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Is This the Most Robust Practice Management System of Them All?

By Neil J. Squillante | Thursday, January 24, 2019

Today's TL NewsWire Hot Product is a cloud practice platform that eliminates the need for QuickBooks and other third-party products thanks to its expansive suite of features (see article below). In addition, you'll find links to many previous TL NewsWire Hot Products, including an Android and iPhone app for capturing billable time on the go, including multiple timers, voice-to-speech, and other shortcuts. Don't miss the next issue of TL NewsWire.

The branch of mathematics known as chaos theory posits that unpredictable events are normal, not out of the ordinary. Busy, growing law firms know this all too well, always expecting the unexpected. This explains why many seek practice management software to bring as much order to this chaos as possible. The more your software can do, the better equipped you'll be.

Zola Suite in One Sentence

Zola Suite is a cloud-based practice management platform that offers billing, financial and trust accounting, matter and document management, full email capabilities, and much more.

The Killer Feature

"Zola Suite is a fully-unified practice management system on which you can run your law firm without having to juggle multiple integrations," says founder, CEO, and Chief Product Architect Fred J. Cohen, J.D. Cohen often uses the word "robust" to describe Zola Suite. The Add New Entry button at the top of every screen serves an apt metaphor for this characterization. Unlike similar buttons in competing products, this one gives you access to all major functions instead of just a handful.

Zola Suite's robustness results in several key differentiators, the most unique of which is its built-in email and calendar apps -- an endeavor few competitors have attempted. Zola Suite works with Office 365, G Suite, and other services. You can encrypt messages using RPost (included at no cost), automatically save them to the corresponding matter, and record a time entry, all from a single screen. The calendar sends standard invites that recipients can accept in all major email and calendar systems. You can continue to use Outlook, Gmail, Apple Mail, etc. as you do now.

Continuing with this "robust" theme, Zola Suite includes an accounting system that eliminates the need for products like QuickBooks. You'll find small touches like showing the Sent Date on invoices as well as major timesavers like the ability to bulk email invoices, trust requests, and statements of account. Thanks to its ability to connect with banks, you can import bank and credit card transactions for faster reconciliations.

"We are a mid-sized firm and Zola definitely helped us grow," says Thomas Dunlap, founder of Dunlap Bennett & Ludwig PLLC. "It's a fantastic cloud-based solution for a firm with multiple locations and attorneys that need to collaborate on a single platform."

Other Notable Features

Similar depth exists across Zola Suite's other functions. For example, the trust accounting system prevents you from assigning more than a matter's trust balance to an invoice even if the underlying bank balance is larger, the billing system can track hard and soft costs, and the task management system has features like multiple assignees and subtasks typically found in project management systems. Reports include all the ones you'd expect plus proprietary reports like Timekeeper Productivity and WIP-AR-Trust for greater visibility.

Zola Suite also has features for your clients. The company's Caseway secure portal enables clients to pay invoices, scan documents, and communicate with your firm. Zola also offers a white-label mobile app that can be customized with your firm's branding. Clients can download your app from the Apple or Google stores.

What Else Should You Know?

Zola Suite offers three plans -- Core ($59 per user per month), Enterprise ($79), or Enterprise Plus ($89). The optional branded app has a one-time setup cost of $99. Zola Suite integrates with sister product Zola CRM for managing your marketing efforts. Explore Zola Suite and bookmark the website.

About TL NewsWire
So many products, so little time. Each week, TL NewsWire reports on the hottest new products for lawyers and law office administrators. The innovative structure of TL NewsWire articles enable you to quickly understand each product's value proposition, and then zero in on its killer feature and other notable attributes. In each issue, you can easily revisit our back catalog of articles and the most recent TL NewsWire Top 25 Products Awards. Subscribe to TL NewsWire.

Topics: Accounting/Billing/Time Capture | Email/Messaging/Telephony | Practice Management/Calendars | TL NewsWire

MySignatures (A Free Siri Shortcut for TL Members); Three Successful Law Firm Marketing Plans

By TechnoLawyer | Friday, October 19, 2018

Today's issue of TL Serendipity contains these articles:

Neil Squillante, MySignatures: A Free Siri Shortcut for TechnoLawyer Members

John Faucher, My Law Firm Marketing Plan: Provisors, Newsletter, Blog, Teaching, and More

David O'Connell, Best Way to Attract New Clients (Now That I've Tried Everything Else)

Philip Franckel, How We Use Our Vanity Phone Number in Marketing

Don't miss this issue — or any future issues.

