Lead-magnet funnel — capture to conversion

Set up a lead-magnet landing page, email capture, drip sequence, and conversion handoff that runs end to end

A lead-magnet sits at the top of most B2B funnels: a useful asset offered in exchange for an email address. The asset draws a reader in, the form captures the email, the drip sequence builds trust, and a clean conversion handoff turns the lead into a customer.

The funnel falls apart at the joints. A great asset behind a broken form. A clean form that drops the lead into a list with no follow-up. A drip sequence that never ties back to a real offer. This recipe sets up all four pieces in SGEN so the joints hold.

What is this for?

Use this recipe to build a working lead-magnet funnel — one asset, one landing page, one form, one drip sequence, one conversion handoff. End-to-end, top of funnel to first paid touchpoint.

The end state after setup:

• A lead-magnet landing page at /<asset-slug>/ with the offer, the proof, and the form.
• An email-capture form that delivers the asset to the inbox within a minute.
• A 5-email drip sequence sent over 14 to 21 days, each with a clear job.
• A conversion handoff — the final email or in-sequence CTA points to a real next step (call booking, free trial, product page).
• A dashboard view of capture rate, open rate, click rate, and conversion rate per cohort.

Good use cases

B2B service business. A 12-page guide answering a specific question the audience asks before hiring. Funnel ends with a discovery call CTA.

SaaS product with a free tier. A checklist or template that maps to the product's main job. Funnel ends with a sign-up link to the free tier.

Course or content creator. A short PDF or a 3-email mini-course tied to a paid program. Funnel ends with an enrollment link.

Agency growth program. A worksheet or audit template that scopes a problem. Funnel ends with a service inquiry form.

What NOT to use this for

• Pure newsletter signups. A newsletter is its own surface — no gated asset, no drip sequence. Use a simple form on the site footer.
• High-trust purchases. A $50,000 enterprise sale does not start from a gated PDF. The funnel for that lives in sales, not marketing automation.
• One-off promotions. A 24-hour discount does not need a 21-day drip. Use the black-friday playbook instead.

How this connects to other features

• Pages + SG-Builder — the landing page is a SG-Builder page. Build it from the brand's existing landing-page template.
• Forms — the email-capture form is a SGEN Form connected to an email integration. The integration is the bridge between the form and the drip sequence.
• Blog — the drip sequence often links to existing blog posts. The blog is the funnel's content backbone; the drip is the delivery rail.
• Media library — the lead-magnet asset (PDF, video, template) lives in the Media library. Upload it once; the form delivery email links to it.
• Custom Codes — open-graph image, tracking pixel, and schema markup ride on the landing page via Custom Codes.

Before you start

You are signed in as an Administrator. You have the lead-magnet asset finalized — PDF, template, or worksheet — and approved by whoever signs off on customer-facing content.

You have an email service integration set up (the form needs somewhere to send the lead). You have the 5-email drip sequence drafted or at least outlined. You have the conversion next-step defined — the call booking link, the trial sign-up URL, or the product page that closes the loop.

Where to find it

Steps

1. Upload the lead-magnet asset

Navigate to Media. Click Upload Files. Before uploading, toggle Convert to WebP (off for PDF — PDFs are not converted) and Compression (on).

For a PDF, the optimization is mostly on the source side — flatten layers, compress images inside the PDF before uploading. Aim for under 5 MB. A 20 MB PDF in the delivery email is a deliverability problem.

Note the asset's public URL. The form's delivery email links to this URL. Do not link to a /sg-admin/ path — those require login and break the funnel for the lead.

2. Build the landing page

Navigate to Pages. Click + Add New. Title the page with the asset name. Slug is short — /<asset-slug>/, not /marketing/2026/lead-magnet-q2-guide/.

Open SG-Builder. Start from the brand's existing landing-page template. The structure follows the brand's hero → benefit → proof → form shape.

Required pieces:

• Hero — 8 to 12 word headline that names the outcome, not the asset format. ("Ship a launch in 90 days," not "Download the launch PDF.")
• Benefit — 3 to 5 short bullets covering what the reader will know after reading the asset.
• Proof — one or two specifics. Reader testimonial, download count, named outcome.
• Form — embedded SGEN Form, two fields max (name optional, email required).
• Footer — minimal. No site nav. The page is single-purpose.

Save and publish. Confirm the page renders at the public URL.

3. Create the capture form

Navigate to Forms → + Add New. Title the form clearly — <Asset slug> — Email capture. The title appears in the admin filters and in the leads export.

