The Missouri Bar and Smokeball recognize the important role solo and small firms play in every local community. By providing Smokeball Bill at no cost, all members of The Missouri Bar will now have access to a user-friendly software solution that ensures trust accounting compliance and simplifies billing.  

“By providing Smokeball Bill at no cost to all Missouri Bar members, we hope to assist them with running efficient and compliant law firms so they can even better serve their clients,” said Shelly Dreyer, 2024-2025 Missouri Bar president.

Manually managing trust accounting can lead to compliance errors and malpractice claims. Smokeball Bill makes it simple for members to easily comply with trust accounting regulations. The software also helps firms send and collect invoices and bills.

“By providing Smokeball Bill software, which typically costs $588 per user/per year, at no cost to Missouri Bar members, we aim to enhance the resources accessible to the legal community as a whole and to the clients they serve,” said Jane Oxley, CRO and co-founder of Smokeball.

This is Smokeball's 14th no-cost product partnership with a state bar, following the announcement of partnerships with state bars including the State Bar of Texas and the Oklahoma Bar Association. To learn more about Smokeball’s no-cost product offering with The Missouri Bar or to sign up, please visit www.smokeball.com/missouribill.

About Smokeball - Smokeball is your partner to drive your law firm into the future. As the industry's leading cloud-based legal practice management software, Smokeball empowers you to run your firm specific to your area of law. Our platform gives you all the insights and tools you need to work smarter, not harder: automatic time tracking and invoicing, streamlined workflows for your specific practice area, a library of over 20,000 standard legal forms and documents, and actionable reports. Smokeball is a member benefit of over 20 U.S. bar associations. Learn how to run your best firm at smokeball.com.

About The Missouri Bar - The Missouri Bar was created in 1944 by order of the Supreme Court of Missouri. Its mission is to improve the legal profession, the administration of justice, and the law on behalf of the public. Through educational programs, publications, and more, The Missouri Bar serves as a valuable resource for members — and for the citizens of Missouri.

Solo and small firms often find the role of a bookkeeper tough to fill. Most small firms may not need a full-time bookkeeper, leading them to try incomplete solutions or handle the work themselves. In many small firms, no single person plays the consistent everyday role of ensuring orderly finances. Regardless of how simple you believe your firm’s finances to be, having a constant form of oversight is valuable. A bookkeeper can streamline your finances and prevent costly errors, helping your firm stay compliant and financially healthy.

Here are eight key bookkeeping tasks that require consistent attention.

1. Time entry

If you bill by the hour, someone must be certain that time is entered into the billing system. Time entry is not the bookkeeper’s responsibility, but you should have an enforced policy of contemporaneous time entry. Then, your bookkeeper looks at daily or weekly reports to ensure people stay current with time entry. Trying to recall what you did for a client on March 3 – when it’s now March 31 and you are about to run bills – is a recipe for frustration and lost money.

2. Expense entry

If you advance costs for clients, you must have an expense recovery process and a set of eyes reviewing your bills and identifying opportunities to recover costs. Many small firms overlook this step. The partner/owner/solo runs to the courthouse for a hearing, tosses a $5 parking fee on their personal debit card or the company credit card, and then forgets to enter the recoverable expense on the client’s matter. A dedicated bookkeeper would be tasked with reviewing the company credit card, check register, bank statement, and bills to ensure all costs advanced have been properly invoiced for recovery.

3. Prompt billing

Bills should be sent out every month, or every quarter – whatever frequency you have adopted – but it should be consistent. You cannot get paid if you do not send bills.

4. Collections

Bills that go out should be paid by your terms. When they are not, someone should be following up for payment. Solo and small firms are not positioned to finance their clients’ legal bills.

5. Accounts payable

You want to get paid, and so do your vendors. Often paying bills is done when the partner/owner/solo has time. They get a bill and simply pay it without regard to the balance in the operating account, or without considering what other bills are coming due. Managing accounts payable is just as important.