How to Receive TL Serendipity
Our most serendipitous offering (hence its name), TL Serendipity consists of contributions by TechnoLawyer members who have important information to share. You'll no doubt enjoy it because of its mix of interesting topics and genuinely useful knowledge, including brutally honest product reviews and informative how-tos. The TL Serendipity newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Topics: Email/Messaging/Telephony | Laptops/Smartphones/Tablets | Law Firm Marketing/Publications/Web Sites | TL Serendipity

How I Changed My Practice to Remain a Happy Lawyer; Reviews of Topaz Electric Pen, Everything, Copernic, Nomorobo

By TechnoLawyer | Friday, September 7, 2018

Today's issue of TL Serendipity contains these articles:

Mark Olberding, How I Changed My Practice to Remain a Happy Lawyer

Michael Schwartz, Review of Topaz Electric Pen for Digital and Print Signatures

Harry Steinmetz, Review of Daylite for Team Scheduling

Mark Olberding, Review of Everything Versus Copernic for Desktop Search

Jim Fortson, Review of Nomorobo

Don't miss this issue — or any future issues.

How to Receive TL Serendipity
Our most serendipitous offering (hence its name), TL Serendipity consists of contributions by TechnoLawyer members who have important information to share. You'll no doubt enjoy it because of its mix of interesting topics and genuinely useful knowledge, including brutally honest product reviews and informative how-tos. The TL Serendipity newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Topics: Business Productivity/Word Processing | Coming Attractions | Email/Messaging/Telephony | Practice Management/Calendars | Technology Industry/Legal Profession | TL Serendipity | Utilities

Practicing Law Is a Great Job; Reviews of Just Press Record, Dictate + Connect, HelloSign, RMail

By TechnoLawyer | Friday, August 31, 2018

Today's issue of TL Serendipity contains these articles:

Emmett Raitt, Law Practice Is a Much Better Job Than Most Alternatives

Troy Marsh, Review of Just Press Record (Dragon Anywhere Alternative)

Andrea Cannavina, Review of Dictate + Connect (Dragon Anywhere Alternative)

Stephen Hayes, Reviews of HelloSign and RMail

Don't miss this issue — or any future issues.

How to Receive TL Serendipity
Our most serendipitous offering (hence its name), TL Serendipity consists of contributions by TechnoLawyer members who have important information to share. You'll no doubt enjoy it because of its mix of interesting topics and genuinely useful knowledge, including brutally honest product reviews and informative how-tos. The TL Serendipity newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Topics: Business Productivity/Word Processing | Collaboration/Knowledge Management | Coming Attractions | Dictation/OCR/Speech Recognition | Email/Messaging/Telephony | Technology Industry/Legal Profession | TL Serendipity

Reviews of News Explorer, Pushbullet, FaxitFast, Dragon for Mac

By TechnoLawyer | Friday, June 8, 2018

Today's issue of TL Serendipity contains these articles:

Neil Squillante, Review of News Explorer

Bobby Abrams, How Pushbullet Works

James Rice, Review of FaxitFast

Rod Stephens, Review of Dragon for Mac

Don't miss this issue — or any future issues.

How to Receive TL Serendipity
Our most serendipitous offering (hence its name), TL Serendipity consists of contributions by TechnoLawyer members who have important information to share. You'll no doubt enjoy it because of its mix of interesting topics and genuinely useful knowledge, including brutally honest product reviews and informative how-tos. The TL Serendipity newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Topics: CLE/News/References | Coming Attractions | Dictation/OCR/Speech Recognition | Email/Messaging/Telephony | Networking/Operating Systems | TL Serendipity

Why Email Is So Stressful Plus 55 More Must-Reads

By TechnoLawyer | Tuesday, April 17, 2018

Coming today to SmallLaw: Our editorial team has selected and linked to the 56 best articles, podcasts, and videos from the past week worthy of your attention. Below you'll find a sampling from today's issue, including our SmallLaw Pick of the Week. SmallLaw is free so don't miss the next issue — sign up now.

