How to collect contacts at a trade show without losing half of them
Capture the minimum that lets you follow up, write one line of context immediately, and send the follow-up within 48 hours. Most leads are lost not at the booth but in the week afterwards, when a stack of cards has become a stack of names nobody can place.
Takes: Set up in 20 minutes, then seconds per contact
Before the event
- 1
Decide the three fields you actually need
Name, email, and one line of context. Everything beyond that is a field someone has to fill in while standing up, and each one measurably reduces how many people finish. Job title and company are usually recoverable from the email domain and a search.
- 2
Test the capture method on a bad connection
Venue wifi is congested and mobile data inside a hall is often worse. Whatever you plan to use, try it with the connection deliberately throttled. A form that hangs on submit loses the contact and the conversation.
- 3
Put the QR code at eye height, not on the table
A code flat on a table is scanned at an angle by someone leaning over it. On a stand or banner at roughly eye height it is scanned straight on, from further away, by more people.
During the conversation
- 4
Let them take your details rather than reading out theirs
Scanning your code takes one hand and three seconds. Typing their email into your phone takes both hands and thirty, during which the conversation stops. If your card can also capture a reply, the exchange happens in their time rather than yours.
- 5
Write the context line immediately
One sentence about what they asked. Not later, not at lunch: by the afternoon you will have had forty conversations and they will have merged. This single line is what makes the follow-up land, and it is the part every system leaves out.
Afterwards
Follow up within 48 hours, while they can still place you. Reference the context line in the first sentence so the message is obviously not a template. Expect a meaningful share of event leads to be unqualified; that is normal and is not a reason to delay the ones that are. If the contacts land somewhere that syncs to your CRM automatically, the follow-up happens from the system you already work in rather than from a spreadsheet you have to remember to open.
Common questions
Is badge scanning better than this?
It is faster and it gives you organiser-verified data, but it usually costs per scanner and the data arrives after the event in a format you then have to clean. The context line is also missing, which is the part that makes a follow-up work.
Should I collect phone numbers?
Usually not at a first meeting. It lowers completion, and a cold call afterwards converts worse than a referenced email. Ask once there is a reason to call.
What about consent and GDPR?
Someone handing you their details for a stated purpose is generally a lawful basis for that purpose, but it does not make them a marketing list. Say plainly what you will send, and keep the record of when and where they gave you the details. This is general information, not legal advice.