Nimbus Professional Account

Don't forget to click the Nimbus Service Desk logo on your homepage and Sign Up to access the Customer Portal as well so you can quickly access all customer help articles.

The Nimbus Service Desk also allows you to raise support requests and has the visibility of tracking the status of all raised support requests.

Thank you for subscribing to a Nimbus Professional account. Now that you have successfully logged into your account, we are here to help you become familiar with the features and functions of Nimbus.

First things first.....

You would have received your "Welcome Email" when you finalised the purchase of your Nimbus Account. This email provides 2 logins:

Account Login - for your Staff
Client Login - for your Clients

We recommend that once you have created your password, and have logged into your Nimbus account, that you bookmark your Login URL. This will give you easy access to your account in the future. To do this,

logout of your account, and
bookmark the URL located in your web browser.

Nimbus Service Desk:

Subscription to the Nimbus Service Desk is via the icon in the top right of your Home Page.

This platform allows you to browse knowledge base articles to help answer your queries, or if you don't find what you are looking for, you can log a support ticket. Our Customer Service Team will respond to you as soon as possible and will assist in anyway that we can.

Quick Page Links

1.Customising your Account:

Your Nimbus account can easily be adjusted as follows:

Adding your Business Details:Your correct Business Details are important as some of this information is displayed to your Clients on both emails sent from your Nimbus account, and on the Client Portal
Banner Headings: Upload your own business logos to replace the standard Nimbus logos
Your Nimbus Colour Theme: Adjust the standard colour theme to match your website branding
Customising the Staff Home Page: adjust to include information relevant to all staff

2.Integrating with your Practice Management software

Your Nimbus account can automatically integrate with many industry standard Practice Management systems. The integrations allow the synchronisation of Client and Contact information, and for some, Contact Relationship information. Integrating with your PM software allows you to maintain only one database (your PM software) and have any changes made in your PM software to then synchronise with your Nimbus account. Our support team can assist with the setup of any integration should you require assistance.

PM Integration:investigate what PM software Nimbus integrates with, and follow instructions to set your integration.

3.Manually adding Clients and Contacts

Even though your Nimbus account can automatically integrate with your Practice Management software, it is possible to manually add both Client and Contact information. There may be scenarios where this is preferable, rather than adding the Client / Contact detail to your PM system and then having that information flow through to Nimbus.

Adding a new Client manually: Client information does not need to be synchronsied from your Practice Management software. You can easily add a new Client manually within your Nimbus account.
Adding a new Contact manually: Contacts information also does not need to be sychonised from your Practice Management software
Creating a relationship between a Client / Contact: Contacts that are related to Client Entities are able to view documents stored in those Client Entities via a Client Portal login.

4.Defining your standard Client and Business Folder structure

Client Folder Templates: allows you to setup a Folder template for either all Clients, or by Entity type, which is then applied across your full database.All of your Client documents are stored in a Client Entity folder. The structure of this folder is easily defined by your business. Most business will create a sub-folder for each year level, as well as a sub-folder for any Permanent documents. Once defined, it can be edited each year.
Defining your Business Folder Structure: allows you to define and create your internal Business Folders, accessed by your staff.

5.Setting up your Team Access

Now that you have some of the basics of your Nimbus account setup, it is time to invite your Team Members to join your Nimbus account.

Adding an Employee: allows you to "Welcome" other team members to access your Nimbus account
Managing Teams: teams are groups of employees, whose access / restrictions are the same. Setup Teams to save time when creating employee access.
Coming Events: useful for all staff to view current deadlines, and important dates

6.Customising your Nimbus Emails

Customising your Nimbus account is easy when using your Nimbus Templates. Your Nimbus account will automatically send emails to your Clients when a particular event occurs, such as sharing a file, or adding a file conversation. You can personalise these email templates by adjusting the wording, so you know you are sending the right message to your Clients. Don't forget to also update your email stationery to show your Business branding including logos, and any industry affiliations. Your account allows you adjust:

System Emails - the standard emails that are sent to your Clients for various events
Email Stationery - include your standard email sign off, including your Business Logo and contact details

7.Document Templates

Nimbus allows you to create / upload standard letters, standard forms, excel worksheets etc, as document templates. For consistency across your business, these templates can then be used to create new letters / forms / spreadsheets for either Clients, or for your Business documents. Mail merge fields can also be embedded into your Word document templates, allowing you to pre-fill Client, Contact and Custom field data directly into your Word / PDF documents. Simply create a new document from a document template, PDF and then share directly with your CLient.

