Tip #324 - Using Mailing Lists in SmartAdvocate

Tip #324 Using Mailing Lists in SmartAdvocate

Using a mailing list can be an extremely powerful and time-saving tool in your office arsenal. Whether it’s your firm’s holiday card list, newsletter, or even a letter, text, or email to all clients of a particular case type, mailing lists are easy and efficient.

SmartAdvocate has a feature called Mailing Lists, which can be useful when sending out non-case-related information. The one limitation of Mailing Lists is that you are making a list of contacts which will be unrelated to any cases to which they are connected, and thus the communications can only include personalization through Merge Codes for the contact, not for their case. In addition, Mailing Lists can only be used to create letters or other documents. However, the Case Browse feature also allows you to send case-specific communications (documents, emails, or texts) to clients in specific cases or case types. Let’s refer to lists created in this fashion as Contact Lists.

Mailing Lists Within SmartAdvocate
SmartAdvocate Mailing Lists are intended only for generic communications; that is, letters or other documents that don’t relate to specific cases. They can include any type of contacts: clients, defense counsel, adjustors, etc. If you need to include case specific information in your communication, or want to send an email or text, you will learn how to create a Contact List using Case Browse further down below in this Tip of the Week.

How To Create A Mailing List
Let’s say you want to create a Mailing List that includes all of the plaintiffs in all of your cases. Here's how:

Click on Contacts > Contact Search.
If you want to include both active and inactive contacts, uncheck the Show Active Only checkbox. You can also limit your results to individuals, organizations, or both.

Under Case Role, choose Plaintiff.
Generally, you would want to be sure the Exclude Prevent Mailing checkbox has been checked as well.
Click Submit.

This will produce a list of all plaintiffs in all of your cases who are represented by your firm. (For a list of plaintiffs in your cases who are represented by other attorneys, you would need to run your search for the Case Role of Other Plaintiff.) You can then choose individual members of the results to add to the mailing list by clicking the button on the left of each person’s row, or you can choose All by clicking on the button at the top of the column. (If you have selected All, you can then unselect individual people by unchecking the box on the left of that person’s row.) Once you have chosen at least one contact, the Mass Action button will become active.

Hover over or click on the Mass Action button and a menu will appear. Click on Add Contacts to Mailing List.

Select an existing Mailing List or create a New Mailing List. If creating a new list, give it a name and, if desired, enter a description.
Click Add Contacts.

Of course, you are not limited to plaintiffs when creating a mailing list through a contact search. You can choose any Contact Type and/or Case Role as your search criteria. Once you create a mailing list, you can run additional searches using different criteria, and add the results to the same mailing list. Thus, mailing lists can contain any combination of your entire contact base.

You’ve created a Mailing List; now you want to use it. So, of course, the first thing you need to do is find and open it.

How To Open An Existing Mailing List

Click on Contacts > Contact Search.

On the bottom of the search criteria panel, click on Mailing Lists and choose the appropriate list or lists. Click on Close.
You may want to click on Exclude Prevent Mailing.
You can also choose whether to search for individuals, organizations, or both, and whether to show only contacts who are currently Active in the SmartAdvocate system.
Click Submit.

Your list will then open.

How To Use A Mailing List
A Mailing List can be used to generate a document (for example, a letter notifying clients that the firm has moved) or it can be exported to Excel for other purposes, such as creating mailing labels. To generate a document, you first have to select the Mailing List you want to use, as described above.

Once the list is open, choose the contacts to whom you want to generate a document (or choose all).
Click on or hover over the Mass Action button.
Choose Generate Document.

Select the template you want to use.
If you want a copy of the individual document to be attached to each contact’s contact card, make sure the “Save generated documents in contact cards” box is checked. This is the only place within SmartAdvocate that a copy of a document created using mailing lists can be saved automatically. Because there is no case information in this list, and a single contact may be involved in multiple cases, there is no way for SmartAdvocate to automatically save these documents to case files. Should you want to do so, the document would have to be attached manually.
If you are saving the document to the contact card, you must also select the document type.
Add a description of the document, if desired.
Click Generate. A message will appear indicating if the document contains merge codes for which any of the contact cards do not have data (including any case related merge codes that may be in the template). You can click Cancel to correct the template, to remove or correct these merge codes, or to add the data to the contact card. You would then run the process again. If you just want to proceed, you can Open or Download the documents.

How To Use Case Browse To Create Contact Lists
SmartAdvocate provides another, even more powerful, way to create Contact Lists, using Case Browse. This is more powerful because Case Browse allows you to filter the results in a much more refined and precise way, and then allows you more options as to how to communicate with those contacts. You can create letters, other documents, texts, emails, and, by using Word, even create mailing labels. Since you are starting with cases rather than contacts, the communications can include any case specific information, as well. Note: You can only make lists of your clients (plaintiffs in your cases) through Case Browse.

Let’s say you want to send a letter to all of your cases involving a specific brand of medical device. Here’s how:

Open Case Browse.
Click on Clear All Filters. (This is important in case you have a default filter set.)
Click on Case Type.
Search for the appropriate Case Types.
Select the appropriate Case Types.
Click on Search Cases.

Select the cases in which you want the letter sent (or select all).

Click on Mass Update > Generate Document.

A new tab will open, on which the case numbers chosen will already be entered. Enter who should receive the document (Primary Plaintiff, Primary Contact, both, or All Plaintiffs in the case). If you change the setting for which cases to include, be sure to click on Search to update your list.
Select the template you want to use and click Generate.

