The Template Builder Add-in is an integration between Microsoft Word and Clio Draft that makes it easy to create, save, and edit templates directly in Microsoft Word. With templates built in the add-in, you can enter text once and have it populate across multiple sets of documents when drafting client-specific documents from the templates in the Clio Draft platform. You can also use advanced features like conditions to add or remove clauses, saving you time on routine correspondence and preparing legal documents.
Tip: Clio Draft also offers court form template building directly in Clio Draft. You can access a library of court forms and pre-fill them with routine repetitive information, saving you time when drafting clients documents from the templates. Learn more about court form templates here.
Important: The Template Builder Add-in will not automatically save your changes as you prepare your templates. Frequently save your template by clicking Save template in the add-in. We do not recommend saving a template to your computer or server.
Install and uninstall the Template Builder Add-in
You can download the Template Builder Add-in from the Microsoft add-ins store directly from your Microsoft Word desktop application (Windows and Mac).
Note: The add-in is only available on Microsoft Office 2016 or later and can only be used on the desktop version of Microsoft Word.
- Open a blank Microsoft Word document.
- In the Home ribbon, click Add-ins and then click More Add-ins.
- Use the search bar to search for “Lawyaw.”
- Click Add next to the add-in.
- Follow the prompts to install the add-in.
- Once installed, log in to the add-in with your Clio Draft credentials.
- Open a blank Microsoft Word document.
- In the Home ribbon, click Add-ins and then click More Add-ins.
- At the top, click My add-ins.
- Find the add-in.
- Click the three dots and then select Remove.
Set up Word document templates for the first time
When you first set up Word document templates, you will need to start from scratch to insert all the relevant merge fields into the document. Once this is done, you can build off your first template for future templates by importing any existing cards and merge fields. Follow the steps below to populate your Word document file with merge fields and then save the file as a template.
Tip: When you have many cards, it may be difficult to scroll through to get to the one you need when inserting merge fields into the Word document. Check the box next to Collapse all to collapse all the cards and their merge fields. You can then open each card individually to add merge fields.
- Open the Word document that you want to turn into a template.
- In the Home ribbon, click Lawyaw Template Builder to open the add-in.
- Sign in to the add-in using your Clio Draft login credentials.
- Enter a name for the template and then click Continue.
- Click Start from scratch.
- To insert merge fields in the document, click and drag your cursor over the text in your Word document that you want to replace with a field, find the field in the template builder, and then click the plus (+) icon. Clio Draft will replace the text from the Word document with the inserted merge field.
- You can insert merge fields individually or in bulk. Learn more about creating and inserting merge fields here.
- If you previously integrated your Clio Manage and Clio Draft accounts, all of your matter custom fields will be available in a Clio Matter card. You can also add more cards with more fields, including cards for plaintiffs, courts, general case information, or document-specific fields. Learn more about creating and managing cards here.
- Repeat step 6 for all other necessary merge fields.
- In the add-in, click Save template when you are finished.
- The template will be saved to the Word templates subtab in your Clio Draft Library.
Create and manage cards
In the add-in, cards are categories that contain specific merge fields. When you first create a template, and if you previously integrated your Clio Manage and Clio Draft accounts, the add-in will show a Clio Matter card that contains all your Clio Manage matter custom fields. You can create additional cards with merge fields specific to that card to help you populate your Word documents.
- Open the add-in.
- If necessary, sign in with your Clio Draft credentials and create a name for your template.
- Click New card.
- Select either Role or Other as the card type.
- Role cards are people, companies, and organizations, such as plaintiffs, defendants, witnesses, courts, and more.
- Other cards are for general case information, document-specific fields, dates, fee agreement information, orders, and more.
- Select a label for the selected card type. You can scroll through the list or type in a custom name.
- If you selected Role as the card type, your naming conventions should match what you used in Clio Manage. For example, if you added Child 1 and Child 2 related contacts for matters in Clio Manage, enter Child 1 here for the card name.
- Special characters are not permitted.
- Click Add Card. The card will be added to your list of cards.
- Role cards will contain a starter list of fields within that card. For example, if you added the defendant card, the card will show fields for first name, last name, address, place of birth, and more. You can also add fields of your choice to the card, including contact custom fields used in Clio Manage. Learn more about adding fields to cards here.
- Other cards will not contain any starter fields.