Creating a Document template: document templates may simply be uploaded directly to the Nimbus document template area
Creating a template with Signature blocks:standard documents which must be signed by Clients can contain signature blocks, which can then be set to a Contact once the PDF is created
Building better document templates: for more information about mail merge fields, custom fields etc
Document Properties:benefits of adding additional details (Meta data) to a document, allowing you to search for the additional information across your Document store

8.Working with Grids

Many of the menu options within your Nimbus account rely on a grid of information. Each grid is customisable, allowing you to add / remove columns, filter on columns and save customised "Views". "Views" allow you to easily find information that you may work with on a regular basis. Each team member may create their own "Views" and as a system administrator, you are able to create standard views which can be accessed by all team members. Nimbus allows you to sort grid data, filter grid information, and "Find" any document easily within the system. Your documents can be viewed in one of 3 different "view modes" allowing you to see the first page of any document.

Working with Grids: customising grid views
Creating Custom Views: filtering and saving custom views
Filtering Grid results: filtering the results on a grid to find information
Filtering Rules: allow filtering on more than one piece of data at a time
Different View modes: 3 different view modes for looking at your data: grid view, thumbnail and card view
Finding Files: use the Find function to find any file in the system based on content or document properties

9.Working with Documents

Editing documents in Nimbus is easy. You can either edit via the web browser within Nimbus using the online editors for Word and Excel, or you can use the Nimbus MS Office AddIns (Outlook, Word, Excel, PowerPoint). Create documents for both the business and your Clients using document templates, ensuring you have setup your mail merge fields for Business and Client information. Set your folder properties so that documents are auto-archived based on the last time a document is changed (eg: archive after 5 years), and access any archived document to either restore or remove completely from your Nimbus account. Setup document workflow status levels so that team members are notified when a document status is changed.

Creating a document from a template: create consistency in your business by creating either Client or business documents from templates
Mail merge fields: use these to pre-fill data for Business, Client, Contact and Custom field information into Word and PDF documents
Document versioning: Nimbus automatically remembers all prior versions of a document, which are then accessible at anytime
Archiving Documents: folder properties can be set to auto-archive documents. Archived documents can be accessed and restored if required.
Document Workflow: use the document workflow to manage team member tasks and ensure jobs are fully managed

10.Configuring your Client Portal

Your Nimbus Professional account allows you to securely share information with your Clients and for your Clients to share information with you. The Nimbus Client Portal, allows for each person (Client) you deal with, to have their own unique login to their Portal so that they can access documents for all of the Client Entities they relate to. For example, a Client may want access to their Individual, Partnership, Company and Trust information. This is possible with only one login to their Portal. Clients can upload information via their Portal either on a desktop PC or on their mobile device, and share with your business. Your business is notified when this occurs.

Customising the Client Portal menus: setup the menu options on your Client Portal for all of your Clients
Including a Client Portal login link on your website: allow your Clients to login to their Client Portal via your website
Customising Advertising for your Clients: publish your own adverts to your Clients via the Portal
Adjust the Content of your Client Home Page: your Clients view a Home Page when they first login to their Portal. Publish information relevant to your whole Client base here.
Publish Newsletters via your Client Portal: publish a library of newsletters for all Clients to access

11.The Client Experience

Now that you have your Client Portal configured, we recommend that you create a sample Client Login, so that you can see what your Clients will experience. This will allow you to then modify any of your Client Portal configurations as required. Your Clients can access their secure Nimbus Client Portal either via a Desktop PC, or via their mobile devices. They do not need to download an app to access on their mobile as Nimbus uses "Mobile Adaptive Technology", where the system recognises they are accessing on their mobile device. We would also recommend that you access the Client Portal, both on your desktop PC and on your mobile.

Create your own login to the Client Portal: create your own login so you can experience the Client Portal
Files shared by your business: the Client Portal allows clients to see their In-Tray, Documents for Signing and All Files
Files shared by your Client: your Clients are able to securely share files directly with you via their Portal
Inviting others to share your Portal: Clients can invite others to access the data stored on their Portal
Finding Files: how to easily locate anything you have stored in the Portal

12.Working with Clients

You should now be ready to start "Welcoming" your Clients to your secure Nimbus Client Portal. With the Portal configured and the Client experience reviewed by your own Client Login, you can now start sharing files, conversations and requests to sign documents via the Client Portal. Your Client data including Client Entities and Contacts will also have been setup ready to go.

