For legal professionals, staying ahead of fast-moving legal, regulatory, and market developments is a daily challenge. Information comes from countless sources - subscription databases, news outlets, industry bulletins, and internal resources - making it hard to capture everything without either drowning in email alerts or spending valuable time running the same searches day after day. Vable is built to solve this problem.
This article introduces the fundamental building blocks of Vable so that, even if you’ve never used the platform, you can picture how it helps legal information managers create reliable, efficient, and tailored current-awareness services.
During a typical trial, Vable’s Client Success team helps legal professionals demonstrate value quickly with live sessions tailored to their success criteria. With our guidance and expertise, you can test the platform’s capabilities, explore best practices, and get a real sense of both the product and the team behind it. Because Vable trials take place in your live environment, everything you configure can be reused if you proceed, with no migration or rebuild required.
From trial through onboarding and beyond, Vable partners with clients every step of the way, providing the same high-quality support throughout. For administrators in particular, understanding the platform’s key elements is the foundation for long-term success.
Vable allows you to create and save bespoke article searches across all your private and publicly available resources, known in Vable as Sources. You can learn more about source aggregation capabilities in our recent article.
A Search in Vable can take different forms depending on your needs. It might be:
a precise, reusable query across all your Sources,
a query scoped to a filtered set of Sources, or
simply filtered results with no query at all.
This flexibility means you can build Searches that are as broad or as targeted as you need. Instead of manually checking multiple sites or inboxes, you build searches that automatically retrieve exactly the legal or market intelligence you need.
Because Searches power everything else in Vable, planning them carefully pays off. Users can utilize Vable’s Boolean search operators and filters to narrow results and eliminate noise. Whether it’s case law updates, competitor movements, or regulatory changes, a well-designed Search ensures downstream content is accurate and relevant.
Once you have Searches in place, the next step is to group them into Topics. Think of a Topic as a folder that gathers related content under one clear heading. Topics make it easy to manage complex areas of law or business, and they are central to how Vable structures information.
There are two main types:
General Topics - Formed from one or more Searches, General Topics can feed into multiple Alerts or Newsletters (more information on these below) and also the MyVable self-service portal, which can be shared for end users to follow themselves.
Alert Topics - Also created from one or more Searches, an Alert Topic is tied to a single Alert or Newsletter and cannot be shared. This is perfect for confidential updates on sensitive clients, competitors, or transactions.
This layered design means you can reuse content where appropriate while maintaining confidentiality when needed.
With Topics in place, you can distribute timely updates to lawyers and entire practice groups through Alerts and Newsletters. These can be delivered by email or accessed via MyVable, where end users can view archives or check the latest updates in the live alert view.
Vable supports two main formats:
Automated Alerts - Ideal for high-volume, time-sensitive monitoring. Once configured, they publish on a fixed schedule with no extra effort from administrators. Automated Alerts consolidate multiple publisher updates into a single, streamlined delivery - reducing inbox noise while ensuring nothing important is missed.
Curated Newsletters - Perfect for premium client briefings or industry round-ups. Administrators can review results before publication, reorder or exclude articles, add commentary, and adjust the tone for their audience. This hands-on control ensures every issue is polished, relevant, and on-message.
Both methods put you in control of how legal intelligence is packaged and delivered, so recipients receive precisely what they need - no more, no less.
Here’s a typical workflow:
Create a Search on a key area such as ESG regulation in Europe.
Combine Searches into a Topic, for example “European ESG Developments.”
Use the Topic to build an Alert or Newsletter, choosing automated or manual publishing.
Distribute to end users by email or via MyVable.
Each step builds on the previous one, ensuring consistent, targeted, and measurable information delivery.
By mastering these core elements - Searches, Topics, Alerts, and Newsletters - legal information managers can transform how their organizations handle current awareness:
Save time by automating routine monitoring.
Improve accuracy with carefully designed Searches and Topics.
Increase impact by tailoring delivery to different teams.
Vable gives firms the tools to move from information overload to actionable intelligence, freeing legal professionals to focus on analysis and advice rather than information chasing.
Whether you are in a large law firm, corporate legal department, or information services team, Vable provides the structure and flexibility to keep your stakeholders fully informed. Contact us for a guided demo or trial and experience how these building blocks come together to simplify current awareness.