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Summary
The onboarding questionnaire is the first step in building high-performing email and SMS campaigns. It enables us to capture vital details about your business, target audience, content preferences, and technical settings, such as sender domains and list sources. With this comprehensive information, we can design, automate, and optimise lifecycle messages that drive revenue and measurable results, all whilst staying compliant with industry policies and legal regulations.
In this guide, we detail what to expect during onboarding, how to prepare the necessary information, and why each element is crucial to your campaign’s success.
Launching an email campaign can feel overwhelming, but it doesn’t have to be. The onboarding questionnaire simplifies the process by gathering all the information we need to design campaigns and build automations that meet your specific objectives.
Why the onboarding questionnaire matters
The onboarding questionnaire is essential for several reasons:
1. Customisation: It captures unique business details, such as your company overview, value propositions, and marketing goals. This helps us craft subject lines and messages that speak directly to your audience and reflect what makes your brand unique.
2. Efficiency: Sharing key details upfront eliminates the need for extensive back-and-forth communications, speeding up the automation and campaign setup process.
3. Data-driven strategy: Detailed insights into your audience segments, send cadence, and performance expectations allow us to build a data-driven campaign. This enables continuous optimisation and ensures that open rates, click-throughs, and revenue per send continually improve.
4. Compliance: Including questions about industry-specific rules and data privacy (e.g. GDPR/CCPA) ensures that your campaigns adhere to regulatory standards and platform policies from the very start.
How your onboarding questionnaire guides our GorillaAudit®
The detailed responses you provide in the onboarding questionnaire form the backbone of our GorillaAudit, a six-stage strategy analysis and review process you approve at each stage to ensure that your email marketing strategy remains fully aligned with your vision. For example, if you’re an ecommerce brand, we specifically ask whether your product images are readily accessible via your Shopify store or if you want to upload custom visuals and lifestyle shots. This not only clarifies your creative asset requirements but also ensures that every subsequent stage, from research to campaign and sequence planning, is fully informed by your input.
Whilst this multi-stage strategy planning process is separate from the questionnaire itself, the initial steps build directly on the data you provide. Here’s an overview of how we use your input to shape a successful campaign:
Stage 1: Onboarding, Research, and Initial Audit
We begin by discussing your questionnaire responses, clarifying brand guidelines, and establishing clear goals and KPIs to measure success. Our strategists perform a competitive gap analysis to uncover opportunities your competitors may be missing, then develop an initial strategy hypothesis (e.g. testing shorter subject lines to lift open rates). Enterprise clients can request additional brand-safety or regulatory checks at this point. By completing this combined onboarding and audit step upfront, we ensure that every decision in later stages is grounded in real data, clear objectives, and any compliance requirements relevant to your sector.Stage 2: Topic and Design Mockups
Using your brand guidelines and the goals confirmed in Stage 1, we outline potential email series (e.g. newsletters, promotions, or nurture flows) then share basic layout drafts in Figma. This stage locks in the creative direction, ensuring the visual style and themes fit your brand before detailed content is produced.Stage 3: List Building and Audience Segmentation
We review or import your subscriber data, clean invalid addresses, and set up segments, such as new leads or repeat customers. If required, we configure new sign-up forms or disclaimers to capture future subscribers lawfully. This validates that each audience group is accurately targeted.Stage 4: Campaign and Sequence Planning
We specify send dates, automation triggers, and any planned tests. Our team maps each email’s role in the overall journey so recipients move logically toward your desired action. You approve the timeline, triggers, and testing approach so the structure of your emails is set.Stage 5: Content Creation
Our copywriters create subject lines, body copy, and visuals that match your brand voice. Draft emails are shared for feedback on text, images, and calls-to-action. Enterprise clients can request additional brand-safety or regulatory checks at this step to protect sensitive industries.Stage 6: Final Quality Assurance (QA) and Compliance
Before launch, we conduct comprehensive technical and quality assurance checks, confirming sending-domain authentication, unsubscribe links, and rendering. Rigorous brand-safety evaluations and compliance reviews are conducted for regulated industries. You’ll review all final details, giving approval only when everything meets your standards, ensuring a smooth and compliant campaign launch.
Completing the onboarding questionnaire is crucial because it supplies the detailed information underpinning each strategic stage. The insights you share enable us to tailor our research, refine audience segmentation, craft bespoke creative elements, and set up a robust campaign structure. Simply put, your responses guide each step of our multi-stage strategy, ensuring that every phase aligns with your business objectives for a truly customised marketing approach.
