Clio Intake Form Integration: Get Submissions Into Your Matter Automatically

Clio is the most widely used practice management platform in the country — and for good reason. But one gap many firms run into: getting new client intake data from your website into Clio without someone manually entering it. This guide covers how that connection works and what it takes to set it up properly.

The problem with manual intake entry

A potential client fills out your intake form online. Someone on your team gets an email notification, opens it, reads through it, and then opens Clio to create a new contact and matter — copying over the name, phone number, email address, case type, and description one field at a time. Every. Single. Time.

That's 5–10 minutes of administrative work per inquiry, multiplied by every new lead you get. At 20 inquiries a month, that's a few hours of work that adds zero value to your clients or your cases.

More importantly, it creates a delay. The faster your team can follow up with a new inquiry, the higher your conversion rate. Manual entry slows everything down.

How Clio intake form integration works

When a potential client submits your web intake form, the integration automatically creates a new contact (and optionally a new matter) in Clio with the submitted information pre-filled. Your team gets notified, the data is already in the system, and they can follow up immediately.

There are two ways to set this up:

Option 1: Via Zapier or Make (webhook-based)

Zapier and Make both have native Clio integrations. The workflow: your form posts to a webhook URL → Zapier catches it → creates a Clio contact or matter. This works well and doesn't require any custom development, but it adds a dependency on a third-party automation platform and associated monthly costs.

Option 2: Direct API integration

Clio has a well-documented REST API that allows direct contact and matter creation. A direct integration is faster, more reliable, and removes the Zapier middleman. It requires OAuth authentication so Clio can verify the connection is authorized by your firm — but once it's set up, it runs silently in the background with no ongoing maintenance.

This is the approach FormKnight uses for clients on Clio. When a form is submitted, the data routes directly into Clio via their API — no Zapier account required.

What fields map to Clio

A standard intake form maps cleanly to Clio's contact and matter objects:

• First name, last name → Clio Contact
• Email address → Clio Contact email
• Phone number → Clio Contact phone
• Matter type / practice area → Clio Matter type
• Case description → Clio Matter description or custom field
• Referral source → Clio custom field

The more structured your intake form fields are, the cleaner the mapping. Free-text "tell us about your situation" fields go into the matter description. Structured fields (dropdowns, radio buttons) map to specific Clio fields.

What about conflicts of interest?

If your intake form collects opposing party information, that data can be stored in Clio as well — either as a related contact or in a custom field — so your team has everything they need to run a conflicts check before the consultation.

Setting it up yourself vs. having it done

If you're technical, Clio's API documentation is solid and their developer sandbox makes testing straightforward. The OAuth flow is standard and well-documented. Expect a few hours of development work to get a basic integration running.

If you'd rather not deal with it — and most law firms would rather not — FormKnight handles the entire setup as part of onboarding. You connect your Clio account through the client portal, we configure the field mapping for your specific forms, and submissions start flowing in automatically.