When I first opened my virtual law office almost four years ago, I wanted to handle every aspect of my practice online. With most of my client base, this worked fine and was what they preferred as well. I have an estate planning and small business setup practice and the majority of my clients are in their late twenties through late forties. However, I have a large number of clients over the age of 50, many of whom are retirees or who are interested for a variety of reasons in getting their estate planning in order for an affordable price and in a way that is convenient for them. (more…)
Tag: skype
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20 of the 60 Tips in 60 Minutes
The NC Bar Association held its Law Tech Expo this past week. Erik Mazzone, the Director for the Center of Practice Management at the Bar, did a great job of reviving the Expo. I look forward to this being an annual event for our Bar Association and anticipate its growth considering the important role that technology plays in the legal profession today. It was a pleasure to meet such well-known speakers as Sharon Nelson, John Simek and Britt Lorish Knuttgen at the event. VLOTech also had a booth in the hall alongside other exhibitors and we were excited to introduce our SaaS product for virtual law practice to the attendees.
At the Law Tech Expo, I sat in on a panel discussion on practicing law in the cloud and co-presented the 60 Tips in 60 Minutes session with Erik Mazzone and Lee Rosen.
This would be an amusing story if it weren’t so frustrating at the time: I protect my netbook by using Truecrypt so that if it were ever stolen, no one would be able to access my law office data. One of the sites I was presenting was Truecrypt. Right before our presentation, we all connected our computers out so that the video will show up on the auditorium screen. The Truecrypt screen comes up asking for the password, but won’t even let me enter it. Fortunately, I also travel with the portable CD drive and restore CD so it wasn’t a problem once I got back to the hotel. However, I had to jump over to the Bar Center’s podium computer to present my 20 sites rather than using my netbook. It’s the perfect example of how one of my 20 tips can be used to protect your law office data — although not exactly the way I had wanted to demonstrate it.
Snafu aside, the presentation was fun and the audience responsive. I’m looking forward to presenting another 20 of the 60 Websites in 60 Minutes for the Practical Skills CLE in a couple weeks.
Here are the 20 tips that I presented from our session with summaries of the sites.
PrimoPDF: A free PDF creator allows you to create PDF files from 300+ file types. For example, turn a Word doc into a PDF and secure with passwords for digital storage, sending to clients, etc.
Portable Hard Drive: Easy to use for backup of law office data. Run nightly backups with Truecrypt and Sycntoy for security. When traveling, it’s easy to take your law practice along with you.
Truecrypt: Free open source encryption software. Works with PCs & Macs. Multiple uses for this software, especially for the mobile attorney. Ex.: Encrypt files on your USB key or portable hard drive.
Zamzar: Free online file conversion. Convert files to doc, image, video and music formats. Useful for working w/clients, other attorneys using different programs to share data.
ZOHO Projects: Creates a project management space for collaboration that is based on social networking. Map out projects with a team, assign tasks, schedule meetings, work on documents, hold forum discussions and more.
Pipes: A tool that aggregates and mashups up content from around the web to create a customized feed. Use simple commands combined together to create more useful, powerful feeds.
Google Voice: Create a Google phone number and route calls to your home, business, or mobile devices. A useful tool for blocking and screening calls with other features, such as voicemail transcripts, storing, sending and receiving text messages from one device or online to other devices. Rather than calling multiple numbers to reach you, your clients dial one number and it tracks you down to the phone you can answer or takes the call to voice mail.
Meebo: Communicate in real-time with your contacts across platforms including IM and other social networking apps. This tool lets you combine all of your contact lists in different apps into one.
Thunderbird 2: Thunderbird 2 email application has superior security and privacy features, including phishing protection, industry leading junk mail filters, and support for user privacy and remote image protection.
Open Office: Free open source version of Microsoft Office, includes word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, graphics, databases and other applications. It runs on PCs and Macs, has great compatibility with other programs and you don’t have to buy a new version to install each time it has an update.
Billeo: A secure tool to manage online transactions, such as payments, passwords, and receipts. Works in your browser to allow for one-click access.
Penzu: This program is for the attorney who enjoys writing but doesn’t want the world to read it. Does your law firm prohibit or discourage you for writing in a public blog? Start a free, private online journal and keep writing.
Scribefire: This is an extension to your Firefox browser that lets you post easily into your blog. Click and drag, drop formatted text from pages and post it on your blog.
Glance: Easy tool for desktop sharing with audio conferencing. Use for web presentations, conferences, training, or general communicating. Allows others to take control of your mouse as well as view your desktop.
iContact: Send clients newsletters and email blasts about your practice and changes in the law without being blacklisted. Use it in conjunction with your blog or website to transfer subscribers to your email updates.