6. Bank reconciliations

All operating accounts and trust accounts should be reconciled monthly. Too often, we log into online banking, see a positive balance, and assume we have money available. Be aware of the Rules of Professional Conduct governing your clients’ funds, trust account reconciliation, use of trust accounts, and the like.

7. Reports/month end

What’s your AR (accounts receivable) balance? What’s scheduled to be paid? What are the bank balances? How much WIP (work in progress) awaits billing? Someone should be responsible for running these reports and making sure the partner/owner/solo understands them.

8. Payroll

Even if payroll is outsourced, someone must ensure it’s submitted on time – weekly or monthly.

While this list appears long in article format, it might not represent 40 hours of work per week, and you may not want to increase your firm’s overhead with the cost of another employee – including salary, benefits, technology, office space, PTO, health insurance – even on a part-time basis. In that case, outsourcing is the answer for your firm.

For many law firms, a key contingent of their new clients come to them through referrals. The Missouri Bar’s 2021 Economic Survey found that referrals from clients and friends are the primary sources of new clients, closely followed by referrals from other lawyers or professionals. In fact, referrals can be a particularly helpful source of new clients because they have already been partially vetted as a potential fit for your firm by previous clients or other lawyers.

Yet earning more referrals can be a challenge, particularly as the business and professional worlds have shifted from in-person encounters to more digital interaction.

There’s no one-size-fits-all solution for increasing referrals, but quality communication, professional visibility, and maintaining positive relationships with clients and other professionals all play crucial roles.

Build your network

To earn referrals, you need to have a network. While client referrals remain important, it’s equally critical not to overlook the people you regularly encounter in a professional capacity.

Whenever possible, seek to build relationships with professionals in related fields. For instance, a lawyer who specializes in business law may earn referrals from an accounting firm that handles bookkeeping for local small businesses or entrepreneurs.

Likewise, consider building a reciprocal referral network with other lawyers in related but non-competitive practice areas. Other lawyers can be great sources of repeat business as they may continue to encounter clients seeking the kinds of legal services you offer in the course of their work.

Maintain an online presence

Your law firm will be much easier for others to refer new clients to if you have an active and professional online presence. A  functionalwebsite is a must but also consider keeping your LinkedIn profile updated to make connections easier.

If you’re participating in professional panels and talks or periodically sending out a helpful or interesting newsletter, former clients will be more likely to think of you when someone they know needs a lawyer in your practice area.

Offer a positive client experience

It may seem obvious, but one of the best ways to earn referrals is to offer a positive client experience. Start by thoroughly vetting your clients to make sure they are a good fit for your law firm.

Once they’re on board, commit to prompt, clear communication. From returning phone calls and replying to emails in a timely manner to sending out clear, specific invoices, good communication is critical to building and maintaining relationships.

If clients have a positive experience with your law firm, they will be more likely to recommend your services to friends, family members, and colleagues.

Forefront positive reviews

It’s always a good idea to conduct a brief client satisfaction survey when you’ve wrapped up a matter. Not only does this let you know where you can make improvements, but it also helps you identify satisfied clients.

Happy clients are good sources for referrals. You can also ask them for reviews, which you may be able to feature on your website. Positive reviews can have a snowball effect by continuing to build others’ confidence in referring people they know to your law firm.

Connect with community

Referrals don’t only come from clients and other lawyers. They may also come from surprising places in your wider social network — if people know you’re a lawyer.

Tap into your community through events (including online ones), local social media groups, and volunteering. Providing pro bono work connects you with other lawyers, but it also presents you in a professional capacity to non-lawyers in your community.

Reciprocate

If you find yourself looking to other lawyers or professionals for referrals, don’t forget to refer potential clients to them as well.

People may want to refer clients to you, but if the favor is never acknowledged or returned, they may eventually stop doing so. If you feel confident in someone else’s professional capabilities and they have referred clients to you in the past, don’t pass by the opportunity to do the same.

Communication remains critical

Ultimately, building and maintaining the types of relationships that lead to referrals requires a commitment to proactive communication and maintaining professional visibility. Build your network, stay visible online, connect with your wider community, and make the most of positive reviews.

