Law Technology Today From the ABA Legal Technology Resource Center
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As an attorney running a practice in the area of real estate law, you’re responsible for the creation of many sensitive and complicated documents. Managing all of these documents without a system built for your practice area can be inefficient, reduce productivity, and worst of all, it takes time out of your day—time that could be better spent serving your clients.
In a real estate closing, client and other side details are entered into a document an average of 3.8 times per document. As you know, some matters have lots of paperwork that involves entering the same information over and over again. If you are working in a matter that involves at least 15 documents, you will enter client or another party’s information a minimum of 57 times.
Instead of drowning in paperwork, many attorneys are starting to use document automation software, especially in a small or solo real estate practice. But what is document automation, and why is it so beneficial for real estate attorneys?
How does document automation work?
Document automation software can make it possible so that data is entered once into the system and then auto-populated in fields many times throughout documents you use most.
What are the benefits of document automation?
Document automation is a powerful tool will help increase efficient throughout your entire practice. With an increase in efficiency, you will see benefits in these areas:
- Huge time savings: less proof reading, copy and pasting, and typing for you and your staff.
- Reduce errors: reduce the risks associated with human error.
- Document integrity: consistent styles, clean templates, and a stable, reliable way of producing work.
- Ensure forms are current: all staff use the up-to-date version of the same form.
When considering a document automation tool, look for these key features:
- Data entered once into a database customized to the matter you are working in, including all relevant contacts, and other relevant matter information.
- Microsoft Word documents are pre-configured with merge fields inserted into the appropriate places in the document where data is usually typed.
- The combination of the (1) and (2) above, allows for the population of merge fields over and over again throughout many documents.
- Types of documents that can be automated could engagement agreement, notice of closing to a buyer, inspection letter, letter to title insurance, or closing statements.
Business Impacts
With document automation, you are able to free up your day to focus on the areas of your practice that make your small business shine.
- Better client service: you can finally focus on the content, and not the formatting, layout, or structure of the document.
- Increased employee utilization: employees can find what they need faster, generate documents in a fraction of the time, and feel confident they’ve completed the work accurately.
- Quality control: document automation standardizes the documents you use most often. Now, instead of pulling up that old client letter and using find and replace to update it, you know each form, letter, or document is created fresh, using only that matter’s exact details.
- Higher profit margins: spending less time on client work means more money in your pocket. You choose to use the time you save on generating new business, following up on referrals, or leaving early to see your family.
Smokeball offers automation software that turns all of your documents into fillable templates. By creating a client database within Smokeball and syncing with Microsoft Word, information is pulled from Smokeball into templates with just a few clicks—saving you time, errors, and frustration.
In a small law firm every minute counts. Instead of spending hours being document machine, take back your day and let document automation do the work for you so you can get back to what matters most—focusing on clients, doing quality work, and building your business.
Visit Smokeball to watch a demo and learn more about how document automation can help your real estate law firm.
