Gideon Legal

Automated Intake for Law Firms

digital intake

Marketing

New Year’s Resolution Suggestion Box: Build a Seamless, Virtual Experience for Legal Consumers in 2022

If you don’t want to spend another New Year’s resolution on a personal goal that you may be one box of donuts away from breaking at any time, why not instead spend some of that capital on your business goals.

So, if you’re taking suggestions for a New Year’s resolution that will have a positive impact on your business, I’ve got one: Build out a completely virtual intake experience for your potential clients in 2022.

The coronavirus pandemic wrecked the traditional law firm intake model, which largely relied on in-person strategies – like meetings, with pens and actual paper.  That became an impossibility for a time, and now it’s just a major inconvenience.  Leads don’t want the hassle; and, if you can’t accommodate a virtual intake program, you better watch out for that asteroid striking the Yucatan Peninsula, because you’re a dinosaur.

The great thing about practicing law in 2021-going-on-2022, is that there is more (and more effective) front office law firm technology being built and released, almost on a daily basis.  So, as a modern law firm, you’re in a great position to develop a viable client journey, for even the most tech-savvy legal consumers.

And, this is one of those situations where you don’t want to bide your time.  Time is not on your side.  If you wait until 2023 to virtualize your intake practices, it may be too late.

Marketing, Technology

Hold On, I’ll Transfer You: Modern Law Firms Need Digital Intake Solutions

For a long time, even deep into the 21st century, law firms were content to rely on analog processes for intake.  High-touch was the watchword; and, the feeling was that that was the only version of events that a potential client would accept.  But then, the coronavirus pandemic turned law firm marketing on its head, and attorneys soon realized, while despairing of traditional opportunities, that perhaps legal consumers were more willing to engage low-touch/no-touch, automated intake options than those attorneys had previously thought.

Now that that’s been settled (in much the same way that ‘work from home’ has been verified as actual work, in the modern construct), it opens up a ton of new opportunities for law firms, which can revert to totally analog procedures, adopt a hybrid model, or go full digital.  Most law firms will approach the middle ground; but, there remains an opportunity for the majority of law firms to add more technology to their intake processes, which should lead to added efficiency, as well as more lead conversions.

And, digital intake tools are absolutely the best way to meet the modern law firm lead’s need for speed, for access to a lawyer. Almost always, the first business to engage a lead ends up picking up that work; and, that’s true in legal, as well.  However, the problem with analog tools is that they require impatient customers to wait.

Let’s take an example: Live chat can be expensive, but functions like a phone call taking place online.  There’s an operator, who may or may not be available.  The consumer waits to be connected.  Sometimes, the operator is able to schedule an appointment, sometimes not.  That’s an analog process, converted to the web. 

Now, consider a chatbot, which may utilize the same script that a live chat operator would be using, but that provides immediate answers, in real-time, and which could book a lead to an appointment with the appropriate person once a few qualifying questions have been answered.  That’s a digital process, built for the web.

Given the speed and accuracy with which a digital agent can operate, it may mean the difference between just getting a lead and converting a client.