What an intake form is actually for
Most freelancers treat the first enquiry as something to respond to quickly and enthusiastically. An intake form changes the order of operations: the client answers questions before you invest a call, a proposal, or an evening of thinking about their project.
That does two things at once. It gets you the information you need to quote accurately — and it quietly filters. A client who won't spend six minutes answering eight questions about their own project is telling you something useful about how the next eight weeks will go.
You don't need software. A Google Form, a Typeform, or the questions pasted into a reply email all work identically.
The eight-question intake form
Copy this. The bracketed notes explain what each question is really doing — delete them before you send it.
1. What are you looking to have done?
Open, deliberately. You want their description in their own words, because the gap between how they describe it and how you'd describe it is where misunderstandings live.
2. What problem is this solving for your business?
The single most useful question on the form. A client who wants a new website because sales are down needs something different from one who wants it because the old one looks dated. It also reveals whether they have a reason at all.
3. What's your deadline, and what's driving it?
Two questions in one, on purpose. "End of the month" attached to a trade show is real. "End of the month" attached to nothing is a preference, and negotiable.
4. What budget range have you set aside for this?
Ask it directly. Freelancers avoid this question and then discover on the call that the budget is a fifth of the quote. Offering ranges makes it easier to answer: [under $1,000 / $1,000–3,000 / $3,000–7,500 / $7,500+]
5. Who will approve the work, and who else will give feedback?
This finds the hidden stakeholder — the founder's partner, the head of marketing on leave — who appears in week three with a different opinion. Knowing about them now is far cheaper than meeting them later.
6. Have you worked with someone on this before? How did it go?
The answer to the second half matters more than the first. "The last three designers didn't understand my vision" is worth hearing before you become the fourth.
7. What do you already have ready — brand assets, copy, logins, examples?
Half of all timeline overruns are missing materials. This tells you whether the project can actually start when they say they want it to.
8. Is there anything that would make this project a failure for you?
People answer this more honestly than the positive version. It surfaces the unstated expectation that would otherwise emerge at delivery.
Send it before the call, not instead of it. The form isn't there to replace the conversation — it's there to make the conversation worth having. You arrive already knowing budget, timeline and decision-makers, so the call is about fit rather than fact-finding.
Five answers that should give you pause
None of these is disqualifying on its own. Two together is worth thinking about. Three, and you should price accordingly or decline.
1. No budget, framed as flexibility. "We're open on budget, just tell us your price" sounds generous and rarely is. Clients with a real budget know it. Clients without one are often hoping your number will be lower than their unstated ceiling.
2. Urgency with no reason behind it. Manufactured deadlines are a negotiating position. They also tend to reappear throughout the project as a reason your terms should bend.
3. Every previous freelancer was the problem. Occasionally true. As a pattern across three or four engagements, the common factor is visible.
4. Vagueness that survives direct questions. A client who can't describe what they want after being asked twice will not become clearer once work starts. They'll define it by reacting to what you produce, which is unlimited revisions with extra steps.
5. Negotiating your process before agreeing the work. Pushback on a deposit, on revision limits, or on having anything in writing — at the enquiry stage — predicts exactly how the payment conversation goes later.
The one that isn't on this list: a small budget. A modest budget honestly stated is not a red flag — it's information. The red flag is a budget that stays hidden until you've done the work of quoting.
How to send it without sounding bureaucratic
The framing matters more than the form. Sent coldly, it feels like a hurdle. Sent as preparation, it reads as competence.
"Thanks for getting in touch — this sounds like something I can help with. Before we talk, could you fill in these few questions? It takes about five minutes and means I can come to the call with a realistic sense of approach and cost rather than guessing. Here's the link: [link]"
"So I can come with a realistic sense of cost" is doing the work in that message. It positions the form as being for their benefit, which it genuinely is.
If someone refuses to fill it in and insists on jumping straight to a call, that's allowed — but treat it as one of the five signals above rather than as nothing.
Common questions
Should I send an intake form before or after the first call?
Before. The form's value is that you arrive at the call already knowing budget, timeline and who approves the work, so the conversation can be about fit and approach rather than basic fact-finding. Sending it afterwards turns it into paperwork.
What if a client refuses to fill in the form?
Some will, and it is not automatically a problem — a referral from a trusted client, for instance, reasonably expects a call first. But treat refusal as information rather than as nothing, particularly if it comes alongside vagueness about budget or an urgent deadline with no reason attached.
Is it rude to ask about budget upfront?
No, and avoiding it costs you more than asking. Without a budget range you can spend hours scoping and quoting work the client was never going to pay for. Offering brackets rather than asking for an exact figure makes the question much easier to answer.
What tool should I use to build the form?
Any of them. Google Forms is free and adequate. Typeform is friendlier to complete. Pasting the questions into a reply email works perfectly well for a solo freelancer with a handful of enquiries a month. The questions matter; the software does not.
How many questions is too many?
Eight is close to the ceiling for a first-contact form. Beyond about ten, completion rates fall and you start losing enquiries you would have wanted. Anything you can find out on the call should stay off the form.