Be sure to attend to foundational aspects too, such as reciprocating when other lawyers send you referrals and providing a positive experience that clients can get excited about.

To keep new clients coming in the door, these tips can help you turn your network into referrals.

CosmoLex is proud to offer Missouri Bar members a 10% discount on CosmoLex products through our member benefits program.

The Missouri Bar has put together additional resources for those interested in building their practice. Members also have access to the experts at Affinity Consulting at no cost through email or unlimited 30-minute virtual visits. 

Reprinted with permission of CosmoLex. Originally published here.  

The number of potential clients searching for legal services exclusively online continues to increase. In 2018 72 percent of respondents to Thomson Reuters’ U.S. Consumer Legal Needs Survey said they consulted offline sources; this year, that ticked downward to 68 percent. Any law firm that wants more clients needs to have an online presence. Every firm without a high-quality website is losing clients since relying on word-of-mouth is no longer an option. Legal website hosting basics are essential for every firm to know – from choosing a hosting platform to search engine optimization.

What is website hosting?

Website hosting is renting or purchasing space on a server to host a website. All the images, content, and code that make a website is stored in this space, which is then accessible through the World Wide Web. To better understand it, think of website hosting like online real estate. People rent or buy a home to live in and that home is attached to an address so it can be found.

But with web hosting, a website’s address is called a domain name or URL (uniform resource locator). Then that URL is connected to the server space, using DNS (domain name system. Once it's all connected, search engines index the site and then it’s accessible on the internet.

Fortunately, setting up hosting doesn’t have to be as complicated as it sounds. Many hosting platforms simplify the process or even set it up for the site owner.

Choosing a legal website hosting platform

When it comes to hosting platforms, there are many options to consider. Each platform offers multiple plans with varying features. Deciding which is the right one should be based on a few different factors. 

Purpose and planning

Every hosting service has different capabilities, features, and services. That’s why deciding the purpose of the site is an essential first step.

So, consider what the site will need to do before looking into hosting services. Will it need to host multiple email inboxes for lawyers? How many pages does it need to host?

Another thing to think about is the goal when a potential client lands on your website. This should help answer some of the questions above. Knowing this information will also help when choosing a hosting plan.

Build or buy a site

One of the next things to consider is who will build and maintain the site. For do-it-yourselfers, ease of use should be a priority. Most hosts provide some sort of website builder in the hosting plan. However, these site builders all vary immensely in how easy they are to use. Some simplify the process so anyone can quickly build an aesthetically pleasing site. Others cater to the technically inclined and require coding in HTML.

There are even some drag-and-drop site builders available. Some products, like WordPress, utilize plug-ins that can change the building interface. Services like that make the process more user-friendly for novices.

Depending on what the site needs to do, the possibilities are limitless.

How to set up hosting

The next issue is deciding how to set up the website hosting. Just like with building the website, hosting set up varies by platform.

Most domain name sellers like GoDaddy and NameCheap also offer hosting. Although the platforms are typically more limited, the DNS and domain are connected as part of the purchase. As such, the simplest way to set up hosting is to purchase it when buying a domain name. This option is ideal for do-it-yourselfers because of the ease and convenience. All the complicated setup is completed, leaving only the page build to handle.

The other option is using an independent hosting service such as BlueHost or HostGator. This option leaves the site owner to attach the hosting space and domain. It isn’t extremely complicated to do, but it is a more hands-on setup than GoDaddy or NameCheap. YouTube has countless tutorials and walkthroughs that simplify the process.

This host setup is primarily ideal for people with time, skill, or tech interests. The main upside to hosting companies like this is storage and features. These companies offer more features, optimizations, site security, and storage than other domain sellers do.

Plans and cost

No matter which hosting option you choose, they all offer a wide selection of prices. Your firm should base this decision on your needs, features, and overall budget. Website hosting prices can vary drastically for standard service and the more advanced types, like dedicated hosting, can be very costly. Fortunately, most platforms offer lower rates to first-time customers.

However, cost should never be the deciding factor when selecting a plan or type of hosting. It all comes down to what best suits your firm's needs.

