SSB Law talks to Access about boosting client relationships with Access Legal's Case Management software
Sheffield-based practice, SSB Law, offers a wide range of services from family law and probate to personal injury and employment law.
Founded in 2007 by Janet Simpson and Jeremy Brooke, the firm prides itself on its excellent reputation for providing legal services to suit any circumstance. SSB Law is unrelenting in its focus on client relationships, using over 70 years combined legal experience and ensuring its team of handpicked staff are entirely focused on client success.
Steve Westwood, Operations Manager at SSB Law, tells us about the choice to implement Access Legal.
Why was the initial system selection made?
Prior to forming SSB Law in 2007, the partners had worked together at a different firm (as did I). During our time there we did have a Case Management system in place but we were never truly satisfied with it and as part of our research strategy, we found Access Legal's Case Management software. Although the aforementioned case management system was never replaced at the previous firm, when the partners formed SSB Law, they knew immediately that Access Legal would be the only software provider suitable.
Why was Access Legal the chosen system in the end?
It was clear from the outset that we would require a scalable Case Management system, flexible enough to meet the firm’s requirements as it developed and grew over time. From our previous research we knew Access Legal possessed an exceptional level of versatility and provided a great open platform – meaning we could tailor the system to suit us as and when we needed to.
What are the day-to-day benefits to using Access Legal?
Firstly, and speaking as the main Access Legal developer at SSB Law, I have to say the system’s inherent flexibility is a huge benefit. The sheer number of toolsets included – and as standard features – is remarkable and means our system is entirely configurable by our in-house administrators. As a way to ensure we are continuously improving our client service, I tailor the system constantly. The workflow toolset is fully customisable meaning I can roll specific workflows out to the team at the click of a button, or alternatively, I can set actions or tasks to be triggered automatically depending on, for example, a case status. Although workflow maintenance is a large area of Access Legal's case management, the training we received from Access Legal means in-depth programming knowledge or experience is not necessary – the simplicity of the system means even non-experienced staff are easily able to make amendments if required, but step-by-step Access Legal guides are always on hand if needs be!
Secondly, for our file handlers, Access Legal is the epitome of ‘user-friendly’. Everything is stored centrally within the database meaning entire cases can be pulled up instantaneously, providing a single, easy to use desktop application and ensuring we don’t need to use a variety of programs for each action. As part of the centralised storage system, Access Legal collates each incoming and outgoing document, therefore providing an efficient audit trail whilst also ensuring we don’t have any difficulties finding and extracting specific case information.
How have you tailored the New Business Enquiries (NBE) module to fit with SSB Law’s Client Relationship Management strategy?
The law industry and the traditional way of marketing law firms is changing dramatically. Access Legal will play a large part in the future success of SSB Law – from a case handling, finance and marketing point of view, as well as in terms of the firm’s growth and ensuring scalability.
Due to the integral flexibility of the Access Legal's software and the NBE module, we have easily been able to tailor the program to meet our exact requirements. If and when these change, the powerful adaptability aspect means we can simply develop the system moving forward in line with our ongoing marketing goals.
Access Legal’s NBE module allows us to put the business intelligence we need in place, by accessing different parts of our database, enabling us to match our marketing expenditure with the results of our campaigns, therefore providing us with the ability to see how best to proceed with future marketing strategies. Additionally, we can use the software to maximise our conversion rate – from initial contact through to instruction – by managing our ongoing relationships with potential clients. Once we’ve been instructed, the appointed team or individual file handler can simply create a live file, including all the relevant existing information, providing a complete client overview.
How has Access Legal’s integration with dotMailer enhanced your client and prospect relationships?
This integration has greatly enhanced our marketing efforts and in turn, our relationships with current clients and potential clients.
Using our Access Legal desktop, we can automatically upload all our new enquiries and the relevant details to address books within dotMailer, ensuring potential clients are added to the correct mailing lists, enabling us to carry out targeted marketing campaigns depending on client requirements. Using Access Legal’s inbuilt reporting tool, we can seamlessly identify these clients and directly upload them to dotMailer to create an accurate mailing list, ensuring we never send irrelevant spam-like emails.
Furthermore, the built-in intelligence means the programs we have set up within dotMailer are initiated by the upload of new data from Access Legal. This completely minimises the need for human intervention, resulting in a great time saver for us!
Overall, SSB Law is focused on offering excellent client services at a great price. Access Legal allows us to work efficiently so that the cost savings can be passed directly to the customer, allowing us to offer straightforward legal advice that doesn’t cost the earth.