Editing a card or field that is used in other templates will cause the field or card in those templates to update. This helps maintain field consistency and keeps your populate page organized and succinct. We do not recommend editing fields or cards that have been used to trigger conditions.
- Open the add-in.
- If necessary, sign in with your Clio Draft credentials and create a name for your template.
- Find the card that you want to edit.
- Optional: If you have multiple cards, click the down arrow next to a card to collapse it. The fields in that card will no longer be visible.
- Click the pencil icon that represents Edit card. You can change the card type and label.
- Once you are finished, click Update Card.
Duplicating cards is helpful since duplicating creates a new card with all of the fields from the original card. For example, if you have a Child 1 card and you manually add the date of birth, child initials, age, etc., when you duplicate that card to create a Child 2 card, the duplicated card will also contain those additional fields.
- Open the add-in.
- If necessary, sign in with your Clio Draft credentials and create a name for your template.
- Find the card that you want to duplicate.
- Optional: If you have multiple cards, click the down arrow next to a card to collapse it. The fields in that card will no longer be visible.
- Click the paper icon that represents Duplicate card. For the duplicated copy, you can change the card type and label.
- Once you are finished, click Duplicate Card.
- Open the add-in.
- If necessary, sign in with your Clio Draft credentials and create a name for your template.
- Find the card that you want to delete.
- Optional: If you have multiple cards, click the down arrow next to a card to collapse it. The fields in that card will no longer be visible.
- Click the trash can icon that represents Delete card.
- Click Delete card to confirm.
Create and manage merge fields within cards
When you create Role cards, they contain a list of starter merge fields to help you get started. You also have the option to create custom merge fields within those cards. When you have a comprehensive library of fields within cards, you can use more merge fields in your Word documents, making it easier to draft client and matter data across general templates.
Tip: You can add Clio contact custom fields to any Role card by creating a field using the steps listed below. Name the field exactly as it is named in Clio Manage. Once done, Clio Draft will remember this field and include it with every new Role card you create using the template builder.
- Open the add-in.
- If necessary, sign in with your Clio Draft credentials and create a name for your template.
- Go to and open a card of your choice.
- Click Add field to card to begin adding merge fields to the card.
- Select a pre-available merge field name from the list or enter a custom name and then choose the field type.
- Short text: This is for short-form data such as names, addresses, etc.
- Long text: This is for long-form data where you need to enter paragraphs of text. Long text fields do not retain formatting entered on the populate page.
- Single-select: This is for multiple choice options in list or dropdown format. For example, you can create a field for “court type” and then have “circuit” and “district” as the available options.
- Multi-select: This is for multiple choice options where you can select multiple options. These fields will retain your speciality formatting (numbering, bullet points, large indentations, etc.) within your document.
- Date: This is for date formatting.
- If you selected Single-select, Multi-select, or Date for the field type, complete the additional information.
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Single-select
- Select whether the multiple choice options should appear in list or dropdown format.
- Enter your options. The Option label will help you determine what the option is, and the text entered in Text to merge will be inserted into the document. Most of the time, these will be the same, but they can vary. For example, if your field name is “Service delivery,” the first option could use “Fax” for the Option label and “facsimile” for Text to merge.
- Insert the newly created field in the document. Learn more about inserting merge fields into documents here.
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Multi-select
- Select whether the multiple choice options should appear as a list, separated by commas, or separated by semicolons.
- Enter your options. The Option label will help you determine what the option is, and the text entered in Text to merge will be inserted into the document. Most of the time, these will be the same, but they can vary. For example, if your field name is “Service delivery,” the first option could use “Fax” for the Option label and “facsimile” for Text to merge.
- Insert the newly created field in the document. Learn more about inserting merge fields into documents here.
- Date: Choose how you want the date to be formatted.
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- Optional: Enter a hint for this merge field. Hints can help you figure out what the merge field’s purpose is later when drafting documents from the Word templates in the populate page of the Clio Draft platform.
- Click Add field to finish.
Editing a card or field that is used in other templates will cause the field or card in those templates to update. This helps maintain field consistency and keeps your populate page organized and succinct. We do not recommend editing fields or cards that have been used to trigger conditions.
- Open the add-in.
- If necessary, sign in with your Clio Draft credentials and create a name for your template.
- Go to and open a card of your choice.
- Click the three dots next to a field’s name and then select Edit.
- Make your changes and then click Update field.
