Mail Merge

1. note - keep these documents together in a folder
2. create and save a spreadsheet in Excel, with the first row being column titles for each piece of information you wish to maintain:
   
3. create a document in Word, such as a letter that will be sent to each person in the spreadsheet

1. go to Tools → Data Merge Manager
2. in the Data Merge Manager toolbar → Main Document, click Create → Form Letters
3. in the Data Merge Manager toolbar → Data Source, click Get Data → Open Data Source…
4. select the Excel spreadsheet you created with the recipient data, and click Open
5. when presented with the Open Workbook dialog, “Sheet1” and “Entire Workbook” should be filled in so just click OK
6. in this Word document, find areas where you would like each person's name and other information to appear
7. in the Data Merge Manager toolbar → Merge Field, drag and drop any desired fields into the locations you want that particular data to appear in your letter
8. you will need to format things as desired for these fields, by selecting a field and choosing your desired font, adding spaces between first/last names, etc…
   

1. in the Data Merge Manager toolbar → Merge, click the icon to “Merge to New Document” (this will allow you to preview your finished letters, whereas the “Merge to Printer” icon would just send all letters to the printer)
2. you should now have a new document, with all fields automatically filled in by Word, and a page for each recipient

You have successfully merged data into letters, but what if you want to limit this letter to specific recipients? First you must decide how to “filter” your recipients. We will use the ¹⁾“column with an x approach.” Let's say we only want to send this particular letter on Christmas, and there are only certain people who would need to receive the letter.

1. make sure your letter has been saved and is closed
2. first, add a column titled CHRISTMAS in your spreadsheet
3. place an “x” in each cell corresponding to the recipient who should receive this Christmas letter
   
4. save your spreadsheet
5. open your Word letter again, and click OK at the “Open Workbook Dialog”
6. in your Word letter, do everything the same except the final step of Merging the Data into a Final Document:
   1. in the Data Merge Manager toolbar → Merge, click “Query Options”
   2. in the “Filter Records” tab, select the CHRISTMAS field, and for the Comparison, select “is not blank” (it won't care if we have “x”, “X”, “-” etc… in the CHRISTMAS field)
   3. notice that you can add up to six record filters in this tab (you could have an EASTER column, THANKSGIVING, etc…)
   4. note that all filtering rules are applied to this
   5. if you would like a particular order for your recipients, select the sorting field in the Sort Records tab (such as LAST_NAME, Ascending)
   6. click OK, and in the Data Merge Manager toolbar → Merge, click the icon to “Merge to New Document”
   7. you should now have a page for each letter sent to the filtered recipients