Client discovery questionnaire template
Great work starts with great questions. This discovery questionnaire surfaces the goals, audience, brand and constraints you need before you scope a project or write a creative brief - so you're working from answers, not guesses. Copy it below, or collect it from every client in a branded intake flow.
0/2 filled - the rest of the [prompts] you finish in your copy.
CLIENT DISCOVERY QUESTIONNAIRE From [Agency name] - for [Client name] Thanks for taking a few minutes. Your answers help us get this right the first time. 1. THE BUSINESS - In a sentence, what does your business do? - Who are your customers, and what do they buy? - What makes you different from the alternatives? 2. THE GOAL - What outcome does this project need to achieve? - How will you know it worked? (a number, if you can) - What happens if we nail it? What if we don't? 3. THE AUDIENCE - Who is this for, specifically? (role, context) - What do they care about? What's stopping them? 4. THE PROJECT - What are we making? What's in - and out - of scope? - Is there existing work or a brand to build on? - Any hard constraints (tech, legal, accessibility)? 5. BRAND & VOICE - Three words for how it should feel. - Brands you admire (and why) - and any you dislike. - Mandatories: logo, colours, legal lines, the CTA. 6. THE COMPETITION - Who else does this well? What would you borrow or avoid? 7. PRACTICALS - Budget range: Deadline: - Who approves the work? Who else needs to weigh in? 8. ANYTHING ELSE - What haven't we asked that we should have?
pick a version, copy it, or download as .docx or .pdf — then make it yours.
How to fill it in
Ask outcomes, not features
'What does success look like?' surfaces more than 'what do you want built?' - lead with the goal.
Make them name one audience
Vague audiences produce vague work. Push for a specific person, not a demographic.
Get the mandatories early
Logos, legal lines, the non-negotiables - surface them now, not at revision two.
Find the decision-maker
Ask who approves and who else weighs in - unclear approval is where projects stall.
Leave an open question
'What haven't we asked?' often surfaces the most important thing.
A filled-in discovery questionnaire
A realistic, filled-in version - so you can see what good looks like before you start.
CLIENT DISCOVERY QUESTIONNAIRE From Northwind Studio - for Acme Roasters 1. THE BUSINESS - We roast and wholesale specialty coffee to independent cafes. - Customers: cafe owners; they buy beans + brewing support. - Different: we train the cafe's staff, not just ship beans. 2. THE GOAL - A homepage that turns visitors into demo bookings. - Measured by demo sign-ups (currently ~40/mo). - Nail it: hit Q3 wholesale targets. Miss it: slow launch. 3. THE AUDIENCE - Independent cafe owners, time-poor, sceptical of "premium". - They care about sell-through; they're stopped by switching cost. [Sections 4-7 answered similarly - project, brand, competition, practicals.] 8. ANYTHING ELSE - We have a Q3 packaging launch the site needs to match.
Common mistakes
- Asking for features instead of outcomes, so you build the wrong right thing.
- Accepting a demographic ('SMBs') as an audience instead of a real person.
- Skipping budget and timeline, then finding a mismatch after you've scoped.
- Not asking who approves, so feedback later arrives from a surprise stakeholder.
- A wall of unstructured questions - clients abandon it half-done.
Collect discovery without the chasing
A questionnaire emailed as a doc comes back half-finished, late. Forge turns it into a branded intake form every client completes in one link - so the answers land complete, structured, and where your team works.
Frequently asked questions
What is a discovery questionnaire?
A set of questions an agency sends a client at the start of a project to surface goals, audience, brand and constraints before scoping or designing.
What should a discovery questionnaire include?
The business and its customers, the goal and how it's measured, the audience, the project scope, brand and voice, competitors, and practicals like budget, timeline and approvers.
When do you send a discovery questionnaire?
Right after a client signs (or during the proposal stage), before you write the SOW or creative brief.