Is it better to have more unqualified leads or less qualified leads?

Per our numbers, it seems like people are less and less likely to give out their personal information. Whether it be their phone number, email address, information about what they are looking for, etc… But fewer people are willing to do so. Phone orders continue to dwindle in all industries as people move to online ordering. But the end user is weary of giving out too much information online, scared of identity theft and having their information sold. Form abandonment rates are growing now too.

So where does that leave those of us trying to glean as much information as possible to help the end user and cultivate a rich lead database? Do you cut the questions on the form in hopes of getting more submissions, and getting your information in their hands, then attempt to follow-up to complete the  information (if you can get a hold of them again)? Or do you accept that your lead numbers will continue to drop, but it’s worth it to get information to make it a qualified lead?

We are in the midst of testing this theory. We are cutting one form to one entry to see if it will increase the completion rate.  If it works, we will succeed in increasing ad views and the amount of leads, but we will lose qualification information. Is this an acceptable trade-off? What are your thoughts? Have you done something similar? If so, what were your results?

Please share your feedback and I will be post the results of our test.