- Open the add-in.
- If necessary, sign in with your Clio Draft credentials and create a name for your template.
- Go to and open a card of your choice.
- Click the three dots next to a field’s name and then select Delete.
Insert merge fields individually and in bulk
Once you have created your cards and merge fields, you can begin inserting the merge fields into your document to turn the document into a smart template. You can insert merge fields either individually one line or term at a time or in bulk. Bulk insert is helpful for situations where there are multiple instances of a word you want to replace with one merge field, such as a defendant’s name.
- Open the add-in.
- If necessary, sign in with your Clio Draft credentials and create a name for your template.
- Go to a card of your choice and find the merge field you want to insert.
- Select text in your Word document and then click the plus (+) icon on the field in the add-in. Clio Draft will replace the text from the Word document with the inserted merge field.
- Open the add-in.
- If necessary, sign in with your Clio Draft credentials and create a name for your template.
- Go to a card of your choice and find the merge field you want to insert.
- Go to the add-in and click the three dots next to a merge field’s name and then select Bulk insert.
- Enter the text that you want to replace with the merge field and then click Find. The add-in will find every instance of the word you entered.
- You can replace each instance of the entered word individually by clicking Replace text, allowing you to skip instances you may not want to replace. Or, click Replace All to replace all instances of that word with the merge field.
- Click Done when you are finished.
Create and insert conditions
Conditions are statements that let you tell Clio Draft what information to show or hide depending on the other text in the template. There are two types of conditions you can create: standalone and triggered conditions. After creating your standalone and/or triggered conditions, you can then insert the conditional tags in the template.
- Standalone: These are conditions that do not require a triggering field and instead allow you to ask the individual drafting a document from the template a multiple choice question on the populate page, and based on the answer, automatically insert text into the document.
- Triggered: These are conditions (“if/then” statements) that are triggered when something is added to or omitted from a field used in your template. Using triggered conditions help make the drafting process smoother and faster for your drafters.
Step 1: Create conditions
- Open your Word document and the add-in.
- Select the Conditions tab and then click Create condition or New condition.
- Under Is this condition triggered by one of the inserted fields? select No.
- Under Question, enter the question that you want the document drafter to answer on the populate page.
- You will see this question when drafting a document from the template in Clio Draft.
- Some examples of the text you can enter here include, “What is the ground for divorce?” or “Is this a felony or misdemeanor?”
- Under Choices, enter the choices related to the question. Click Add choices to add more choices.
- When you draft a document from the template in Clio Draft, selecting one of the choices will tell Clio Draft which language to add or omit from the template.
- For the “What is the ground for divorce in this case?” question, your options might be “Adultery” and “Irreconcilable differences.” For the “Is this a felony or misdemeanor?” question, your options would be “Felony” and “Misdemeanor.”
- Optional: Enter a hint if the question is complicated. This can help you figure out what is being asked when drafting a document from the template in Clio Draft.
- Click Create condition.
Note: Triggered conditions are reliant on cards and merge fields. Before creating and inserting triggered conditions, create all your cards and merge fields and insert the merge fields in the appropriate places in your template.
- Open your Word document and the add-in.
- Select the Conditions tab and then click Create condition or New condition.
- Under Is this condition triggered by one of the inserted fields? select Yes.
- Under the If field, select the card containing the triggering field from the first dropdown and then select the field that will trigger the condition from the second dropdown.
- Under the Condition field, select the trigger type. If you select a trigger event that requires a Conditional value, enter the condition value in the field.
- Exists: Use this trigger if you want Clio Draft to insert text into your document when your triggering field contains any value.
- Does not exist: Use this trigger if you want Clio Draft to insert text into your document when your triggering field is left blank on the populate page.
- Equals: Use this trigger if you want Clio Draft to insert text into your document when your triggering field equals a specific value.
- Does not equal: Use this trigger if you want Clio Draft to insert text into your document when your triggering field does not equal a specific value.
- Contains: Use this trigger if you want Clio Draft to insert text into your document when the value of your triggering field contains a certain word, phrase, or number.
- Does not contain: Use this trigger if you want Clio Draft to insert text into your document when the value of your triggering field does not contain a specific word, phrase, or number.
- Is greater than: Use this trigger if you want Clio Draft to insert text into your document when the value of your triggering field is greater than a certain amount.