Skype: Free skype-to-skype calls with video, text message from Skype; forward calls to your mobile device, etc. Multiple uses for online communication.
Iceberg: A web-based tool to develop your own custom workflow based app for your law practice or for individual projects. Provides customizable applications to build on. No code writing experience necessary.
Virtual Paralegals: For an attorney practicing law remotely or online, virtual paralegals are a useful resource for transcription, legal research, legal document preparation or other administrative activities. There are virtual paralegal companies, independent virtual paralegals and virtual assistants that may work in different arrangements, such as on a regular basis for a solo or small firm or as added support on a project basis for a larger firm.
Firefox Add-ons: Download these add-ons for extra security for your Firefox browser. Use no-scripts for safest web-browsing.
Bing: Microsoft’s version of the search engine. Keep an eye on how it will compete with Google because it does use a different formula for ranking sites. Attorneys should monitor their personal and professional online presence on a regular basis and this is one more search engine to check.
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Attorneys Scared of Web 2.0? ABA Journal Article Says Yes.
The September issue of the ABA Journal ran an article entitled Web 2.0 Still a No-Go: Lawyers Slow to Adopt Cutting-Edge Technology. I’ve been wanting to blog about this article for a couple weeks now because I think any virtual attorney should find it interesting. The article consisted of three pages of charts showing that attorneys are starting to use more technology in their daily law practices, but they are not jumping to it at the rate that the general public has been over the past five years.
Only 2% of attorneys maintain a law blog and only 15% of lawyers have joined a social network. Attorneys use technology to receive information, but its primarily through news websites (79%) or by email newsletters (59%) and discussion lists (40%). Only 10% use RSS feeds and 6% use podcasts. Even more disturbing, only 30% use their firm’s intranet, extranet or website to communicate and receive information.
What are you folks using? A phone, a fax machine and snail mail?
Did these statics surprise me? A little, but they shouldn’t have. Attorneys are by training a skeptical bunch. Nevertheless, the statistics in this ABA Journal survey make our profession seem like a close-minded and archaic bunch compared to the general public. And this is at a time when we should be working to improve the image of attorneys as progressive professionals who are ready to serve the public and stand for justice in the legal system.
Yes, my perspective is a bit skewed considering how I operate my own solo law practice. I run a virtual law office from my home and work with other attorneys and clients who make the most of the technology that is available to us. So it is difficult for me to understand why an attorney would not make use of the evolving Web 2.0 applications that are now available to them. Check out the list of useful websites from my last post and the CLE presentation last week. Many of these sites are for useful Web 2.0 apps that can have an impact on your practice.
It doesn’t make practical sense to hold back on Web 2.0. Why?
1) The general public is not holding back. These are your clients. Attorneys serve their clients. In the end, it is all about customer service. Your clients use these technologies to communicate with co-workers, family and friends across the nation. They enjoy the convenience and affordability that the technology provides for them. Ignoring these trends in the general public will keep your law practice in the dark ages. You may retain a clientele that enjoys receiving snail mail and can’t use email to save their life, but don’t expect that clientele to hang around forever.
Can you be efficient, convenient and affordable? Will you work with me using the technology that I use on a daily basis and not talk down at me just because you are a professional?
This is what your clients want. Instead of buying a lovely new set of chairs for your reception area, invest in the technology that will make your practice run smoother. Start simple. Learn to use your email, buy a scanner and start storing your docs online, learn basic backup techniques for your systems. Learn about encryption and security. Try setting up a virtual law office, using web conferencing, hiring a virtual paralegal, connecting with others on Twitter, Skype, LinkedIn, Facebook, Legal OnRamp, etc. Find ways to connect with other attorneys through the technology. It will benefit your clients and your law practice.
2) In this dark economic climate, why wouldn’t you want to lower your law office overhead? Not only can some of these Web 2.0 applications make your practice more efficiently, many of them are free or the cost is low enough to receive a fast return on investment. Lower your overhead and pass the savings along to your clients.
3) Take a second look at the life of a typical attorney. Do you have a life outside of your practice? One positive statistic in the article was the indication that more attorneys are using mobile devices. In two years the number of firms providing attorneys with BlackBerrys or iPhones has increased from 49% to 76% in two years. 72% of attorneys under the age of 40 are using mobile devices.
That’s perhaps positive progress. It’s either being used to bill more hours while on the go or to make more time for a personal life by using the flexibility of not having to be tied down to a physical office. That work/life balance detail wasn’t in the survey, but at least the option of more flexibility is there to those attorneys through the use of mobile devices and Web 2.0 apps.
That said, I recognize that change is never easy, and for a solo practitioner it can be a scary leap. But in my opinion, not understanding Web 2.0 and keeping up with current technology is a much bigger risk. Here’s looking forward to an ABA Journal Article that shows other attorneys agree with me.