Plan options

There are different hosting plans intended to cater to different needs. Therefore, knowing the purpose and needs of the site is essential. Most hosting plans include a set amount of storage on the server, but that storage is shared by the site’s pages, photos, and content. Then storage is further used up by email inboxes for people in the organization. So, the larger an organization is, the larger the required storage.

Depending on the hosting service provider, there are many optimizations available. Some providers may include a few optimizations in the hosting package. Others offer them as addons for an additional fee.

Search engine optimization

Search engine optimization (SEO) improves a website’s location in search query results. By improving it, a website climbs closer to the top of the search results. The higher on the list a site is, the more traffic it receives.

Good SEO ranking is crucial in lead attraction, but when it comes to SEO, not all hosting services are created equal. Some even limit a website’s ranking, making SEO an important consideration when choosing a hosting platform.

Legal website hosting doesn’t have to be complicated.

There is a lot to consider when choosing a legal website hosting service. No two platforms are built the same, so it’s important to identify what your law firm’s specific needs are in a website and use that to guide your decision. You’ll also need to consider skill level and the amount of time you have for setup.

With this guide and a clear plan of your firm’s needs, you’ll be on your way to holding a domain in the digital space.

Missouri Bar members receive discounts from member benefit providers who specialize in website hosting and SEO, including Brilliant Practice by Biztourage, Digital Age Marketing Group, and Zola Creative. Missouri Bar members have access to more than 60 member benefits.

PracticePanther is a proud Missouri Bar member benefit provider. Missouri Bar members receive a 10% discount for a year on PraticePanther’s law practice management software.

Members interested in learning more about opening, building, managing, protecting, or winding down a law practice have access to the experts at Affinity Consulting at no cost through email or unlimited 30-minute virtual visits. 

Reprinted with permission of PracticePanther. Originally published here.

Whether you’re straight out of law school or ready to strike out on your own after practicing at a firm, you face several “unknown unknowns,” as former U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld would say. 

People 

For recent graduates, you know you need clients, as well as mentorship and guidance. You may know the law -- or at least an idea of where to start -- but no law school teaches you the mechanics of filing, the preferred languages of certain judges or mediators, and all the other seemingly small but fundamental “wheel greasing” aspects of legal practice. The Missouri Bar’s sections and committees can be a great resource for forming mentorships. The LawyerSearch tool can also help connect you with prospective clients. 

For seasoned lawyers charting a new path, your prior firm probably took care of more than you think. Unless you were in a managerial position, it was someone else’s job to think about everything from rent to health insurance to breakroom snacks. Furthermore, it’s possible you relied on secretaries, legal assistants, and paralegals to facilitate client interaction and document preparation. For insurance options, check out the Plan | Insure member benefits page. If you’re looking to hire an associate or contract lawyer, post on The Missouri Bar’s Jobs for Missouri Lawyers board. For support staff positions, some local bars, like Metropolitan St. Louis, accept postings for non-lawyer personnel. For office space, look to the Office Space/Office Sharing page. 

For additional considerations regarding business structure, employee compensation, and accounting options, review the bar’s Practice Management site for the Starting a New Firm checklist. It doesn’t have all the answers, as some questions are fact-specific, but the checklist will move some topics from “unknown unknowns” to “known unknowns.” 

Technology 

Beyond legal knowledge and personnel, you also must consider technology. Gone are the days where a legal pad, law library card, and well-placed Yellow Pages ad got the ball rolling. When starting a new firm, we can break down your technology needs into two core categories: hardware and software. 

Hardware 

On the hardware front, I encourage you to equip all employees, lawyers, and support staff with laptops. It is a slightly pricier route, and you can argue that certain job functions don’t require mobility. But, if you had started your firm prior to March 2020, how much better-positioned would your employees be if they could grab their laptops and pick up working from home immediately? 

