Law Office Technology

How to chose Between Microsoft 365 and Google Apps

A big part of our business is moving legal clients from in-house Microsoft Exchange to the cloud.   When our company does “cloud migrations” we have to decide whether to use Microsoft 365 or Google Apps. 

	365	Google Apps
Cost	$4 per User	$4 per User
Storage	25GB per user	25GB per User
Outlook 2010,2007	Yes	Yes
Outlook 2011*	Yes	No
Direct** Clio Sync	No	Yes
Direct** Amicus Sync	N0	Yes
Direct** PCLaw Sync	N0	No
Direct TimeMatters Sync	Yes	No
Amicus Cloud	Yes	No
Gmail Interface	No	Yes
Web Mail	Yes	Yes
Easy Migration	Yes	Yes

* Outlook 2011 is the Mac Version of Microsoft Outlook.  It is a pain in the ass to deal with.  On my Mac,  I run Parallels and Windows Outlook 2010.   Another thing to consider, if a program says they have Outlook integration, it means Windows Outlook not Mac Outlook.     Hey, if it weren't complicated I would not have a job.

**Direct means that the software syncs via the application and not Outlook.  Clio, Amicus and PCLaw all have applications that you can install in Windows Outlook that syncs To Dos, Contacts, and Calendar.  For each user that wants to sync you have to install this in Outlook and their computers need to be on and Outlook running for the sync to work.  In a Direct Sync Environment,  nothing needs to be on.  Clio and Amicus support a direct sync with Google Apps.  Clio is also working in a Direct Sync with 365.  TimeMatters and Amicus Cloud has a direct sync with 365.  Direct sync is the way to go. 

 

Still confused?  Here are some questions I ask clients during our tech audit:

Are you in a Mac Environment running Outlook 2011?

365

Are you using Clio or Amicus Attorney?

Google Apps

Are your users familiar with Gmail?

Google Apps

Do you hate Microsoft?

Google Apps

Are you running TimeMatters or Amicus Cloud?

365

Do you hate Google?

365

Data Escrow with Clio

When you move your data into the Cloud with a SaaS (Software as a Service) provider there is the perception that you lose control of the data.   Most attorneys are worried about the cloud provider going out of business, suffering a hardware failure, or the inability to move to a competing product in case of a price hike or diminished service.  By sticking with traditionally installed software, all three of these concerns could be avoided.

Clio, a leading cloud based Practice Management Software has a Data Escrow feature that allows you to backup all of your data (including documents) to Amazon Web Services.  This allows a law firm to have complete control of their data while still getting all the benefits of the cloud. 

Setting up Data Escrow

Step 1: Sign up from Amazon Web Services.  Under 5gb of storage is free

Step 2:  Go to Security Credentials –> Access Credentials –> and Create an Access Key ID

Step 3: In Clio go to Settings –> Clio Settings –> Data Escrow

Take the information from Amazon Web Services and plug it in here. 

Viewing Your Data

Step 1: Log into Amazon Account and go to S3

Step 2:  Chose what data you want to view.

Documents contain all the Documents you have uploaded to Clio.  So if you have a Word or PDF  Document that you attached to a Clio File, it is here you can open or download it.

If you go into the Exports Folder, you see the following:

These are CSV’s (Comma Separated Values) of all your data.  This can be viewed in Excel or imported into a new practice management system. 

As you can see from above, if you use Clio or similar products with Data Escrow,  you have full control of you are your client’s data while still having all the benefits of cloud computing. 

Clio and DropBox

I knew that Clio released an integration with DropBox and that it worked pretty well.  I didn’t realize how powerful it was until I recently converted a 30 user firm to Clio.  Since most of the users at the firm already had DropBox,  they were extremely excited about how the integration worked. 

The best function of using DropBox to store your Clio documents is that they still reside on your server.  So if the internet goes out,  you still have access to all your documents.  If your server blows up,  you can log into Clio and get all your documents.  From a DR (Disaster Recovery) standpoint,  this is the best solution. 

Some Starter Tips

• The firm needs to purchase a “master” DropBox Account that the firm owns.  Don’t link to an individual user account.
• Purchase PackRat as well,  this will give you the ability to restore documents at any time.  So if 3 years from now, you realize someone deleted a document, you can find and restore it.  You can’t do that with traditional backups.  
• Only install the “master” DropBox Account on your document server(the computer where your documents reside).  You don’t need to put DropBox on every machine.
• Map a drive “Windows” or use an Alias “Mac” to share this folder to all your users.
• If attorneys have their own DropBox account,  just share their matters with them.
• Use Folders like correspondence, discovery, ect in the the DropBox Folders.  This will make them easier to see in Clio.  \
• Clio has a pretty good article about using this and setting it up. 

Part 1: Setting up Clio and DropBox

Go to the System Settings –> Dropbox.com Settings

Authorize DropBox

Login to your DropBox master account (Make sure this comes up.  If it does not you are probably logged into your own personal DropBox Account.)

Allow the connections between Clio and DropBox.

 

Go back into the settings and make sure DropBox is your default Document Source.

 

Part 2: DropBox and Your Documents

If we go to DropBox,  we see that Clio has created a folder called DropBox.

 

 

The folder is arranged by client name.

If we drill down to one of those folders, we can see that they are then arranged by Matter ID. 

Part 3: Moving Documents into DropBox

Once you have setup DropBox and Clio you need to copy documents from their old location into the Clio DropBox Folder.

In the example above,  I found the documents on my computer, and copied them into the correct DropBox Folder.  I then logged into the matter in Clio and all my documents appeared, as seen below. 

While this works flawlessly,  it would be much nicer if  I could create subfolders to see my Documents in Clio.  In my DropBox Folder,  I created the following Folders and dragged all my Documents into them. 

Now when I log into Clio, everything is more organized. 

Your Practice In the Cloud

Your Practice in the Cloud

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The Mississippi State Bar: Greenville CLE on the Road Program

04/20/2012

Tom O’Connor and Craig Bayer

We are Official Clio Consultants!!!

We are very excited that Clio has opened a consulting program and have jumped at the bit to be a part of it.  Clio is a Practice Management Program (Front Office) offered as a SaaS model which means that you pay for it monthly instead of one lump sum.   Clio will help us work with an increasing growing segment of attorneys that are either on Macs or don’t have any equipment to run a server application.  These are people we had to turn away before and now we can help them out.  

For more information check out: 

http://www.goclio.com/blog/2010/05/clio-launches-certified-consultant-partner-program/

and

http://www.goclio.com/consultants/ClioCertifiedConsultantAnnouncement.pdf