Software for Law Firms and Legal Services
The provision of legal services is a challenging business - it all comes down to people, knowledge, and relationships.
Your
lawyers, solicitors, attorneys, paralegals and other legal professionals go to work each day to address
key legal issues for your clients. Ensuring they can do their job
effectively is not easy: How do you train and develop them? How do you
equip them with the tools they need to do the job? Or to leverage
knowledge from across the firm? Or even to manage time and expenses
without undue administrative hassles?
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In addition to the day-to-day work,
there are a number of specific challenges at the overall firm level.
How do you raise the profile of your law firm and communicate
with clients, prospects, and the broader community? How do you
get real-time visibility on the key drivers of your profitability? How
do you manage the selection, retention and training of your valuable
professionals? Or manage the sales process and keep track of client
relationships?
The right software can be a
powerful asset in running a successful law firm. There is legal software available to streamline and improve each key function
in your business - are you taking full advantage of it?
Common types of software for law firms
Software
can help improve all parts of your law firm. Some of the most common software solutions found in law firms are:
Office Productivity Suite
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Software
to help lawyers and other legal professionals perform their day-to-day tasks includes
email, calendar, word processing, slide show, spreadsheet, and database
software. The most common suite is from Microsoft, with Outlook, Word,
Excel, Powerpoint, Access, etc. Other alternatives are becoming more
common, such as the free OpenOffice suite, or online applications such
as Google Docs or Zoho Sheet.
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Timesheets
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Keep
track of staff time against clients, projects and tasks,
and use this to generate invoices and get insight into how projects or
the firm as a whole are performing. Typically, timesheet software
allows to you distinguish between billable and non-billable time, set
different billing rates for different situations, and manage the
approval process - amongst other things.
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Expense Management
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Tracking
expenses on client work is easier with the right expense management
system. Lawyers, solicitors, paralegals and other professionals can lodge their expenses, managers can approve
them, finance can reimburse them then and charge the client accordingly.
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Customer Relationship Management (CRM)
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Relationships
are key in legal services, and CRM software allows you to get proactive in
managing your client relationships. From keeping track of client
contact details through to a more sophisticated system that manages
your sales prospects and records all interactions, there is a CRM
system that can help improve your client relationships.
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Case Management
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Manage your matters and cases more effectively with the right case management software. Store documents securely, keep track of tasks and notes, timelines and calendars, and more.
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Human Resources Management (HRM)
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People
are one of your biggest assets, so it is important you manage them
appropriately. Keep track of all your staff, manage their training and
development schedules, and streamline the recruiting process. This and
much more is possible with the right HRM solution.
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Email Marketing
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Manage
your email campaigns to clients, prospects, staff and alumni with
powerful email marketing software. Ensure high delivery rates, learn
which content is working best, see who opened and responded to your
messages, and much more.
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Practice Management or Professional Services Automation (PSA)
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Manage
all aspects of your legal practice with a single,
integrated system. There are typically modules available to handle each
of the above specialist functions, such as timesheet, expenses, case management, CRM, and HRM. If your accountancy is large and growing, it
may well be worth investing in a fully-integrated solution.
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Find the right software for your law firm
There
are many choices you will face in choosing the right software for your
legal practice. Should you buy separate software for
each function, or should you get an integrated practice management or
professional service automation (PSA) solution? Should the software be
installed on your servers or hosted by the
vendor? Do you need internet or mobile phone access? And many other
questions…
Rather than trawling through the many available options yourself,
why not use SoftwareShortlist’s free software recommendation and
comparison service to find law firm software that is right
for you?
SoftwareShortlist helps you build a shortlist of the best software to meet the unique needs of your legal services firm – quickly and easily. Time is money, after all!
 
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Online Software Comparisons |
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