Microsoft Word for Desktop-your Ticket to Smooth Contract Edits

When it comes to redlining contracts, Microsoft Word has always been a tool trusted by legal professionals for decades.  Until a better alternative gains widespread adoption and usage among lawyers worldwide, there is no need to reinvent the wheel.

Possibly the Most Useful Integration we did for Legal teams on SpotDraft. 

At the heart of every integration we build at SpotDraft is the intent to meet users where they already work. And there are no two ways about it when we think of MS Word as the go-to for any contract edits. It’s familiar, standardized, and packed with features that lawyers have mastered over the years.

While our cloud-based editors have been great for collaboration, the data from our customers showed that proper formatting, not collaboration, was the top priority. 

In fact, 99.9% of contract edits in SpotDraft are made by a single editor, and 88% of contracts only have one editor throughout their lifecycle. Given this reality, our users told us that the number one thing legal teams wanted was an editor that maintained the same level of formatting control and advanced features as MS Word. So, we thought: why not give them exactly that, plus a little something extra?

SpotDraft’s - MS Word Integration For The Win!

Our guiding principle was simple: Make it easy for users reviewing their contracts on SpotDraft to seamlessly switch to MS Word Desktop for redlining, while ensuring that any changes made are automatically saved back into SpotDraft.

With this integration, you no longer need to download, edit, and re-upload contracts. Simply open the contract directly from SpotDraft in MS Word, make your edits, save, and close the document—your updated version will automatically sync back to SpotDraft.

There are other key advantages we are bringing with this integraton:

• Visibility into other members who are actively reviewing the document.
• Know the current version and status of the contract, including whether it is in Draft or if a version has been published.
• Immediate updates of any direct edits or tracked changes you make in MS Word will automatically reflect in SpotDraft.

• You can clearly segregate internal and external comments, allowing the right users to take action accordingly.
• All your version saves in MS Word are neatly organized as drafts and published versions, with proper numbering within SpotDraft for simplified version control.
• Activity logs now track exactly who edited and saved each version, providing full transparency for every contract version saved through the MS Word Desktop integration.
• We’ve made it easier to compare different contract versions directly from the version side sheet, eliminating the need to open a separate modal and keeping all version-related actions in one place.

The Best of Both Worlds

By integrating MS Word Desktop with SpotDraft, we bring users the best of both worlds: the power of SpotDraft’s contract lifecycle management (CLM) platform with the robust, familiar capabilities of Microsoft Word. No more switching between systems or downloading/uploading files.

Stay tuned for future updates!