Congratulations to Dorie Clark of Harvard Business Review on winning our SmallLaw Pick of the Week award: Why Email Is So Stressful, Even Though It’s Not Actually That Time-Consuming

The Best Office Chair

I Might Be Alone Most of the Time, but I'm Not Lonely

Seven Ways to Improve Your Attorney Biography Page SEO

Justia Adds Lawyer Ratings and Reviews to Its Lawyer Lawyer Directory

Law Firm Marketing 101: The Basics

How to Receive SmallLaw
Small law firm, big dreams. Written by successful small-firm founders, managing partners, administrators, and legal technology and practice management experts, SmallLaw provides practical advice on management, marketing, and technology issues in solo practices and small law firms. Additionally, SmallLaw features comprehensive reviews of legal products with accompanying TechnoScore ratings. SmallLaw also ensures that you won't miss anything published elsewhere by linking to helpful articles, podcasts, and videos about solo practices and small law firms. Subscribe now for free.

Topics: Coming Attractions | Email/Messaging/Telephony | Law Firm Marketing/Publications/Web Sites | Law Office Management | SmallLaw

Reviews of Firm Central With Deadline Assistant, Kanban Tool, Asana, Swift ToDo, HotDocs Market, PhantomPDF Business, TextMagic; iPad Pro Woes

By TechnoLawyer | Friday, April 6, 2018

Today's issue of TL Serendipity contains these articles:

Michael Kelly, My Task Management Portfolio: Reviews of Firm Central With Deadline Assistant, Kanban Tool, Asana, Swift ToDo

Thomas F. McDow, Review of HotDocs Market With Surface Pro and iPad

Austin Wilkerson, Review of PhantomPDF Business

Jason Pink, Review of TextMagic

John Root, Problems Using an iPad Pro to Draft Legal Documents

Don't miss this issue — or any future issues.

How to Receive TL Serendipity
Our most serendipitous offering (hence its name), TL Serendipity consists of contributions by TechnoLawyer members who have important information to share. You'll no doubt enjoy it because of its mix of interesting topics and genuinely useful knowledge, including brutally honest product reviews and informative how-tos. The TL Serendipity newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Topics: Automation/Document Assembly/Macros | Business Productivity/Word Processing | Collaboration/Knowledge Management | Coming Attractions | Email/Messaging/Telephony | Laptops/Smartphones/Tablets | TL Serendipity

The 25 Best Productivity Apps for 2018 Plus 53 More Must-Reads

By TechnoLawyer | Monday, March 19, 2018

Coming today to BlawgWorld: Our editorial team has selected the 54 best legal technology articles, podcasts, and videos from the past week. Below you'll find a sampling from today's issue, including our BlawgWorld Pick of the Week. BlawgWorld is free so don't miss the next issue — sign up now.

Congratulations to Jared Newman of Fast Company on winning our BlawgWorld Pick of the Week award: The 25 Best Productivity Apps for 2018

One-Click Email Filing in Outlook via Artificial Intelligence

Review: Evoluent Reduced Reach Right-Hand Keyboard

Best PDF Editors for Windows in 2018

Review: Galaxy S9+

The Best Laptops of 2018

Laptop Tech Support Showdown: Our 2018 Ratings

How to Receive BlawgWorld
Our newsletters provide the most comprehensive coverage of both legal technology and mainstream technology of interest to the legal profession. But not the only coverage. BlawgWorld enables you to stay on top of all the noteworthy legal and mainstream technology articles (and podcasts and videos) published elsewhere without having to hire a research assistant. Even when you're busy, you won't want to miss each issue's Pick of the Week. Subscribe now for free.

Topics: BlawgWorld Newsletter | Collaboration/Knowledge Management | Coming Attractions | Email/Messaging/Telephony | Laptops/Smartphones/Tablets

Reviews of Ring Doorbell, Ecobee Thermostat; Two eFax Alternatives; Offline Task Management System; iPad Shortcomings

By TechnoLawyer | Friday, March 16, 2018

Today's issue of TL Serendipity contains these articles:

Caren Schwartz, Thoughts on Smart Home/Office Plus Reviews of Ring Doorbell, Ecobee Thermostat

Wells Anderson, Review of Two eFax Alternatives

John Ahern, My Offline Task Management System

Roy Greenberg, iPad Shortcomings: Dictation, WordPerfect, and More

Don't miss this issue — or any future issues.