Sending off the Welcome Email to your Client / Contact: depending on your Client Portal configuration, you can do this manually or wait for the system to send off the Welcome Email when you Publish / Share a file
Uploading files to share with your Client: Nimbus allows you to upload files originating from other sources (other than Nimbus CDM) to share with your Client. These may come from your General Ledger system (Financial Statements), or anywhere for that matter
Publishing files to share with Clients: you may create files via CDM, and then publish these so they are visible to your Client

13.MS Office Integration

Nimbus Professional provides you with direct integration with your MS Office Apps. Install the AddIns to access files directly from MS Office, or save back to Nimbus from your MS Office Apps. AddIns are available for:

MS Outlook
MS Word
MS Excel
MS PowerPoint
MS Calendar

Ensure you don't loose emails received from your Clients and always keep a copy of any email sent to a Client. Email files are then stored within your Client folder in Nimbus. Create documents from your Document templates using Word (remember you can do the same within Nimbus itself), PDF and then directly publish to your Clients.

Installing the Nimbus MS Office AddIns: - install the AddIns on your workstations for direct integration with your Office Apps
Saving Emails to Nimbus: save emails received from Clients or business associates into a Nimbus Client / Business folder
Send and Save Emails: send an email and save a copy direct to Nimbus
Save Email Attachments: it isn't necessary to save the whole email with an attachment; just save the attachment
Create a document from a template: if you prefer to work using MS Word, you can also create a document (for a Client / Business) from a Nimbus Document template
Using the Word, Excel and PowerPoint AddIns: become familiar with the workings of the AddIns to add value

14.Signing Documents

Nimbus Professional includes the ability for both staff and clients to digitally sign PDF documents within the security of the system. Rather than send documents requiring signing via email, Nimbus provides a link to the secure document.

Staff can setup document templates which include signature blocks so that when the document is PDF'd, the signature blocks are defined. Where more than one person needs to sign a document, it's possible to set each signature block to a specific Nimbus Contact, so that only those signature blocks present to the person when they sign the document.

The Digital Signature Process: take a look at the overall process
Document Templates with Signature blocks: setup standard letters with signature blocks included to automatically include on PDF's
Contact specific signing: link a signature block to a specific Nimbus contact so that only those blocks present when signing
Adding signature blocks to PDF's: any PDF document can be edited in Nimbus, and signature blocks manually added. Useful for documents which originate from other sources and are manually uploaded to Nimbus
Setting up your Digital Signature: each staff member, and each client / contact must setup their Digital profile before they can sign a PDF. Use the Digital Signature wizard to step through the process
When a Client signs a document: understand what happens when a client signs a document from auto-notifications to being able to see who has signed the document

15.Working With PDF's and Linking Documents

Your Nimbus Professional subscription also includes access to the Nimbus PDF manipulator software. This software allows you to Add/Remove/Re-order pages on PDF documents as well as inserting system stamps.

Manipulating a PDF: learn how to edit a PDF, add pages, remove and reorder pages. Also how to insert stamps to your PDF's
Inserting Stamps onto a PDF: use the standard Nimbus stamps, or create and upload your own
Linking Documents: link documents together, so that you can open one document and jump to other linked documents
Jumping to a Linked Document: once a document is linked to another, jump from one document to another without having to navigate
PDF All documents in a linked list: once documents are linked together, you can PDF all into one document

16.Email Jobs

Email jobs may be used to send many different types of emails either in bulk (many clients) or individually (nominated client) including:

text based emails eg: Newsletters
emails with links to published client documents including documents for signature
emails with link to customised online questionnaire (called a Webform Checklist)

The value add from using an Email Job is such that:

content of emails can be setup on templates
tracking is available for online questionnaires and documents requiring signature, with the ability to setup automatic followup reminder emails

Creating an Email Job: how to create an email job
Setting up Followup Emails: these are reminder emails which are sent automatically by Nimbus if a Client has not signed a document, or submitted a Webform Checklist
Scheduling an Email Job: jobs can be setup ahead of time, can be set to be approved or even to recur on a regular basis
Email Job for Approval: include an approval process in your internal workflow to ensure jobs are correct prior to sending
Helpful hints when sending email jobs: learn all the quick hints regarding email jobs
Email Jobs to track signatures: setup followup emails when it is vital that documents are signed on time
Email Job Dashboard: monitor all of the jobs that have been sent; know when a client opens an email, signs a document, or submits a Webform Checklist