Wednesday, November 9, 2011

How to mail merge


In Microsoft word, there are many features we may not know how they work. [Thanks to my previous employer], I learned how to use a feature called "mail merge". This is a very useful tool when you have 10-20 email addresses and you want to send out a template email at once using your Outlook.

Things you will need:

1. Microsoft Word 2007
2. Microsoft Excel 2007
3. Outlook

First of all, set your Bulk as a default from which you'll send out email. Right now it is set to Inbox. If you have 10-20 emails to send out then don't worry about this. But if you have more than 50, then you might want to consider this otherwise your outlook will freeze on you.

FYI: Youtube video explaining this is coming soon ! 

Let's get started.
Here are step by step instructions on how to approach this:



1.    Open up the excel sheet with the leads list
2.    Make sure the leads are separated by First name and Last name

3.   Select everything. Including Header.
4.   Press Alt. Press I key , Press N key and Press D key one after the other.
5.   A new window will pop up. Click on “new”

6.   Click ‘OK’. Close the window.
7.   Open a word document with invitation prompt written in it. Put your curser after “hello”

8.   Go to ‘Mailings’ tab on the top
9.    Select “select recipients’ from the ribbon. And then select “Use existing list”

10.   Select the excel sheet which you used in step#1
11.   Select “insert merge field” from the ribbon and select “first_name”
12.   You should see something like this:

13.   Put a comma after <<First_Name>> to make it look like “Hello Nidhi,”
14.   Click inside <<first_name>>
15.   Press ALT+F9
16.   Write down exactly like this image: {MERGEFIELD First_Name \ * charformat},

17.   Select the entire gray area and Bold>Unbold
18.   Press ALT+F9 again
19.   Click ‘Preview results’ from the ribbon to preview names.
20.   Click “finish & Merge” and select “send email messages” and press OK.