Best Practices For Lead Generation Forms
It’s very tempting, on a lead generation form, to require users to fill out every bit of information about what they are looking for and what they need from you. While this info would be great to have, the longer your form is, the less likely it is that anyone will fill it out. It’s better to build a basic two-page lead generation form.
Page one of the form should ask for basic contact information and all the fields should be required. Page 2 should ask for more specific info, but should still be brief. Four or five specific questions that narrow down what the lead is looking for should be fine. Be sure to make these questions optional, as many users won’t want to fill them in, but you still want to be able to gather their contact info, so you don’t want them to abandon the form entirely on page two.
Keep the first page of your form simple and easy to fill out.
A polite note on page two of your form explaining that you are only asking for this additional info in order to better prepare for a conversation with them may help with getting people to fill out these fields. Even if they don’t fill out page two of the form, you still have the contact information needed to follow up with them.
Once you have your initial form built, don’t be afraid to use the Formstack duplicate button to make copies and experiment with different versions of your form, wording questions differently or asking different questions entirely. Test multiple forms to find out which your users respond to the best. It’s also not a bad idea to have multiple lead generation forms on your website, each tailored to to a specific page or product on your site (assuming you have multiple products). If you have landing pages targeting different key words, doesn’t it also make sense to have lead generation forms on those pages tailored to those key words?
Speaking of customizing your form, don’t just copy a form from a website you like or a competitor. Don’t use a template. Make your questions relevant to your product and your company. Start with a blank form in Formstack and put some serious thought into exactly what information you want from your customers while trying to be realistic about what info they’re likely to be willing to give you up front. Only ask for the bare minimum amount of info needed for you to start a dialogue with this prospective customer.
Following these steps and best practices when creating your online lead generation form will help you get the best results. Have any other forms you want to learn best practices for? Let us know in the comments section below.
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About the Author
These posts come from a collaboration of multiple team members! Everyone from marketing to development pitches in to share some insight on small business, online forms, data collection, and all things awesome.
Very good article. “Customization is the key”.
I’d like to add:
“Average life” of such pitch pages is only 10-15 seconds. In other words you have to make sure your message gets there in less than 10 seconds and the reader is obliged to fill your form. Studies have shown that more than 50% of the readers give up when it comes to a “contact us for more information” kind of form that requires them to fill 5-6 fields; so keep the information you want to capture as short as possible. May be just email/phone and name should be more than sufficient. Use that information to later on contact and qualify the lead.
Thanks.
http://www.neverendingthoughts.com
We have found that although we could ask for much more information on our form that keeping it simple and on just one page has dramatically increased the amount of completed applications we receive.
Once you have your initial form built, don’t be afraid to use the Formstack duplicate button to make copies and experiment with different versions of your form, wording questions differently or asking different questions entirely. Test multiple forms to find out which your users respond to the best. It’s also not a bad idea to have multiple lead generation forms on your website, each tailored to to a specific page or product on your site (assuming you have multiple products). If you have landing pages targeting different key words, doesn’t it also make sense to have lead generation forms on those pages tailored to those key words?
What’s the best way to handle bot’s filling in forms? In the past I would just included a captcha to keep some bot from generating bogus leads in our sales database. But nowhere in your intro guide is that covered. Is this an intentional exclusion.
James
Great advice. We are in the process of creating better website forms to qualify leads. A two step process fits the objective perfectly and allows us to prioritize leads generated by placing a higher degree of importance on people that fill in the second form.