Should consultants automate proposal follow-up?

Automate reminders and task creation, but personalize high-value follow-up once buying intent becomes visible.

What CRM stage should trigger onboarding?

Closed Won should trigger onboarding workflows including intake, scheduling, invoicing, and workspace creation.

Can AI summarize discovery calls effectively?

Yes, especially when transcripts are paired with structured prompts focused on decision drivers and operational risk.

What is the biggest operational mistake solo consultants make?

Most fail to maintain a consistent client workflow between discovery, proposal, onboarding, and delivery.

How much should a solo consultant spend on software?

Many solo consultants can run an effective operating stack for under $100–$150 per month.

Template · Onboarding OS

Consultant Client
Intake Form Template.

An intake form is not a questionnaire. It is the information-capture layer of your onboarding operating system — the structured input that feeds your CRM fields, informs your kickoff brief, and triggers your workspace setup. Built correctly, it reduces the time from signed proposal to productive first call from three hours to twenty minutes.

Updated: May 2026 · 12 min read

Why most intake forms fail

The form should support the first real conversation, not replace it.

The most common intake form mistake: asking for information you could find yourself, or asking for information so specific that clients feel interrogated before the engagement has started. A 40-question intake form does not produce better client relationships — it produces friction that delays onboarding and overwhelms clients who are already nervous about a new engagement.

The intake form has one job: capture the minimum viable information needed to start strong. Every question should either (1) feed a specific field in your CRM or project workspace, (2) inform a specific section of your kickoff agenda, or (3) reveal a risk or constraint that changes how you approach the engagement. If a question does none of these three things, cut it.

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Feed the CRM

Basic contact, company, and project information maps directly to HubSpot contact and deal properties. This eliminates manual CRM data entry after every new client call.

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Inform the kickoff

Goals, current state, constraints, and stakeholders shape your kickoff agenda. The intake brief should be readable in 5 minutes and produce a focused, productive first call.

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Surface the risks

Previous failed attempts, internal politics, timeline pressure, and budget constraints are risks that change your approach. Discover them before the kickoff, not during delivery.

The structure

Six sections. Twenty questions or fewer.

The template below is designed to be completed in 12–18 minutes. It covers six categories with specific questions written in the plain language a client will actually answer. Adapt the questions to your specific practice — the structure is the non-negotiable part.

Section 1

Contact & context

CRM feed

Maps to HubSpot contact and company properties. Keep it short — you likely have their name and email from the proposal. Only ask for what you genuinely need to set up their workspace and send their first invoice.

1. Full name and preferred name
2. Company name and role
3. Best email for project communication
4. Best phone number (for urgent items only)
5. Billing contact name and email (if different)

Section 2

Context & goals

Kickoff agenda

These answers become the first 10 minutes of your kickoff agenda. You want the client's version of the goal in their own language — not a polished version, the raw version. It reveals what they actually care about versus what they said in the proposal process.

1. In plain language, what would success look like 90 days from now?
2. What's the single most important thing this engagement needs to accomplish?
3. How will you know if this engagement has been worth the investment?

Section 3

Current state

Risk surfacing

This is where the real context lives. Previous attempts that failed, tools they're committed to, metrics they're currently tracking. This section changes how you approach the kickoff — knowing they tried this two years ago and it failed for a specific reason is worth ten times its weight in questionnaire friction.

1. Have you tried to address this before? What happened?
2. What tools or systems are you currently using that we'll need to work with?
3. What are the one or two metrics you look at most to understand how the business is doing?
4. What's working that we should be careful not to break?

Section 4

Scope & priorities

Workspace setup

This section aligns the engagement scope and sequences the work. The answers build your project workspace structure — phases, deliverable order, quick wins. Ask for priorities explicitly: clients who know the outcome but haven't ranked their priorities will surface it here.

1. If we could only accomplish one thing in the first 30 days, what should it be?
2. Are there any areas that are off-limits or not a priority for this engagement?
3. Are there any hard deadlines we should be aware of?

Section 5

Stakeholders

Relationship map

Understanding the stakeholder landscape prevents surprises. The person who signs the contract is not always the person whose opinion matters most for the work. Mapping this early prevents scope surprises, approval delays, and "my CEO needs to see this before we can proceed" situations that appear in week six.

1. Who else should be involved in or aware of this engagement?
2. Who is the final decision-maker for approving our work?
3. Is there anyone internally who is skeptical about this engagement? (Optional, but valuable)

Section 6

Working style

Communication setup

Communication preferences are frequently a source of quiet friction — the client who prefers Slack and the consultant who works through email will create misalignment without this conversation. Getting these answers before the kickoff means you set up communication the right way from day one.

1. What's your preferred channel for quick questions? (Email / Slack / WhatsApp / other)
2. What response time should we expect from each other for non-urgent items?
3. How do you prefer to receive deliverables — shared document, presentation, email summary?

The OS connection

How intake answers flow into your operating system.

The intake form's value multiplies when its answers connect to downstream tools automatically rather than sitting in a form response inbox that you check inconsistently. Here is how each section maps to the rest of the Consultant OS:

→ HubSpot CRM

Section 1 data flows to contact properties

Name, company, billing contact, and project role map to HubSpot contact and company fields. Use Tally's Zapier/Make integration to push form responses to HubSpot properties automatically. Zero manual data entry per new client.

→ Notion portal

Sections 2–5 build the kickoff brief

Use Claude Prompt: "Here are my client's intake form responses: [paste]. Summarize into a kickoff brief covering current state, goals, risks, priorities, and stakeholders. Format as a 1-page agenda for a 60-minute kickoff call." Paste into the Notion client portal before the kickoff.

→ Make automation

Intake submission triggers workspace creation

When a Tally form is submitted: Make creates a Notion client workspace from template, pre-fills the client name and engagement dates, sends you a notification with the intake summary, and marks the HubSpot deal as "Intake Complete." Zero manual steps between signed contract and ready workspace.

→ Calendar

Section 6 sets communication expectations

Working style answers feed your communication setup — which channel to use, what response time to expect, how to deliver work. These answers go directly into the kickoff agenda and the "Working together" section of the Notion client portal. No misalignment discussions mid-engagement.

Implementation

Build this in 45 minutes. Run it permanently.

Step 1

Build in Tally — Create the six sections above in Tally (free). Tally produces clean, professional forms that embed easily and integrate with Make and Zapier. Add your company name and a brief intro paragraph at the top: "To help us hit the ground running, please take 12–15 minutes to complete this intake before our kickoff call."

Step 2

Connect to Make — Create a Make scenario: Tally form submitted → update HubSpot contact properties → create Notion workspace from template → notify you with intake summary. This takes 1–2 hours to build once. See client onboarding automation guide →

Step 3

Add to onboarding sequence — The intake form link goes in the welcome email, sent automatically when HubSpot marks a deal as Closed Won. Client receives the link. They complete the form. Make handles the rest. You show up to the kickoff with a complete brief and a pre-built workspace.

Step 4

Iterate after every client — After each kickoff, note which intake answers were most useful and which questions went unanswered or unused. The form improves with every client. By client 5, it should feel exactly right for your practice.