Use 3 to 5 pre-meeting questions to confirm: advice need, approximate asset value, decision-making authority, timescale, and fit with your firm's regulatory permissions. Automated qualification via form and scheduler lifts meeting-to-client conversion by 30 to 60%.
The five questions 1. **Need:** which area of advice? (pension, mortgage, IHT, etc.) 2. **Assets or loan size:** rough ballpark (ranges, not exact). 3. **Authority:** are they the decision-maker? 4. **Timescale:** when are they looking to act? 5. **Current adviser:** do they already have one?
How to capture it - Multi-step form with progress bar (converts better than one long form). - Optional free-text box to capture context. - Auto-route based on answers (hot leads to senior advisers).
What it saves - Wasted meeting time on out-of-scope enquiries. - Compliance risk from advising outside permissions. - Mismatched expectations around fees.
Trade-off Too much qualification drops CPL inflow. Three to five questions is the sweet spot.