Teacher: Waynetta Naughton

Grade 10

Lesson #2

Word Processing

Mail Merge

Imagine being the manager of your own corporation. Now, imagine if you have to send a letter
to one of your employees to tell them that they are invited to a luncheon for the company. Seems
simple enough, right? Well it would be, but that’s genuinely not how it works. As your company’s policy,
once you hold a luncheon for your company, all employees are supposed to be invited. Now you have to
write a letter inviting all employees to this luncheon. This said, you now have to invite all of your 475
employees to this luncheon. Not as easy now, is it?

When a static letter has to be written to many people at once, it would make no sense retyping
the same letter multiple times. The purpose of the “Mail Merge” feature is to reduce the amount of
time it takes to type the same letters to different persons by allowing you to change only specific data
about these individuals on one letter.

It works by using the “find and replace” concept, where a list of data for all the persons which
the letter must be sent to is prepared and the necessary data is placed into an already prepared Master
Letter. This list of data is called the list of recipients. The master letter contains what are called markers
which indicate where the data from the list of recipients have to be placed when mail merge occurs.

The result will be a list of personalized letters for each individual recipient, as specified in your
Master Letter and List of Recipients. More time is conserved this way as there is reduction in the
repetition process for creating letters.
Steps in Performing Mail Merge

Step One: Create your list of Recipients

This is the list of details about the individuals for which the letter will be sent to. To do this, you
must:

1. Go to the Mailings tab in your ribbon.

2. You will see the “Select Recipients” option. Click the drop down menu icon. You will be given the
option to type a new list of recipients or to use an existing list.
If you already have a list of persons and their details and you would like to reuse that list, select
use existing list. If not, select Type new list.
3. When using an existing list, you have to look for the file which you would have saved with your
details.
4. When typing a new list, a dialog box should appear in the middle of the screen with a datasheet-
like format. Fields/Columns are already present and named in order to collect input about each
recipient.

5. Input information about reach person which you would like to send the letter to. When you
need to enter the data of the next person, select new entry at the bottom of the dialog box. If
you want to enter data into a field which does not exist, select customize columns. This allows
you to add another field which does not exist by clicking add when the customize address list
dialog box appears on the screen.
6. When finished, click ok. You will now be given the option to save this list. Save it in an easily
accessible place, with a valuable name for easy access.
7. If it is that you want to edit a list of recipients after creation, click on “edit recipient list” in the
mailings tab. This will allow you to make the necessary adjustments to your list of recipients.
Step Two: Create your Master Letter

This is the letter which will be sent to all of your recipients after mail merge is performed. It
contains markers which specify where the details from the list of recipients created should be inserted
for each specific individual. Markers are inserted using the “<< >>” operators where the name of the
field is within these operations e.g. <<first name>>.

To create your master letter, just type your letter in a blank document in Microsoft Word as per
norm, omitting the areas which your markers must be placed.

Step Three: Linking your Master Letter and your List of Recipients

Since we have your master letter and your list of recipients, the next thing to do is to insert your
markers in the areas which we need data to be replaced for each individual recipient.

1. Click on the exact area in which you would like to insert a specific piece of data. E.g. First Name.
2. When the cursor is in the specified area, select the dropdown menu of Insert Merge Field from
the Mailings tab. A dialog box with a list of fields from the previous step with the New Address
List will appear.
 3. Select the name of the field which contains the data which has to be inserted in that specific
area. E.g., selecting the “First Name” field.

4. Once clicked, the marker for this field will appear in the letter at the specific point where the
cursor was placed. E.g., <<First Name>>.

5. Repeat this for any other portion of your letter where data must be continuously replaced.

N.B
Ensure that you format your data properly within your letter. This includes the proper spacing
and indentation, etc.

Step Four: Preview and Finish

To view how your letters will turn out before actually finishing the mail merge process, select
Preview Results from the Mailings section. You will see one letter with the data specifies in the first row
of your recipient list replacing the markers in the letter. This sample is provided to give you the authority
to decide whether you would’ve formatted your letter properly or enough.
 If/When satisfied with your results, select the drop down menu of Finish and Merge in the
mailings tab. You will then need to select Edit Individual recipients, where another dialog box with open
with options on how to merge.

If you want to merge your letters with all of the recipients, select all, then click ok. A list of
letters with the necessary data will appear on your screen. These are the merged letters and this
concludes the mail merge process.

For those who learn better visually or are too lazy to read the notes:

https://youtu.be/do9ujnZLIC4