Form fields:

• Email — required, validated.
• First name — optional. Adds a personalization hook later but slightly lowers conversion rate.

Skip phone, company, role — every extra field cuts conversion. The asset is the value exchange; one email field is the right price.

Set the form's Confirmation message to a short line: "Check your inbox — the guide is on its way." Do not pop a thank-you page; the inbox is the next surface and the user should go there.

4. Wire the form to the email service

Navigate to Forms → Integrations. Pick the email service the brand uses. Connect the form to a specific list or tag inside that service.

Two critical settings:

• Tag the contact with the asset slug. lead-magnet-launch-guide or similar. The tag carries through the drip sequence.
• Trigger a welcome automation that sends the asset delivery email immediately.

Send a test submission to yourself. Confirm:

1. The lead appears in the email service contact list within 30 seconds.
2. The tag is applied.
3. The delivery email arrives in the inbox within a minute.
4. The asset URL in the delivery email resolves to the actual asset.

If any of those four fail, fix before moving on. A broken delivery is the most common funnel failure.

5. Write the 5-email drip sequence

The drip runs over 14 to 21 days. Each email has one job. Skip filler emails — the reader unsubscribes from filler.

Write each email in the brand voice. No corporate filler. No false urgency. The reader subscribed for the asset; the drip earns the next step by being useful.

Set each email up in the email service as part of the automation. The trigger is the tag from step 4.

6. Wire the conversion handoff

The final email points to a real next step. Pick one of:

• A call booking page (Calendly, Cal.com, or similar) for a 20 to 30 minute call.
• A free-trial sign-up URL for a product.
• A product or pricing page with a clear CTA.
• A second, deeper lead-magnet that qualifies the reader further.

Whatever the handoff is, the link in the email should resolve to a page that matches the email's promise. If the email promises a discovery call, the page is a calendar. If the email promises a product trial, the page is the trial sign-up. The reader's click-to-conversion ratio dies when the landing surface does not match the promise.

Test the link end-to-end — click from the email body, land on the conversion page, complete the conversion action. If the test breaks, fix before launching the drip.

7. Add the tracking layer

Navigate to Custom Codes. Add the tracking pixel for whichever analytics or ad platform the brand uses (the codes go in the head or body of the landing page; check the platform's exact instructions).

Track at least:

• Landing-page view.
• Form submission (event-fired on the form's success callback).
• Drip-email click (handled by the email service's link-tracking).
• Conversion action (tracked on the conversion page).

The four events let the team compute capture rate (view → submit), open + click rate per email, and conversion rate (submit → conversion).

8. Launch and watch the first week

Publish the landing page. Push traffic — organic, social, paid, email-list mention. Watch the four events for the first week.

Realistic week-one benchmarks (the brand's real numbers will differ — these are the order of magnitude, not the target):

• Capture rate (view → submit): 5 to 25% for warm traffic, 1 to 5% for cold.
• Drip email-1 open rate: 60 to 80% (the delivery email is anticipated).
• Drip email-5 open rate: 25 to 45%.
• Conversion rate (submit → conversion): 1 to 10% depending on the conversion offer.

Below the floor on any metric is a signal to look at that joint of the funnel. Capture below 1% on warm traffic — the page or the form has an issue. Drip-1 open below 50% — deliverability problem.

What success looks like

After launch, week two:

1. The landing page resolves at the public URL with the open-graph preview correct on social.
2. A test submission delivers the asset to the inbox within a minute.
3. The drip sequence sends emails on the scheduled days with the right tag-trigger.
4. The conversion handoff link in email #5 resolves to a real next-step page.
5. The dashboard shows capture, open, click, and conversion events firing.
6. At least one lead has converted through the full funnel.

What to do if it does not work

The delivery email does not arrive. The email service is filtering, the sending domain is unauthenticated, or the form-to-integration connection broke. Send a test from inside the email service to confirm sending works. Re-check SPF / DKIM for the sending domain. Re-test the form submission.

The asset link in the email returns a 404. The asset URL in the email points at a draft, a removed file, or an admin-only path. Confirm the asset is in the public Media library and the URL resolves while logged out.

The capture rate is very low. The headline or the offer is not matching what the traffic source promised. Re-write the hero. Or the form is asking too much — drop optional fields. Or the page is too long; readers leave before reaching the form.

