The weakest logo presentations usually trace back to a thin brief. The client said "modern and clean," the designer produced something modern and clean, and the client said it didn't feel like them. Nobody had asked who "them" was. A brand questionnaire forces that conversation into writing before any sketching starts, and gives you something to point back to when feedback drifts.
This template is written for brand identity designers, logo designers and small studios. It's longer than a general intake form because brand work depends on nuance: how the founder describes the business, which competitors they worry about, which words they'd never want associated with them.
TL;DR
The brand questionnaire template is a downloadable form with about 35 questions across business story, audience, competitors, positioning, brand personality sliders, visual likes and dislikes, existing assets, and where the brand will appear. Send it after the deposit and before the kickoff session. Read every answer before you meet, and use the contradictions as the agenda for the strategy conversation.
What's inside
- The business — origin story, offer, mission and where the business is heading.
- Audience — who the ideal customer is and what they care about.
- Competitors and positioning — who else they're compared with, and how they want to differ.
- Brand personality — slider scales (classic vs modern, playful vs serious) plus three words.
- Visual preferences — brands they admire, styles they dislike, colors to avoid.
- Name and messaging — the name's meaning, taglines, tone of voice.
- Existing assets — current logo, what to keep, what to drop.
- Applications — every place the brand will appear, from favicon to vehicle signage.
- Practical details — deadline, decision-makers and approval process.
When to use it
Send it for any identity project: a new brand, a rebrand, or a logo refresh where the business has changed. Use it after the branding proposal is accepted. For a narrower logo-only job, the logo design brief covers the essentials in fewer questions, and you can fill it in from a call yourself.
Don't send it for small design jobs inside an existing brand, such as a social template or a flyer. The brand already exists; a short creative brief is enough.
Questions that do the heavy lifting
"Describe your business to a stranger at a party in one sentence." You get the founder's own language, which often contains the positioning. Compare it with what's on their website.
"Which competitor would you least like to be mistaken for, and why?" This tells you more about positioning than "who are your competitors."
Personality sliders. Ask the client to place the brand on a 1–5 scale between pairs such as classic/modern, playful/serious, luxury/accessible, quiet/loud. Numbers are easier to discuss than adjectives and expose contradictions quickly.
"List three brands outside your industry whose look you like." Same-industry examples lead to imitation. A bakery owner who loves a particular outdoor clothing brand is telling you something about texture, color and tone.
"Where will people first see your brand?" A brand seen mostly as a 32-pixel app icon or an Instagram avatar needs a different mark from one mostly seen on storefront signage.
Running the kickoff with the answers
Print or annotate the completed form, highlight the three to five answers that conflict or surprise you, and make those the agenda. Typical ones: "premium" alongside "affordable," a stated audience that doesn't match the current customers, or "keep the current logo" next to "we want a completely fresh look." Resolve these in the room. Then write a one-page summary of the agreed direction and have the client approve it before concepts. That summary is what you present against.
Customize it in your COLO workspace
COLO doesn't host questionnaires, so download the template and send it as an editable file. Clients can upload the completed questionnaire, mood images and current logo files through the client portal, and you can keep them with the branding project and discuss open points in project chat before kickoff.
Common mistakes
- Accepting one-word answers. Follow up on "modern" and "clean" with "what does modern mean for you; show me an example."
- Skipping dislikes. You lose the fastest way to narrow the field.
- Not asking who approves. The co-founder who didn't fill in the form will have opinions at the presentation.
- Treating answers as instructions. The questionnaire informs your strategy; it doesn't replace it.
FAQ
Q: What is a brand questionnaire?
A brand questionnaire is a set of questions a designer sends a client before branding or logo work. It captures the business's story, audience, competitors, personality and visual preferences, so the design direction is based on the client's answers rather than guesswork.
Q: When should I send a brand questionnaire?
After the client has signed and paid the deposit, and before the kickoff or strategy session. Read the answers before you meet, so the session is spent on the gaps and contradictions, not on basic facts.
Q: How many questions should a brand questionnaire have?
Around 25 to 40 is common. Fewer than that and you miss important context; more and clients start giving one-word answers. Group them into sections so the form feels shorter than it is.
Q: What if the client's answers contradict each other?
That's normal and useful. A client who wants to look premium and also the cheapest option in the market has a positioning question to resolve. Raise contradictions in the kickoff session before you start designing.
Q: Should clients share brands they dislike?
Yes. Dislikes are often more precise than likes. A client who says they hate gradients and script fonts has just ruled out a whole set of directions for you.