Depending on your practice area, and any specialized software you may need, you have two options. If you are platform-agnostic, meaning you don’t require software that runs only on Windows, and are already in the Apple ecosystem with iPhones and iPads, it’s worth considering a MacBook Air. If you need Windows-only software or are not in the Apple ecosystem, I suggest a ThinkPad X1 Carbon. Both the MacBook and ThinkPad start at about $1,000. Bar members get a discount on ThinkPads via this link. 

Beyond the laptop, there are a few additional core tech pieces: a docking station, webcam, quality headset, and scanner. With docking stations, the convenience and technology has shifted in the last three years. You want to find a USB-C or Thunderbolt 3 or 4 dock. These docks connect to your laptop with a single cord that provides the connection for external monitors, webcams, wired internet, and other peripherals. On the USB side, I like the ICY BOX USB 3.0 Universal Docking Station, available at Amazon for around $100. On the Thunderbolt side, where the single cable will also charge your laptop, I recommend the CalDigit TS3 Plus, which retails for about $250. For webcam, you can’t go wrong with Logitech. Any of their webcams are a step up from what’s built into laptops. For headphones and a microphone, refer to the headphone recommendations on our Practice Management site. Finally, the Practice Management site has recommendations on printers, scanners, and portable printers and scanners, which are useful if you’re going to clients’ locations or to court. 

Software 

Software for your new firm falls into one of two categories. There’s the everyday, core software that you’ll need, and then there’s the legal-specific software. The two core software products are an office suite, usually Microsoft Office, and a PDF program that lets you create and edit PDFs. For email and word processing, I suggest subscribing to Microsoft 365. Rather than buying a shrink-wrapped copy of Office that never receives updates, Microsoft strongly encourages people to subscribe for $8.25 per person per month, or more depending on desired features. That $8.25 gets you the desktop programs most people think of as “Microsoft Office,” with installation rights on up to five machines per user, and full access to the smartphone and tablet Office programs. An additional $4.25 per month would move you up to the Microsoft 365 Business Standard, meaning Microsoft hosts your email and provides you access to many additional, business-oriented web-based programs. 

On the PDF side, everyone has heard of Adobe Acrobat, the granddaddy of PDF software. It is available as subscription only for about $15 per user per month. That $15 per month also includes access to Adobe Sign, Adobe’s legally binding e-signature platform. If $15 per month is too much, or you dislike having more subscriptions, there are many PDF programs available that have the same features as Acrobat (other than Adobe Sign) and can be purchased on a traditional “pay once” model. Visit Affinity Consulting’s Practice Management PDF Programs Comparison Chart for more information. 

On the legal-specific side of the fence, your firm should consider how you’re going to handle matter information and financial information. For matter management, you must decide if you want a web-based case management program or a traditional program that runs on a server. If you are fresh from law school with no established work habits, I suggest going the web route. On the other hand, if you are already familiar with PracticeMaster, for example, I might lean more towards sticking with the familiar program as you begin your new business. One hesitation on this point is that all web-based programs are subscription based so they let you try them month-to-month, with minimal-to-no upfront expense. For a server-based program, you will need to pay for hardware and software upfront. 

The Practice Management section contains resources to help you decide what features are most valuable for your practice areas. Affinity Consulting also has two comparison charts corresponding to web-based and server-based practice management options. 

As for financial information, nearly all practice management programs let you record time, send bills, and track trust accounts. A minority of practice management programs also allow you to track general ledger business information, such as rent and office expenses. The programs lacking this functionality usually integrate with QuickBooks Online or Xero to bridge the gaps. After you have narrowed down your choices, visit the Build | Manage page to see which programs offer discounts to Missouri Bar members. 

Off and Running 

The Open a Practice section of The Missouri Bar’s website holds additional information not covered here, including suggested minimum computer specifications, helping prospective clients become DIYers, and a walk-through of using the comparison charts effectively. 

If you have questions, contact Affinity Consulting through the Ask an Expert page on the bar’s site or email mobarlpm@affinityconsulting.com.  

There is also an upcoming CLE on this very topic in the bar’s Management Matters Series. The program is available in both a webinar and self-study format. Click here to register. If you were admitted to the bar in Spring 2021, the starting a law firm CLE is complimentary, so check out the flyer from MoBarCLE in your welcome kit for more details.  