- Is less than: Use this trigger if you want Clio Draft to insert text into your document when the value of your triggering field is less than a certain amount.
- Click Create condition.
Tip: You can create compound conditions that tell Clio Draft to insert text if the value of a field meets multiple criteria, such as if you want the email address of your opposing counsel to appear in your certificate of service when your document is served via email or using the court’s e-file system. You can create a compound condition that says: IF Certificate of Service EQUALS e-mail OR IF Certificate of Service EQUALS e-file.
You can also create compound conditions that tell Clio Draft to insert text if the value of one field meets a specific criteria and if the value of another field also meets a specific criteria, such as if you want to insert the contact information for the attorney of a co-defendant in a case when there is a co-defendant and when the co-defendant has an attorney. Your compound condition might be: IF Co-Defendant Full Name EXISTS AND IF Co-Defendant Counsel EXISTS.
Step 2: Insert conditions
- Click and drag your cursor to select the text in your document where you want to insert a condition.
- In the add-in, find the condition you want to insert and then click Apply.
- The conditional text will be sandwiched between If and End condition tags. Everything between the start and end tags will be inserted if the condition is triggered when drafting a document from the template in Clio Draft.
- When inserting a condition, do not insert the condition inside another field or condition tag. Adding a space before or after a field or condition prior to inserting another can help prevent conditions from being dropped on top of other conditions or other tags.
- When inserting a condition around a letter, word, phrase, etc., that is in a sentence or surrounded by other text in the same line, move the tags and the text back so that they are in line with the surrounding text.
- Do not alter condition tags when inserting conditions around a word, sentence, paragraph, or section that stands alone on the page.
Import cards, fields, and conditions from existing templates to new templates
Creating your first template can be a lot of work, but subsequent templates are quicker to create since you already have cards and fields. To import cards and fields, all you need to do is click a button to import those cards and fields into any additional templates that you plan to create. For conditions, you can copy and paste into a new document. Clio Draft will automatically recognize the conditions.
- Open the Word document that you want to turn into a template.
- In the Home ribbon, click Lawyaw Template Builder to open the add-in.
- Sign in to the add-in using your Clio Draft login credentials.
- Enter a name for the template and then click Continue.
- Special characters are not permitted in template naming.
- Click Import fields from existing templates.
- Select the template or template set from which you want to import cards and fields.
- Click Import.
- Open the Word document that you want to turn into a template.
- In the Home ribbon, click Lawyaw Template Builder to open the add-in.
- Sign in to the add-in using your Clio Draft login credentials.
- Enter a name for the template and then click Continue.
- Special characters are not permitted in template naming.
- Select the Conditions tab.
- Using a template that has conditions, copy the text, including the condition tags, from the document containing conditions and then paste that text into your new template. Clio Draft will automatically build the condition for you in your new template.
- Since Clio Draft is building the condition for you, this process can take a few minutes. Avoid clicking in your document while waiting. The process is finished when you see the condition appear on the Conditions tab in the destination template's add-in template builder.
Edit Word document templates
If you need to make any changes to a Word document template, you can do that from the add-in.
- Open Microsoft Word and sign in to the add-in.
- Click the three-line menu icon at the bottom and then select Templates.
- Select the template that you want to update.
- Make any changes and then click Save template.
- The template will be saved to the Word templates subtab in your Clio Draft Library.
- Refresh your page on the platform before generating the updated template.
Log out and reboot the add-in
You can log out of the add-in from your settings menu. If you are having trouble with the add-in, you can try rebooting it from your information menu. When attempting a reboot, you can reload the add-in or clear the cache and/or reload the add-in again.
- In the Home ribbon, click Lawyaw Template Builder to open the add-in.
- Click the three lines at the bottom and then select Log out.
- Open Microsoft Word and the add-in.
- Click the “i” or “<” icon in the top right and then select Reload.
For Windows users, Microsoft Office functionality is tied to and operates out of Microsoft Edge. Clear your cache in Microsoft Edge first, even if it is not your default browser. You can learn how to clear your cache on Microsoft Edge from Microsoft’s help center. Once the cache is cleared, follow the steps listed below to reboot the add-in.
Mac users can just follow the steps below without clearing browser cache.
- In Microsoft Word, open the add-in.
- Click the “i” or ”<” icon near the top right corner of the add-in.
- Click Clear Web Cache.
- Click the “i” or "<" icon again and click Reload.