From the moment clients contact your firm until their case is completed, every client deserves a smooth and professional experience.
The client intake procedure is one of the areas where the ball is frequently dropped.
It isn’t only about streamlining things for your office; it’s also about providing the client confidence in their decision to hire you as their attorney.
What is client intake management?
The client intake process is a vital aspect of the overall life cycle in client management.
It is one thing to generate leads, while it is another to convert leads into the intake. When perfected together, both will make your law firm more profitable.
You might be investing a lot of valuable dollars in attracting an influx of clients. But, without proper optimization, the client intake process may slip through the cracks.
Our client intake process at Bolster Legal Services essentially entails the series of steps needed to convert potential prospects into permanent paying clients.
In other words, the intake process is a law firm’s elixir.
Yet despite its importance, only a few law firms have put efforts into optimizing their intake process in creating a better client experience, increasing their efficiency for improving the firm’s conversion rate.
We are here to guide you through our client intake process to help optimize your firm’s overall operations.
Things that our client intake management includes:
When a new client contacts your law office, your legal intake form is crucial in ensuring you have all of the information you need to analyze their urgent needs and efficiently screen and qualify each prospect.
Although it’s crucial to have customized forms based on your specific fields of practice, there are five topics that should be included on any legal client intake form, regardless of specialization.
Your conversion rate, return on investment (ROI), and client happiness can all be improved by improving your intake process.
When creating intake forms for your legal business, we make sure that each one includes the following elements:
CORRESPONDENCE,
COSTS,
MEDICAL RECORDS,
DEPOSITION TRANSCRIPTS & NOTICES,
DISCOVERY,
MEDIATION,
MSJ,
INVESTIGATION,
PLEADINGS,
PHOTOS,
NEW CLIENT DOCS
Intake Specialists have experience working on Case Management tools like:
File Vine
Case Peer
Smart Advocate
Trial Works
Our experts can also assist with all the below-mentioned Case Management systems:-
Clio
My Case
CASE peer
Firm Central
Needles
Our intake team works in two ways:
New Case
Referred Case
Primary stages of the client intake process
At Bolster Legal Services, we believe that a well-developed intake process highly alters the way a law firm runs and manages its operations.
A poorly-developed intake process can result in wasted time, disorganization and lost revenue as potential prospects tend to deviate.
That is why our effective client intake process includes four primary stages that eventually leads to success.
First stage: Acquiring and fostering leads
After obtaining all of the paperwork from the Referring Attorney/Co-Counsels, the INTAKE Process then begins.
The client intake process initiates whenever you get hold of a lead, otherwise referred to as a ‘potential new client’ in the legal sector.
Irrespective of the source of contact, the intake process initiates at the moment when you receive the initial email, phone call or contact form submission.
After we receive all of the documents, we begin sorting and renaming them according to the naming standard used by the law firm.
We categorize the case depending on the sorts of documents and upload them to the Attorney’s Drop Box or Operating Tool once Renaming is complete.
However, it is easier to make errors with lead management than you can imagine. Given these mistakes have a severe consequence on your conversion rate, we carefully implement a lead management system that improves the overall intake process without errors.
Second stage: Initial consultation & conflict check
Once we’ve determined that the client is a suitable fit, we may set up an initial session to learn more about the client and his or her case.
Now is the moment to pay attention to your client. To make your client feel acknowledged and cared for, you’ll want to reply correctly to their circumstance.
After the initial meeting, you’ll be able to do a full conflict check to ensure there’s no reason you won’t be able to work for a potential client.
Consultation may be regarded as a sales meeting as you get the opportunity to learn more about the client’s legal matter and how they would fit well in your business.
Given the importance of consultations, we develop effective strategies for setting such appointments and ensuring their positive result.
The following are some of our best practices for initial consultations:
Pre-screening clients with a short questionnaire
By gathering this information ahead of time, the firm’s administrative staff can conduct a conflict check, assess the merits of the person’s case, and determine whether or not they can afford the services. That is, before determining whether or not to bring them in for a consultation with an attorney.
Sending a confirmation and reminder email
We employ a good technique to engage the prospect and establish your firm’s credibility, such as including links to relevant educational articles from your website, positive testimonials from prior clients, video introductions of the attorneys, or other resources.
Third stage: Gathering information and doing data entry
Once we have acquired a lead, collecting client information and doing data entry is the focal point of the client intake process. The process of collecting information usually starts right away when a new lead is generated.
The Data Entry Part entails setting the case with all relevant information and tying it to the case’s documents which includes:
Accident Date & Time,
Facts of the case,
Attorney,
Defense Attorney,
Depositions,
Discovery,
Pleading,
Costs
The process of collecting information usually starts right away when a new lead is generated. Thereafter, it continues in various ways before, during and after the consultation stage.
Since collecting information is fundamentally important in providing legal services, the process is something that must be optimized for greater efficiency and organization.
Our client intake strategies at Bolster Legal Services can result in a stronger conversion rate from intake to case, making it more effective and productive for your firm.
Fourth stage: Drafting and signing the agreement
By this stage of the client intake process, we have almost sealed the deal and landed you your new client.
The eventual step is where we get the fee agreement drafted and signed by the new client, and then release the matter for billing in your case management system. This is also one of the most important stages in the intake process because in this stage the attorney-client relationship is finally formalized and the client agrees to pay the fees.
At Bolster Legal Services, the primary element we focus on at this stage is to make the sign up as easy as possible for both your law firm and the client.
NOTE – IN THE EVENT THAT THE LAW FIRM MIGHT LIKE TO CHOOSE AN ADDITIONAL/RELATED SERVICE, THE SERVICE WOULD BE –
CALENDARING AND DOCKETING
In the attorney’s calendar, we docket & calendar all future hearings & forthcoming trial dates, making it easier for them to keep track of their upcoming events.
Did you know? For fee agreements, we use templates
It’s always a good idea to sign a fee agreement before starting work on a case. This will help to clear up any misunderstandings or uncertainty about the nature of the legal services you’ll be delivering and the remuneration expectations.
A fee agreement template will help you save time and improve the efficiency of the intake process.
Furthermore, the form we provide already contains crucial provisions and disclaimers that your client should be aware of.
Standard fee agreements can always be changed and altered later to meet the needs of your client.
We ensure maximum accountability
At every step in the intake process, we have systems in place to ensure accountability.
For example, note that after each step has been executed, such as checking conflicts, signing the fee agreement, and calendaring deadlines.
We consider using a client intake checklist to ensure that all steps have been accomplished before the file is deemed open and set aside for your law firm or practice.
End note
At Bolster Legal Services, the core purpose of our client intake process is to improve client flow, increase the law firm’s conversion rate, and their ROI from marketing, besides improving client satisfaction parallelly.
We also focus on standardizing prospective marketing efforts and improve customer service and client retention with a CRM/Case Management Software (CMS) system.
As an attorney or legal firm, you may easily preserve and manage crucial client data for future use.
Want to drive more sales and revenue through enhanced intake management? Call us on +1(337)448-4110 or drop us an email at support@bolsterlegal.com to game up your client intake process.