The drip emails have very low open rates. The "from" name is wrong, the subject lines are weak, or the deliverability is poor. Test from-name (brand name vs. founder name) and subject-line variants. Check the email service's deliverability report.

The conversion rate is zero after 100 captures. The drip is not making the case for the next step, or the conversion offer is too big a leap. Re-read email #5; rewrite if it does not clearly name the next step. Or insert a smaller intermediate step (a free 15-minute call, a free workshop).

Leads are not getting the right tag. The form-to-integration connection is mis-wired. Open the integration, confirm the tag is applied on form submit. Re-test with a fresh email.

Variations

Two-step funnel with a quiz. Replace the standard landing page with a short quiz (3 to 5 questions). The quiz result determines which lead magnet the visitor receives — a different PDF, template, or guide per result segment. The form is on the results page, not the quiz page. Capture rate tends to be higher because the quiz increases engagement. The drip forks per segment.

Gated video instead of a PDF. The lead magnet is a 20 to 40 minute video rather than a document. The form gates the video (the page shows a preview thumbnail; full access requires submitting the email). The delivery email contains a unique link to the hosted video. Trade-off: video is harder to update once distributed. Keep the source in the Media library and re-upload when the content changes.

Multi-step form with a second asset. Email #3 in the drip offers a second, deeper asset to readers who are still engaging. The link in email #3 goes to a second landing page with a second form. The second form tags the contact with lead-magnet-stage-2. The contact's tag history shows which assets they have received — the conversion handoff in email #5 cites the stage-2 asset directly.

Re-engagement of cold leads. Leads who downloaded the asset but did not convert after the 5-email drip go into a cold segment (lead-magnet-no-convert). Three months later, run a re-engagement send — one email, one question ("Still working on [the problem the asset addressed]?"), one small CTA (a free resource, not a sales pitch). Leads who click re-enter the drip at email #4.

Anti-patterns

Headline that names the format, not the outcome. "Download our 14-page PDF guide" is the format. "Ship a launch in 90 days" is the outcome. The headline determines whether the visitor stays on the page long enough to reach the form. Name the outcome.

More than two form fields on the capture form. Every additional field cuts conversion. Name + email is the ceiling for most lead magnets. If the brand needs company size, role, or a qualifying question for segmentation, add those as optional fields in the drip email sequence using a survey link — not on the capture form.

Broken asset link in the delivery email. The most common funnel failure. The asset link in email #1 points at an admin-protected path, a removed file, or a staging URL. Test the delivery email from a fresh email address with a logged-out browser before the funnel goes live. Repeat the test any time the asset file is moved or replaced.

Drip emails that are indistinguishable from each other. Five emails that all say "here's another tip from the guide" lose the reader by email three. Each email needs one specific angle — a different section of the asset, a customer story, a common objection answered, a tangential insight. Variety earns the next open.

Examples

B2B service business — discovery-call funnel. Lead-magnet is a 14-page guide on operational discipline. Landing page targets agency owners. Form is one field. Drip sequence runs 18 days, ending with a CTA to a free 25-minute call. Conversion rate runs 4 to 6% on warm traffic.

SaaS product — free-trial funnel. Lead-magnet is a template the product uses natively. Form captures email and asks "what tool do you use today?" as an optional segmentation field. Drip runs 21 days. Email #5 links to the product's free trial. Conversion rate runs 8 to 12% — the asset and the product use the same template format.

Course creator — paid-program funnel. Lead-magnet is a 4-email mini-course. Landing page mirrors the brand's main course sales page. Drip is the mini-course itself, sent on days 0, 3, 7, 12. Day 14 email is the program enrollment pitch. Conversion rate runs 1 to 3%.

Agency — audit worksheet funnel. Lead-magnet is a self-audit worksheet. Landing page is one screen. Form captures email and company size. Drip runs 14 days, each email a deeper view into one audit dimension. Email #5 is a CTA to book a real audit. Conversion rate runs 6 to 9%.

The funnel dashboard after a full drip cycle shows the four key metrics that tell whether the joints are holding:

Related recipes

• Newsletter signup flow — the double opt-in and form wiring used in the newsletter flow is the same pattern used in the lead-magnet capture form
• Customer onboarding emails — leads who convert through the funnel enter a post-purchase sequence; the two sequences should not overlap
• Black Friday playbook — if the conversion CTA in email #5 is a campaign offer, coordinate the drip window with the campaign dates

Related reading

• Form integrations
• Create a page
• Create and manage blog posts

Last updated: 2026-05-25