What our onboarding questionnaire covers
Our onboarding questionnaire is divided into seven key sections:
1. Business information
This section lays the foundation for your campaigns by capturing essential company details:
Basic details: Business name, website, VAT status, and contact information.
Objectives: What do you want to achieve? Examples include increasing email-driven revenue, boosting open rates, or nurturing repeat purchases.
2. Audience insights
Since targeting the right audience is essential, we dive deep into your ideal subscriber profile:
Demographics: Who are your ideal customers? Share details like age, gender, income, and location.
Behaviours and interests: What hobbies, brands, or products do they engage with?
Pain points: What problems do your products or services solve for your customers?
Geographic focus: Which regions or countries should be targeted?
3. Brand assets
Strong branding creates consistency across every send. In this section, we request the following:
Logos and visuals: High-quality logos, lifestyle shots, or product imagery for banners and hero images. If you use Shopify, we can access product images via partner access.
Brand guidelines: Fonts, colour hex codes, and messaging preferences for consistent branding.
Creative input: Ideas for offers, promotions, or themes you’d like us to focus on in your campaigns.
4. Platform access and subscriber data
To set up and optimise your campaigns, we require:
ESP access: Admin access to your preferred email service provider (ESP) platform (e.g. Klaviyo, Mailchimp, HubSpot, etc.).
SMS gateway credentials (if applicable): Details for Twilio, Attentive, or your chosen provider.
5. List health and performance goals
This section ensures that your campaign is aligned with realistic targets and data quality:
Current list metrics: Active subscribers, average open rate, click-through rate, and recent unsubscribe data.
KPIs: Define targets for key metrics, such as monthly email revenue, click-through rate, retention rate, or SMS opt-in growth.
Previous campaign data: If available, share insights on past performance, such as winning subject lines or automation results, to help us refine our strategy.
6. Campaign and offer focus
In this section, we pinpoint the specific focus areas of your campaign:
Core flows or sequences: Highlight any priorities (e.g. welcome series, post-purchase, win-back).
Priority products or services: Highlight any products, services, or landing pages you want to focus on.
Offers and incentives: Ideas for promotions such as free shipping, discounts, bundles, or time-limited offers.
Tone and messaging: Preferences for copy style (e.g. professional, conversational, or light-hearted).
7. Compliance and policy considerations
Providing compliance details is optional for companies that are not subject to strict regulatory or data privacy requirements. However, if your business operates within a regulated sector or handles sensitive customer data, these details are required:
Industry-specific rules: Information on whether your business falls under any regulated categories (such as housing, credit, healthcare, or alcohol) so that strategies can be tailored accordingly.
Data privacy requirements: We ask for confirmation that your subscriber data collection complies with laws like GDPR, CAN-SPAM, or other relevant regulations to ensure that proper consent has been obtained. If you’re unsure whether your data collection practices meet these legal requirements, our team can review your processes, recommend appropriate adjustments, and even help implement consent management tools to ensure you’re fully compliant.
Channel-specific requirements
Different messaging channels require slightly different inputs. Below is a breakdown of what we’ll need for email and SMS:
How to be ready for the onboarding process
The more information you share about your business, audience, and objectives, the better the results we can deliver with your campaigns. Here are some tips to ensure a smooth onboarding experience:
1. Provide key details: Gather all relevant branding assets, guidelines, subscriber lists, and account credentials beforehand.
2. Focus on your audience: Think carefully about segments that matter most, such as new subscribers, VIP customers, lapsed buyers, or interest-based groups. The clearer your segmentation, the more relevant we can make each message.
3. Upload assets securely: Use tools like Google Drive to share high-quality logos, images, past email templates, and other essential files with our team securely.
4. Ask questions: If you’re unsure about any section of the questionnaire, please don’t hesitate to reach out to our team.
If you’re also signing up for paid advertising or social media management, be sure check out our other preparation guides:
A thorough onboarding questionnaire sets you up for success
The quality of your email marketing campaigns directly depends on the detail and clarity provided during onboarding. By thoroughly completing the questionnaire, you empower our team to design a highly customised strategy that accurately reflects your business goals, subscriber expectations, and brand voice.
With GoGorilla, your onboarding questionnaire isn't simply a formality. It is the foundation for measurable results. Partner with us today, and leverage our data-driven approach to turn every send into tangible revenue.