You will receive a message about any merge fields in the document that do not have data in SmartAdvocate. Either click Close to cancel the document creation and add the missing data, or click Open to generate the documents.
If you click Open, SmartAdvocate will open Word, insert a copy of the document for each recipient, and insert the appropriate data from the case files.
A copy of the individual documents will automatically be attached to each case file, as appropriate.

Instead of documents, you can use the same list to send texts or emails, or perform various other actions. As with documents, in order to personalize the communications with merge codes, you need to create templates first. You can simply enter the words you want in the text or email without using a template, but will then lose any personalization. Once the templates are created, the process of producing the mass emails or texts is much the same.

Texts
Note that you need to have an account with a text provider service that integrates with SmartAdvocate.
Run a Case Browse search and, in the Results Page:

Click on Mass Update > Generate Text.
The case numbers will auto populate.
Choose the plaintiffs to whom the text will be sent.
Review other options.
Choose the appropriate template.
Note that, because you used a template, you can include merge codes to insert data from SmartAdvocate.

EMails
Run a Case Browse search and, in the Results Page:

Click on Mass Update > Generate Email.
The case numbers will auto populate.
Choose the plaintiffs to whom the email will be sent.
Review other options.
Choose the appropriate template.
Note that, because you used a template, you can include merge codes to insert case and contact data from SmartAdvocate in both the subject line and the body of the email.

Mailing Labels
You can easily create mailing labels from the lists you create in SmartAdvocate, whether the lists are Mailing Lists created through a Contact Search, or Contact Lists created in Case Browse. The process is the same. The initial work, creating the list, is done in SmartAdvocate. Using the list to create labels is actually done directly in Word.

Let’s say that you want to send holiday cards to all of your clients. You don’t need to create a letter; you just need to attach mailing labels to the envelopes. First you create the Mailing List in Contact Search or the Contact List in Case Browse:

Click on Case Browse.
Clear All Filters.
You can choose to include closed cases by clicking on the All button at the top of the page.
Click on Search Cases. This will provide a list of all open cases.
In the left-most column, click the checkbox at the top. This will select all of the cases. (Alternatively, you can choose the desired cases individually.)
Click Mass Update, then Add Contacts to Mailing List.
Choose which plaintiffs will receive the holiday cards. (For this purpose, you probably want to choose All.)
To add these contacts to an existing Mailing List, select that Mailing List. Duplicate contacts will be eliminated, so you don’t have to worry about someone receiving multiple cards.
To put these contacts into a new list, click New Mailing List and enter a Name for the list and, if desired, a Description.
You have now created the new Mailing List, or added to an existing one. Now you need to open it.
Click on Contacts > Contact Search.
On the bottom of the Contact Search Criteria panel, choose the desired Mailing List.
Click Submit.

You now have your complete list of clients, including their addresses, phone numbers, etc. and you are almost ready to create your labels in Word. The last step in SmartAdvocate is to export the list to an Excel spreadsheet.

In the upper right portion of the screen, click on the Excel icon. This will export the data into a spreadsheet and download it to your computer.
- This may vary somewhat depending on which browser and browser version you use.
In most instances, the downloaded file will appear on the bottom of your screen. Click on the file to open it. Excel will open and display the file.
- If you wish, you can clean up the file by removing any columns that are not required for the mailing labels, but this is not necessary.
Click on File > Save As > Browse to rename the file to something you can easily remember and place it in a location where you can easily find it. Again, this may vary a bit depending on the versions of Windows and Excel you have.

You’ve now completed the SmartAdvocate portion of this process. To actually create the Mailing Labels, you’ll need to go to Word.

Creating Mailing Labels in Word
The next step, creating the Mailing Labels in Word, uses the spreadsheet we created in SmartAdvocate. (Once again, this may vary somewhat depending on the version of Word you have, and how it is set up.)

Open a blank Word document.
Click Mailings > Start Mail Merge > Labels.

Choose the brand of label and product number. Click OK. This will create a document containing blank labels.

Click Select Recipients > Use an Existing List.

Navigate to wherever you saved the Excel spreadsheet and choose it from the list of files. Click Open.

Generally, the column labels are on sheet # 1, so select the first option. You will be brought back to the labels, with your cursor in the first one.

Click on the little arrow at the bottom of the Insert Merge icon.
This will bring up a list of the merge fields. Choose the one you want to appear first, presumably First Name. The list will disappear and you can enter any needed characters (spaces, commas, returns, etc.). Repeat this process until the label contains all necessary merge fields.

You will then have one complete label, filled in with merge fields.

Click Update labels. This copies the format you have created to all of the labels.

Click the little arrow on the Finish and Merge button. Choose Edit Individual Documents. When the next panel opens, choose All and click OK.

A new document will open, containing the labels filled in with the data from the spreadsheet. Just print the document onto the label stock and you’re ready to attach the labels onto the envelopes!

If this is the first time you have set up this kind of label, before you print out hundreds, or even thousands, of labels, you might want to check and make sure everything is set up properly to print the labels the way that you want. Here’s how:

Click the little arrow on the Finish and Merge button. Choose Edit Individual Documents.
Select the From and To fields to cover the number of labels on one page and click OK. That will insert the data onto the first page of the labels and allow you to review or print them.

Once you are confident that the labels will print as desired, you can go back and run the entire list. Then, just print onto your label stock. You can print 10 labels or 10,000 labels. It takes just minutes.