How to Receive TL Serendipity
Our most serendipitous offering (hence its name), TL Serendipity consists of contributions by TechnoLawyer members who have important information to share. You'll no doubt enjoy it because of its mix of interesting topics and genuinely useful knowledge, including brutally honest product reviews and informative how-tos. The TL Serendipity newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Topics: Business Productivity/Word Processing | Coming Attractions | Dictation/OCR/Speech Recognition | Email/Messaging/Telephony | Gadgets/Shredders/Office Gear | Laptops/Smartphones/Tablets | TL Serendipity

One-Click Email Filing in Outlook via Artificial Intelligence

By TechnoLawyer | Thursday, March 15, 2018

Today's issue of TL NewsWire covers a Microsoft Outlook add-in that predicts where to file your email and even lets you know when a colleague has beat you to it and already filed the same message (see article below). In addition, you'll find links to the previous 11 TL NewsWire features, including our coverage of a cloud practice management system that has added financial and trust accounting to complement its billing features, obviating third-party software such as QuickBooks, an online video tutorial service to help lawyers prepare clients for depositions, mediations, and trials, and much more. Don't miss the next issue.

Over the years, document management systems have adapted to include email. The companies behind these products have developed all sorts of tools for saving email messages and attachments so that everyone working on a matter can access them. However, solutions to date require too much manual labor, and don't take into account multiple recipients of the same message to prevent duplicates.

ndMail … in One Sentence

Recently launched, NetDocuments' ndMail is a Microsoft Outlook add-in that uses artificial intelligence to make saving client-related email in the correct location faster and more accurate.

The Killer Feature

NetDocuments pioneered cloud document management nearly 20 years ago. In recent years, the company modernized NetDocuments to pave the way for companion products like ndMail.

Once installed, ndMail monitors your inbox to identify where in NetDocuments you likely want to file each new message. Select a message to view these recommended locations. Check a box if you agree with a prediction and the message is stored in that NetDocuments folder, inheriting the corresponding client, matter, and other associated metadata. You can file email in multiple folders. If you're unsure about a recommendation, right-click to open that location in NetDocuments for more context.

ndMail uses the sender, recipients, subject line, attachments, etc. to make its predictions. A Signal Strength Indicator to the left of each recommendation indicates the confidence level of ndMail's Predictive Email Filing technology. If none of the recommendations is a good fit, you can search or browse NetDocuments to find the correct folder, or create a new folder (e.g., new matter). ndMail learns from your behavior to improve its future recommendations.

"ndMail is unlike other email management solutions," says NetDocuments Sr. Product Manager of ndMail Bradlee Duncan. "It comes pre-loaded with accurate filing predictions, leveraging AI technology based on existing matter content and filing behaviors. This eliminates the need for complex deployment or pre-trained models to generate its predictions. The value is immediate in time saved, helping new employees get up to speed, and preventing errors."

Other Notable Features

NetDocuments realizes you're part of a law firm, and that colleagues often receive the same email messages. Therefore, ndMail includes a Global Filing Indicator in the form of a NetDocuments column in Outlook. If a colleague has already filed a message, the Global Filing Indicator in this column lets you know before you open the message. This prevents the storage of duplicate email messages in the same NetDocuments folder.

When composing an email message, ndMail works similarly, predicting where you likely want to file the message after sending it. If a recipient works in your law firm, they will see the Global Filing Indicator in Outlook to let them know you have already filed the message in NetDocuments.

If you communicate frequently on one matter, you can use ndMail's Folder Mapping as an alternative way to save messages in NetDocuments. Folder Mapping enables you to list NetDocuments folders within Outlook's navigation panel. Drag and drop multiple messages into a mapped folder to store them in NetDocuments.

What Else Should You Know?

You can deploy ndMail centrally. Some firms create a rule in Microsoft Exchange to remove filed messages from user inboxes after a specified period of time. Alternatively, you can give users the ability to keep or delete email in Outlook after filing it in NetDocuments. Learn more about ndMail.

How to Receive TL NewsWire
So many products, so little time. In each issue of TL NewsWire, you'll learn about five new products for the legal profession. Pressed for time? The newsletter's innovative articles enable lawyers and law office administrators to quickly understand the function of a product, and zero in on its most important features. The TL NewsWire newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Topics: Document Management | Email/Messaging/Telephony | TL NewsWire
 
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