with you.

For most B2B companies, the name, email address and job title of the lead is a must have. Keeping in mind the above 3-7 fields rule of thumb for optimal conversation, you will be left with an addition 4 fields you may want to ask for from your leads. If, for example you ask for a prospect’s birthday, they expect you to use this information.

What influences the information you want to collect?

• What types of lead nurturing campaigns does your marketing department want to run?
• What does your marketing team need to effectively segment and personalize the marketing campaigns?
• What information will sales need to get in touch with a lead?
• What information is necessary to qualify sales leads? To secure more sales, more effectively?
  
  

You might also want to consider using smart forms, which basically pre-fill information for your leads, if a lead has supplied you with such information at an earlier campaign for example.

And finally: don’t forget to test your shiny new lead generation form(s) with your target audience. You might think something will work great, but find out otherwise. You can easily change things for the better; just pay attention to what your customers react to best.

We wish you a fruitful lead generation form building!