Peer to Peer Magazine

P E E R T O P E E R : I L T A ' S Q U A R T E R L Y M A G A Z I N E | F A L L 2 0 1 8 53 E ven though the entire business model in law firms is about building long-standing relationships and connections, there probably is not another industry with more disconnected systems and data. Legal marketing professionals and technologists are constantly struggling with the challenges caused by juggling so many disconnected systems including CRM and ERM, eMarketing systems and blogs, websites, intranets and portals, experience databases, proposal generators, social listening and competitive intelligence tools, and more. And don't even get us started on the spreadsheets. All of this can lead to a significant number of people and processes issues. Laying the Foundation: When is it Time to Build a Bridge? When systems are not connected, it causes challenges such as vast sets of duplicate contacts and duplicative data entry. Attorneys and staff waste time doing inefficient tasks such as entering data into multiple disconnected systems, which is frustrating and time-consuming – which can be a real problem for professionals who make money by billing their time. These independent 'silos' of data can also keep attorneys from being able to effectively analyze this disconnected data to make informed, timely decisions. One frequent answer to these problems is to build a bridge to connect the disparate systems and lead to enhanced information flow as well as efficiencies, aka integration. But then more pressing question becomes where to build the bridge. One answer for many firms has been the CRM system. A CRM has many qualities that make it a good option. These systems have been around for a long time, and many firms already have already made B E N E F I T S O F C R M B R I D G E B U I L D I N G B Y C H R I S F R I T S C H A N D J E N N I F E R W H I T T I E R

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