Leaving Big Law to Start a New Firm with Clio

“So, leaving a large law firm can be extremely stressful and worrisome. Especially in my practice, where I have an immigration court calendar with dates scheduled out for three to five years. I knew that we had to transition quickly, and we had to have the clients comfortable in the process. Clio—with the Billing feature and the integrations with various forms of software—made the transition extremely simple. And the fact that I was less stressed made the process reflected in having happy clients.

I wanted to go to a simpler model, and Clio has been wonderful and helped me transition as well as maintain a growing client base.

The biggest thing was the quick and smooth transition, and Clio was wonderful in terms of helping us to maintain 99% of our clients. We were able to notify them and then get them set up as clients in Clio Grow in a very fast manner—within a month-and-a-half time period.

I knew that we needed the software right away. The transition took us literally four to six weeks—and otherwise, without Clio Grow, the transition probably would have taken us 10 to 12 weeks.

We had used INSZOOM for immigration forms and Google programs in the past, but we found that they just weren’t integrated enough and not client-driven to the specific needs of a small immigration practice. 

At the time that we reactivated the practice, I was really nervous about the data migration. I remember saying, ‘Well, we have these real simple spreadsheets, so if the data doesn’t migrate quickly or it doesn’t make sense, we can at least defer to that.’ But the data migration was pretty much seamless. I remember it being done literally in a matter of hours, and I remember it was such a relief to hear from my business manager that all the client files and the data had been quickly migrated so that I could start working on the cases.”

“On a weekly average, the Clio Suite has saved us anywhere between 12 to 15 hours of administrative work, which we’ve been able to take and reapply to focusing on client matters.

Converting prospective clients to new clients, being able to use Clio Grow has probably increased our productivity—in terms of getting the case matters opened and the work started—by approximately 30% I would say, easily.

Clio Manage has helped us to streamline the overall performance of the law firm. Everything from keeping track of particular client matters and status to the overall weekly, daily, or even monthly numbers. So that’s been good for us to know where we are in terms of quarterly revenue. Clio Manage helps us to look at our quarterly projections and see if we’re on track and also to be able to make adjustments.

The time that I’ve been able to save by using Clio Suite has allowed me to be able to focus on my advocacy work. Whether I’m volunteering pro bono at community immigrant organizations or the time I spend as an advisor to the mayor of the city of Pittsburgh, I wouldn’t have been able to do it if I was stuck in my office focusing on administrative tasks.

The Clio reporting, including the Dashboard functions, has allowed somebody like me, who is typically not a well-versed business person, to be able to understand where we are in terms of our profits and productivity.”

“Clio has been essential to our success as a small practice. My staff was able to be quickly trained, and they feel comfortable using Clio. I’m spending less time on the administrative aspects of practicing immigration law and more time on my clients’ legal strategies and casework.

Since the pandemic began, I’m like most employers—a critical component for us to be able to continue to be successful has been being able to have flexibility with staff to allow them to work both at home and at the office, and the integration of the Clio Suite has allowed us to transition to more of a virtual practice than probably traditionally we would be.

So I liked the integration aspects, the support for both hourly billing, as well as flat fee billing. When I had gone to a large law firm, I had transitioned from primarily flat fees to billable hours, and the fact that Clio gives the flexibility for us to be able to use either setups is wonderful and it makes the clients happy—because a lot of times when faced with hourly billing, even when you give clients estimates, they’re really nervous because they don’t know what the final costs are going to be. So being able to use Clio and being able to easily go in and make changes that reflect that the costs don’t exceed the estimates is huge for the type of clients that I work with, as many of them are on limited budgets in terms of legal expenses.”

“We use Clio Grow primarily for new client intake and for new matter intake for existing client immigration laws—one of those fields where you might finish the process of getting someone a green card, but you’ll still have to do their citizenship down the road. In the current COVID 19 pandemic situation, we heavily use the online contract signing feature, preferring virtual appointments with clients over face to face. We also started using the appointment booking functionality, allowing prospective clients to use our website or call the office. Because we have multiple locations, Clio Grow has been great at keeping everything on the cloud, so that it doesn’t matter where anybody—whether it’s me or this physical stuff—is located.

For converting prospective clients to new clients, being able to use Clio Grow has probably increased our productivity—in terms of getting the case matters opened and the work started—by approximately 30%, I would say, easily.

Having everything online while using Clio Grow has been able to save tremendous time in terms of converting a prospective client into a new client. Especially in immigration law—where you might have a 30-day appeal period, or a client comes to you and they have an individual hearing in four months. It’s really important that we get their case set up online so that we can focus on the legal work. 

Using the Clio Grow intake forms allows the client themselves to do a lot of the input. And then, basically, it allows us to get them in for additional appointments to evaluate their cases a lot quicker than the traditional method that I’ve typically used in the past as well as at the large law firm.”

“Clio Manage helps me and my staff keep track of all client matters and statuses, and we can track our time and expenses. Clio reports help me to track the performance of my law firm, the client billing, as well as our overall productivity. Clio integrations help with emails and calendaring. It integrates with our Vonage business phones systems as well as with our accounting QuickBooks software. It provides a significant productivity boost. Overall, I’m able to define a standard process for me and my staff or client matters and we’re able to follow it in almost every case, over and over.

Clio Manage has helped us to streamline the overall performance of the law firm—everything from keeping track of particular client matters and statuses to the overall weekly, daily, or even monthly numbers. So that’s been good for us to know where we are in terms of quarterly revenue.

Clio Manage helps us to look at our quarterly projections and see if we’re on track and also to be able to make adjustments, because in the field of immigration law, especially in the last six months, we’ve seen a number of regulations that overall have affected productivity. It allows us to make adjustments in terms of if we need to speed up a case because a new proposed regulation is coming into place … Overall, Clio Manage has been able to help us look at productivity as well as speed in terms of trying to complete client matters.

I have anywhere between 165 current client matters to sometimes upwards of 180, and Clio Manage has helped us to keep organized and keep track of where we are with different cases. Many times, one case will be at one level and another case will be at another, and Clio Manage helps us to not lose track of anything and be able to stay ahead of deadlines.”

“The end result is being able to get cases filed in a faster manner. Clio also links in with immigration software that we use, so—in terms of being able to go from Clio Grow and getting the client’s case put together—we’re able to relieve a lot of time that it would normally take to get cases filed. 

Being married to an immigrant myself and having gone through the immigration process, I understand the anxiety and the fear. So, being able to work with Clio has been a lifesaver in terms of being able to focus on the client’s needs—whether emotional, physical, etc—to help them get through the case, because it’s as much about the law firm doing the work as it is about the client feeling comfortable and feeling secure as we maneuver through the immigration process.”

“The best thing about Clio is that everything is integrated. We use the client intake process, the online contract signing process, the client and case matter reporting, and time and expense tracking, and the fact that it’s integrated to our emails and to our calendar has really made navigating the ability to reactivate my firm stress free and worry free.

For anyone or any law firm considering transitioning into Clio—whether you’ve been in existence for a while, or if you’re just recently incorporated—do the free trial of Clio. Do the demonstrations. Learn how it works. You’ll see that compared with the other products in the market, Clio can’t be beat.”