Intake and Qualification Questions for Tax-Planning Consultations

This is the practical companion to the ideal client profile worksheet — the actual questions that surface whether a prospect fits it, asked before they land on your calendar. Note the distinction from the live discovery-call agenda: this is a pre-booking screen, not the conversation you have once someone is already on the call.

Form vs. a short pre-call screen

A form (embedded on your booking page or sent immediately after opt-in) works well when you want zero manual effort per lead and are comfortable auto-routing based on answers. A brief pre-call screen (a 10-minute call or a short async exchange with a team member) works better if your qualification depends on nuance a form can’t capture, or if you want a human touchpoint before the full consultation.

Either way, the question set below is the same — only the delivery mechanism changes.

The question set

Income & business structure

• What’s your business structure (sole proprietor, S-corp, partnership, multiple entities)?
• Roughly what range does your business’s annual profit fall into? (offer bands rather than an open field — most prospects answer more honestly with ranges)
• Has your income or profit been relatively stable over the past two years, or has it changed significantly?

Complexity signals

• Do you have income from more than one source (the business, real estate, other investments)?
• Is there a specific event driving your interest right now — a sale, a big year, an expansion, a new entity?

Timeline & readiness

• Are you looking to make a decision in the next few weeks, or exploring for later in the year?
• Have you worked with a tax planner or strategist before, or would this be your first advisory engagement (beyond return preparation)?

Decision-making authority

• Are you the sole decision-maker for this, or is there a partner/spouse who’d need to be involved?

Scoring and routing

You don’t need a formal points system. A simple three-way routing works for most firms:

• Book — clear fit across income stability, complexity, and readiness.
• Nurture — fit on complexity and income, but timeline says “not yet” — route into follow-up, not straight to decline.
• Decline (politely) — no meaningful complexity, no stated readiness to act, or a mismatch your firm doesn’t serve well. A short, respectful message beats silence — and can include a referral elsewhere if appropriate.

What happens next

Once a prospect clears this screen, they move into the consultation funnel — booking, confirmation, and the discovery call itself, now with a prospect who’s both pre-sold and pre-qualified.