How Smith.ai, Lawmatics and Finch Won the Law Firm Front Door

About this episode

In 2024, only 40% of law firms answered when a prospective client called, down from 56% in 2019, according to Clio’s Legal Trends Report. Almost half never called back at all. Three companies built businesses on that gap.

In Episode 2 of WhoBringsTheBusiness, Sagar Pratap Singh breaks down how Smith.ai, Lawmatics and Finch won law firms at the front door: Smith.ai by selling through the bars and platforms lawyers already trust, Lawmatics by naming its product in the lawyer’s own words, and Finch by selling the outcome instead of the tool. He then turns each move into something a firm can do this week, and closes with a quick look at the legal tech players reshaping intake.

Key takeaways

• The first conversation decides the case. Not the ad, not the ranking, not the website. A firm that answers, sounds human and gives a clear next step keeps the client its marketing paid to attract.
• Sell through the people your clients already trust. Smith.ai rarely knocks on a law firm’s door cold; it arrives through state bar member offers and the software firms already use. For a firm, that means referral sources who know exactly what to say and who to call.
• Use your client’s words, not your industry’s. Lawmatics calls itself an attorney-client relationship manager, not a CRM. Callers aren’t shopping for legal services; they are scared, confused or angry, so the first two minutes of intake should sound like it.
• Clients buy outcomes. Finch sells cases moved from first call to demand, not software. Every client call should end with one concrete next step and one time.
• Test intake the way a client would. Whatever you use, call it yourself at 6 p.m. as a worried client before you sign anything.

Chapters

• 0:00 Intro
• 0:20 The call that decides the case
• 1:15 The call nobody answered
• 2:27 Smith.ai: sell through the people firms already trust
• 4:17 Lawmatics: build it because you have lived it
• 5:54 Finch: sell the outcome, not the tool
• 7:40 What all three have in common
• 8:13 What your firm can borrow
• 8:55 The Transferable Bit
• 9:19 Legal tech players in intake
• 10:05 Wrap-up and next episode

Want the ten-minute intake leak check? Reply or comment INTAKE and we’ll send it over.

Transcript

Lightly edited for readability. Figures are the companies’ own announcements or press reports unless another source is named.

The call that decides the case

Tonight at a quarter past six, someone in your city will call a law firm about the worst week of their life. Whether that firm wins the case will be decided before any lawyer hears about it. It will be decided by who picks up the phone.

Welcome back. In the first episode, we looked at how Clio, Harvey, Legora and EvenUp won law firms. Many of you wrote to me about it, so this is now a series. Every few weeks I take two or three companies that sell to law firms, break down the one move that won each of them their buyers, and turn it into something your firm can use. Today is about the front door: the phone call, the web form, the first conversation a client has with your firm. Three companies built businesses on that moment: Smith.ai, Lawmatics and Finch. Most numbers here are the companies’ own announcements or press reports, and I’ll name the source each time. The moves are what matter.

The call nobody answered

Let me start with the problem all three companies are solving, because I have watched it up close for years. For more than twelve years I worked on the support side of US law firms: intake, medical summaries, drafting, follow-ups, case management software, paralegal and admin support, plus four more years around legal businesses and conferences. The leak I saw most often was not in the marketing. It was in the minutes after someone reached out.

Clio’s 2024 Legal Trends Report put numbers on it. As the Oklahoma Bar Journal reported last year, when researchers called firms as prospective clients, only 40% of firms answered. In 2019 that figure was 56%. And 48% of firms neither answered the call nor called back.

Think about what that means. A firm pays for the website, the reviews, the ads and the content, and somebody finally calls. In almost half of firms, nobody is there, then or later. So the client does what any of us would do: they call the next firm on the list. That gap is a market. Here is how three companies won it.

Smith.ai: sell through the people firms already trust

Smith.ai was founded in 2015 in Palo Alto by Aaron Lee and Justin Maxwell. It answers calls, chats and texts for small businesses, and by 2022 it had served thousands of law firms. Today it offers two things: human virtual receptionists, and an AI receptionist with a human as backup.

The product is good, but the product is not the move I want you to notice. Look at where Smith.ai shows up. In July 2022, Filevine, the case management platform, named Smith.ai its preferred partner for call answering and intake. Filevine had its own receptionist service, shut it down and moved those customers to Smith.ai. A platform that firms already trusted with their cases handed Smith.ai its customers.

Now look at the state bars. This September, the State Bar of Michigan announced a member discount of 25% off a firm’s first two months. Smith.ai appears on the State Bar of Nevada’s business partner list, the Florida Bar’s member offers include a free Smith.ai trial, and it connects with Clio, MyCase and Lawmatics, the systems firms already run. So Smith.ai rarely has to knock on a law firm’s door cold. It arrives through the bar the lawyer already belongs to and the software the lawyer already uses. When your buyer is careful, the most efficient sales channel is the place they already trust.

For your firm, the same idea works in reverse. Most of your best clients come through someone they already trust: a doctor, an accountant, a former client, another lawyer. Make a list of the five referral sources that sent you a case this year. Then ask whether each of them knows exactly what to say and who to call at your firm. If not, that is your first marketing job, and it costs nothing.