Have you tried to compare products or services slightly off the beaten consumer path? Or well-known products for a non-marquee feature? Despite that product’s market being worth tens to hundreds of millions of dollars, the information is difficult to come by. 

If you’re in the market for a pillow or bedsheets, there are obvious sources of information such as the website Consumer Reports that rate pillows and bedsheets on relevant categories like softness, durability, and ease of cleaning, for example. Easy enough. But suppose you want to buy a pillow made in America or in a union shop? It’s harder to come by that information in part because most buyers are not including those features in their buying decisions. In that case, your best recourse is to look for manufacturers who brag about location or employees. You could also look to sites that promote “Made in America” products. 

The same information gap occurs with tech products too. To begin with, honest feature comparison sites that aren’t littered with ads are hard to come by for the general consumer. And once found, those sites target the broadly relevant features. Websites like PC Magazine or CNET will compare Dropbox, OneDrive, and G Drive, but they’re unlikely to do so with a legal professional in mind. General audience news sources will talk price, speed, and ease of use, all relevant to legal professionals as well as the general public, but they won’t address more esoteric things important to lawyers. A PC Magazine comparison won’t address data center locations, what the service does when served with a subpoena or warrant, or how you could use a “roll your own” encryption on top of the service. 

For legal-specific products, the problem is worse. While potential buyers can compare Dropbox, OneDrive, and G Drive, software and services targeted at legal professionals have websites and marketing materials that often offer vague descriptions of capabilities, lacking important caveats, and many times hide pricing behind a “Request a Consultation” form that results in a sales call. 

These problems are exacerbated because lawyers, particularly those new to the profession or unaccustomed to comparing and choosing software, may lack a good idea of what features they want in a practice management solution, for example. 

Using Your Resources to Make Good Legal Tech Decisions 

That’s where the Law Practice Management Resource Center come into play. We’ve collected and analyzed information in key law practice tech areas so you don’t have to. Let’s walk through an example: 

Suppose you find your case and matter organization lacking. You can’t access documents unless you’re in the office. You rely on one or more people to figure out what, if anything, a client owes you and how much, if anything, the client has in their trust account. A client calls, texts, or emails you inquiring about case statuses, and you spend time rifling through emails, handwritten notes, and your memory to give updates. You talked with clients all day but, at the end of the day, are hard-pressed to remember who you talked to for how long and what was discussed. The clients are happy, but poor recollection has cost you billable time. Not good! 

If we treat this like a law school exam, we can unpack it and get an idea of issues this law office should address when evaluating a new practice management system. 

• Document access: You want to be able to access documents from outside the office. Is it just documents or do you also want access to case information? How important is it that access works well on tablets or iPhones, or is good laptop access enough? 

• Accounting: You want to know what the client owes and what’s in his trust account irrespective of whether the bookkeeper or support staffer, if any, is reachable. Do you want to know other financial information as well, like upcoming rent or office supply bills in the same program? If not, what accounting program do you use now, and will it share data with your prospective practice management program? Should clients be able to see and pay bills over the internet? 

• Case status: Most practice management programs hold general case information, party contact information, calendar dates, and tasks. Most also have some form of document storage. All would be an improvement over the “rifling lawyer” in our hypothetical scenario, but there are wrinkles in the options. How important is mobile access and from what device? Many programs can capture email and sync calendars and contacts but are you a Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace firm? Many products, particularly the web-based ones, offer client portals where the client can see upcoming appointments, share documents, exchange secure messages with the lawyer, and see bills. Is this case status “self-help” a feature you want? Some programs integrate with voice over internet phone (VOIP) systems so phone call numbers and length become proposed time entries, so you don’t lose billable time as in our hypothetical situation. How valuable is that? 

As with a law school exam, our one paragraph hypothetical became three paragraphs of additional questions and considerations. You don’t want to do all the leg work yourself! 

