The Leads You Never Knew You Had | Pure Focus
Oct 30, 2026 · @Chad Engelke
Nobody wants to drop their name in your bowl
I've worked trade shows. You know the setup. A table, a banner, a prize, and a bowl or QR code that says "Enter to win."
Here's what I've seen. A lot of people walk right past it. They know what happens if they enter. They'll get sales calls and emails for something they never wanted. All they wanted was a shot at the free gift.
And the people who do enter? Many of them aren't real leads. They wanted the prize, not you.
We've all been trained on this. We're tired of spam calls and spam email. So when a business asks for our info just to enter a drawing, we see it for what it is: a gimmick.
That's the capture leak. People are interested. They stop by your booth, visit your site, take your card. And you walk away with nothing you can follow up on.
Give them something they actually want
The fix isn't a better drawing. It's trading something people want for their contact info.
Here's how I do it at events. I set up a photo experience. People step in, take a picture, and type in their cell number so the photo gets sent to them. They want that picture, so their guard is down. They're not entering a contest. They're getting something right now.
That's where most setups stop. Mine keeps going. The phone number goes into a CRM, and a second text goes out automatically. Something like: "Glad you stopped by. It was great meeting you. We'd love to keep in touch. Can I get your name?"
Then comes the next step. Say it's a home show. The follow-up might offer a free download, like the top renovations worth doing before you sell. To get it, they fill out a short form. Now you have a name, a number, and a reason to follow up that they asked for.
Will every one of those people become a customer? No. But you'll walk away with real leads instead of a bowl of names you can't use.
Your website needs a next step
We all work hard to get people to our websites. Then they get there, and there's nothing to do.
This is where I see the most leads get lost. A lot of business websites are just information. Here's who we are. Here's what we do. Here are our services. No call to action. No next step. So the visitor reads, nods, and leaves.
Even pages built only to capture leads lose most visitors. Unbounce looked at more than 41,000 landing pages in 2024. The median conversion rate was 6.6%. That means about 93 out of every 100 visitors left without taking action. And that's for pages designed to convert. A website with no next step at all will likely do worse.
My website gives people two things to do. They can book a call with me. Or they can take the Full Frame Assessment and find out where their business is leaking leads. Either way, I get their information and can follow up based on what they need.
Look at your own site. If someone is ready right now, what do they click?
Make your business card do something
Business cards are a little outdated. People don't keep them like they used to. But if you're going to hand them out, make them work.
First, put a QR code on it that goes somewhere useful. I've used mine a few different ways over the years:
A short video, so people can get to know me before we ever talk again.
A link to book a one-on-one call.
My website.
A text-to-join demo, where someone texts a number and gets walked through a virtual photo experience on their phone.
The point is the same every time. Don't just hand someone your name. Give them a next step they can take in ten seconds.
Second, use the back of the card to show what you do. Your front should have the basics: your name, phone, email, and company. But a company name doesn't always tell the story. Picture a card for an event venue with a name that could mean anything. Flip it over and there's a photo of a set banquet room and a plated meal. Now they know exactly what you do.
Capture the right people, not just more people
More names isn't the goal. The right names are.
You can't serve everyone. So decide who your target customer is before you start collecting contacts. Then build a way to sort them.
Say you only want to work with plumbing companies doing a million dollars a year. Ask questions that tell you who fits. The ones who match move forward and can book a call. The ones who don't aren't thrown away. They just get a different path, like an email follow-up instead of a spot on your calendar.
That way your time goes to the people most likely to buy, and everyone else still hears from you.
One more thing. Capture is getting harder. People don't fill out forms the way they used to. That's why the trade matters. Offer something people actually want in their hands. The ones who need what you do will take it. The ones who don't will skip it. Both of those outcomes help you.
Find out where you stand
Capture is the third of seven places businesses lose leads. If people are interested but you never get their contact info, you can't follow up. And they won't remember to come back.
The Full Frame Assessment scores your business across all seven. It takes a few minutes, and your results come by email.
https://purefocus.media/full-frame-assessment
Next up: speed-to-lead, and what happens in the minutes after someone reaches out.
Source: Unbounce, 2024 Conversion Benchmark Report, based on more than 41,000 landing pages and 57 million conversions.