Lawmatics: build it because you have lived it

Lawmatics was founded in 2017 by Matt Spiegel. Matt is a former lawyer, and before Lawmatics he founded MyCase, the practice management platform, in 2009. By the time he started Lawmatics, he had already spent years selling software to lawyers. Lawmatics raised a $2.5 million seed round in October 2020 and a $10 million Series A in December 2021. The product handles intake, follow-up and marketing automation, everything from the first enquiry to a signed engagement.

The move here is language. In that 2021 funding announcement, Spiegel said he prefers the term attorney-client relationship manager to CRM, and he described the goal as enabling the front end of law firms. That sounds small. It is not. Lawyers do not think of themselves as running a sales pipeline, and many of them dislike the word sales. A founder who has sat with lawyers for years knows that, so he names the product in the lawyer’s own terms: a relationship with the client that starts from the first call.

For your firm, do the same with your own clients. People who call a law firm are not shopping for legal services. They are scared, confused or angry. Rewrite the first two minutes of your intake call in their words. Instead of “What type of matter is this?”, try “Tell me what happened.” Instead of “We will review and get back to you,” say “You will hear from an attorney by 4:00 today.” The firm that sounds like it understood the caller gets the case.

Finch: sell the outcome, not the tool

Finch is the youngest of the three. It was founded in 2024 and works only with personal injury firms. In April 2025, Built In reported that Sequoia Capital led its funding round, and in October 2025 Law360 reported a $20 million Series A.

Here is what makes Finch different. It does not sell a piece of software and leave the firm to make it work. It pairs AI agents with its own paralegals and case staff and covers the work before litigation: bilingual intake around the clock, insurance claims, collecting medical records and drafting demands. Experienced legal operators review the output before it goes back into the firm’s case management system. So the firm is not buying a tool. It is buying a result: cases that move from the call to the demand.

Finch’s CEO said something in that 2025 article that I want to push back on a little. He said many firms offshore parts of pre-litigation work, at a cost to quality. I spent over a decade in legal outsourcing, so I’ll be honest with you: quality is not about geography. It comes from reviews, checklists and someone who owns the result. I’ve seen offshore teams produce summaries better than in-house teams, and the reverse. Where Finch is right is that firms want one owner for the outcome, not three vendors and a login.

For your firm, remember that clients buy outcomes too. Nobody wants a consultation. They want to know what happens next. At the end of every client call, give the caller one concrete next step and one time: “You’ll get a text from me in ten minutes with what to bring, and we’ll see you tomorrow at 11:00.” That one sentence often decides whether they keep calling other firms or stay with you.

What all three have in common

Three different companies, three different moves. Smith.ai goes through the people firms trust. Lawmatics speaks the lawyer’s language because its founder has lived it. Finch sells the outcome instead of the tool. But all three won on the same belief: the first conversation decides the case. Not the ad, not the ranking, not the website. The firm that answers, sounds human and promises a clear next step wins the client, rather than handing them to the competitor down the street after paying to attract them.

What your firm can borrow

If you take nothing else from this episode, do these three things this week. First, call your own firm at a quarter past six tonight. Then fill in your website form and time how long it takes for someone to reply. Write both numbers down. That is your baseline. Second, rewrite the first two minutes of your intake script in the caller’s words, and end it with one next step and one time. Third, call your top five referral sources and ask what they say about you when they refer someone. Then give them one sentence and one phone number to use.

If you want the ten-minute intake leak check we use with firms, comment or reply with the word INTAKE and I’ll send it to you.

The Transferable Bit

Not a lawyer? This still applies to you. If you run a clinic, a consultancy or a B2B company, the same three moves work. Sell through the people your buyers already trust. Describe what you do in your customers’ words, not your industry’s. And sell the outcome, with a clear next step. Your first response to an enquiry is your marketing, whatever business you are in.

Legal tech players in intake

Before we wrap up, a quick look at the intake field, because it is moving fast. Smith.ai now offers both human and AI receptionists; the AI option can qualify leads, book consultations and send retainer agreements during the call. Ruby has spent about 20 years answering phones for small businesses and still leads with real people on the line. Lawmatics sits behind the call, running follow-up and marketing automation once a lead comes in. Finch bundles intake into a larger outcome for personal injury firms, from first call to demand. And AI voice agents are being added to intake across the market. My advice: whichever you test, call it yourself at 6:00 in the evening as a scared client would, before you sign anything.

Wrap-up

That’s it for today. The front door is where most firms lose the cases they paid for, and the fix starts with one phone call to your own office tonight. Next week: how EvenUp, Supio and Eve won plaintiff firms, and what the demand letter tells us about where legal work is heading. If this episode helped, share it with the person at your firm who answers the phone. They are the one who brings in the business.

I’m Sagar Pratap, and this has been WhoBringsTheBusiness, powered by Dizital Connect. Follow me on LinkedIn and Instagram at @iamsagarpratap, and find more at whobringsthebusiness.com.