Our Law Practice Management Resource Center offers checklists and whitepapers to spur these types of questions. Find the checklists (here and here) and whitepaper relevant to practice management software on our Law Practice Management website. Once you’ve picked your “must have” features and prioritized their importance, then head over to the Checklists and Charts resource, scroll down to the “Manage a Practice” heading, and you’ll find two relevant comparison charts. The “Practice Management Server-based” comparison chart compares vendors offering software that would install on a desktop or server that you maintain. This route is popular with lawyers who have more complex needs, want to integrate with other desktop software such as PCLaw or Microsoft Word, and those who don’t want client data stored with a cloud-based provider. The “Practice Management Cloud-based” comparison chart compares vendors whose offerings run in a web browser, requiring little to no software maintenance on the user’s side. This route is better for lawyers newer to practice, those who are more mobile, those who desire tablet or smartphone apps, and those who don’t want to make an upfront investment in software and hardware to run traditional software. 

The comparison chart organization makes feature analysis easy. For example, if you are committed to desktop/server software over a web-based solution but want the ability to email or text appointment reminders to clients, then Coyote Analytics is your answer. Or if you’re committed to a web-based offering but want offline access to case information because you have spotty internet, then Smokeball is your answer. Missouri Bar members receive discounts on many top practice management programs, including Smokeball, at the Member Benefits section of the bar’s website. 

Finally, once you’ve selected a practice management solution, be sure to clean up your data before moving case and billing information to the new system. 

Much More to Discover 

Practice management software is just one example of high-value, legal tech decisions that the comparison charts can help you make. Comparisons exist for everything from document management solutions (that can talk to your practice management solution) to document assembly tools (that can pull information from practice management software into documents) to voice over internet phone (VOIP) that can automatically create times from phone calls. Visit all the checklists and comparison charts available for bar members. 

If you have any questions or want information from experts who’ve implemented these solutions for law practices and legal organizations, visit LPM’s Ask an Expert to email questions or schedule a phone or video call. 

Open
In this section of the website, members will find technology checklists, purchasing guides, tips for finding the best deals on legal technology, and links to Missouri Bar member benefits, including discounts on services and products. Members will also find a guide for starting a law practice and a new lawyer’s guide to the bar.

Build
Tools for marketing, advertising, navigating social media, earning referrals, and, of course, links to articles and relevant ethics opinions on these topics are located under this section. We worked to think of everything bar members may need in one spot, so it’s easy to find, and easy to use.

Manage
This is the most densely populated area of the site, with helpful checklists and whitepapers on practice management; time billing and accounting; documents; e–filing; technology; time management; hiring and firing; working with clients; and limited scope representation. There are also comparison charts to help lawyers navigate software and technology options.

Protect
Lawyers have an ethical obligation to protect client data, and with so many devices being used to access and consume client and matter information, protecting it can be overwhelming. Lawyers owe it to their clients, employees, and law licenses to check out this section. Here, members will also find information for disaster preparedness, cybersecurity planning, and more.

Wind Down
Whether members are closing their practices and planning for retirement or merging law offices for a new venture, in this section of the website they will find helpful checklists to makes sure they have left no stone unturned. Succession planning checklists and guidelines live here, too – and it is never too early to start planning.

Ask an Expert
The resources don’t stop there. If bar members don’t find what they are looking for, they can email Affinity Consulting any question about the management and technology at their firms. While Affinity Consulting can’t provide legal advice, their experts can connect lawyers with the tools and re-sources to help open, operate, and wind down their practices.

Members can also schedule a short consultation with one of Affinity Consulting’s consultants. Best of all? These services are included in your Missouri Bar membership. No extra fees, and no separate login; just the resources Missouri Bar members need to make good decisions and run a successful law practice.

The Law Practice Management Center can be Missouri Bar members’ go-to resource for all their law office management and technology needs. Get started at MoBar.org/LPM.

Endnotes

1 As a Missouri Bar member benefit, lawyers can speak with Affinity Consulting experts regarding legal technology and law practice management questions. At no cost, Missouri lawyers can email their question to an expert or schedule a one-on-one, remote consultation. Learn more at MoBar.org/LPM.