git:20260828.f80dcb5 to git:20260901.b973f20

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name: lead-capture

description: Converts anonymous traffic into known contacts — lead magnets, gated content, free tools, popups, and the forms behind them. Use this to design or improve a lead magnet, plan a free tool, add or fix popups and overlays, improve form conversion, or decide what is worth gating and what should stay open.

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# Lead capture

## What gating costs

Every gate trades reach for contacts. That trade is worth making only when the contact is genuinely

worth more than the reader — which is true far less often than it is assumed.

Gate: things with immediate practical utility that a buyer would use during evaluation — templates,

calculators, assessments, data. Do not gate: thought leadership, anything you want cited or shared,

or anything a competitor publishes openly.

## Lead magnets

The test is whether someone would pay a small amount for it. If not, it will not earn an email

address that gets used.

The best ones are things people *use* rather than read: a template that saves an afternoon, a

calculator that answers a specific question, a checklist for a process they are mid-way through.

An ebook that restates blog posts is not one.

Match the magnet to a stage. Someone downloading a beginner's guide is not ready for a sales call,

and treating them as if they are burns the list.

## Free tools

The strongest form: durable, earns links, and qualifies by use rather than by claim.

Build one only if it does something genuinely useful standalone, and keep the gate light — let

people use it, and ask for the email to save or export the result. Gating before value is delivered

converts a fraction as well.

## Popups and overlays

Popups work and are widely hated; both facts matter.

- **Trigger on behavior, not time** — exit intent, scroll depth, or a second visit. A popup at three

seconds interrupts someone who has not yet decided whether to care.

- **Once per visitor**, remembered. Repeated interruption is what generates the hatred.

- **Never on mobile mid-content.** Beyond the user cost, it is penalized.

- **Offer something specific.** "Subscribe to our newsletter" is not an offer. "The pricing

calculator" is.

- **One clear dismissal.** Hidden or tiny close buttons cost more in reputation than they gain in

conversions.

## Forms

Every field costs conversion. Ask for what you need to do the next step and nothing for a later one

— enrichment can fill the rest. Explain any field whose purpose is not obvious, since unexplained

fields are where people abandon.