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The One: Why You Need a Universal Intake Form in Your Law Firm

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All new leads in a law firm should ultimately filter through a single, universal intake form .  This form will gather contact information, identify a case type and allow the lead to provide some basic information about her case .  That’s whether the lead is completing a form on your website, or providing this information to a staffperson of yours over the phone (who is filling out a form on her behalf) , or whether a staffperson in your office is adding the information to the form from a direct email query.   There are a whole host of reasons why this strategy works well .  First, it is a form that gathers all the necessary initial information, without pestering the client for m or e extraneous detail .  Second, it gathers all the primary information, which can then be directly added to a customer relationship management software, and tagged appropriately .  Third, because you’re asking for a case type, you can automatically start the intake pipeline for that case type in
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Pay Advance: Will AI Finally Force Firms to Move on From Hourly Billing?

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There are some common themes across a recent spate of AI ethics opinions and practical guidance releases from bar associations.  One of those is that there is some question about whether AI will finally be the thing to force the majority of lawyers to adopt alternative fees ( ie – not hourly billing), particularly flat fees.     Of course, this isn’t really a new question, as it relates to legal technology – in essence, what’s being asked is whether, because technologies like AI allow attorneys to perform their work faster, law firms can still charge the rates they did before ?  And, for hourly rates, the answer is pretty plainly ‘no ’.   You can’t just make up hours that you’ve worked.   Now, the reason flat fees are being suggested as an alternative in this environment, is because those types of fees are based on value , not hours.     AI is not the reason, that you should consider alternatives billing methods, like flat fees; but, rather: it is another reason you should c
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Team Effort: How to Control the Use of AI in Your Law Firm

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AI is everywhere; it’s embedded in so many technologies that you use already , that, in some cases: you’re probably not even aware you’re using it.  So, of course, the first step here, is to understand AI yourself, including how it is deployed in the softwares you use (everyday).     Once you have a handle on that, you’ll next need to figure out whether and how you want your staff to use AI .  At this point, it’s probably foolish to prohibit the use of AI for you r associates and staff, because it’s even embedded in Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace, at this point – productivity softwares that almost every attorney and law firm staffperson use at least one of .  So, this is more about warning folks of the potential dangers of AI (including its predilection for ‘hallucinating’ = making things up), making suggestions about how to use it and limiting the places where client or confidential data may be added to AI tools (not free, generic tools – like ChatGPT; but, instead
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Payment Plan: This is the One Necessary Precondition for Any Paid Advertising Campaign

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Lots of law firm owners don’t pay for advertising, at all .  But, for those who do, they’re often skipping a crucial step, that will allow their marketing campaigns to flourish.     They don’t have an intake program.     With any paid advertising campaign, it’s essential to be able to track calls and clicks – because, if you can’t , you won’t know whether your campaigns are working, or not; and, your new marketing strategy could devolve into a money pit.   Sure, there’s the basic notion of ‘return on investment’ (ROI) = are you making back what you’re paying – or profiting, and at what level .  But, with the right software, you can also run a whole bunch of different reports, including custom ones, to better understand your marketing spend.     At the very least, the modern law firm, running a paid marketing program, should be tracking calls (potentially with a software , like CallRail ) and clicks (potentially with a customer relationship management software (CRM), like
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