Ease Holiday Mailings With Word and Mail Merge

Use Word To Create Labels From Your Address Book Of Contacts

You can use Word’s “mail merge” feature when you want to create a set of documents that are essentially the same but where each document contains unique elements. For example: a letter of holiday greeting, your inserted photos and the basic message (text) will appear in each letter, but the address and greeting line will be different in each letter.

Using mail merge, you can create:

• A set of labels or envelopes The return address is the same on all the labels or envelopes, but the destination address is unique on each one.
• A set of form letters, e-mail messages, or faxes The basic content is the same in all the letters, messages, or faxes, but each contains information that is specific to the individual recipient, such as name, address, or some other piece of personal data.
• More…

Using mail merge, all you have to do is create one document that contains the information that is the same in each version. Then you just add some placeholders for the information that is unique to each version. Word takes care of the rest.

It is that first – creating address labels – that can really help if you need to send correspondence to a lot of people. Your “address book”, or “Contacts” list, can be used as the source for the label maker (see Step 2). Microsoft has a very clear tutorial on using Word’s “mail merge” feature, and here are the links:
Step 1: Choose a document type and main document
Step 2: Connect to a data file and select records
Step 3: Add fields to the main document
Step 4: Preview the merge and then complete it

When you have “merged” your address book, and the ‘labels’ (or, if your printer allows it, envelopes), you just insert a sheet of labels (such as Avery) and hit “Print”. Saves having to look up, and manually copy down each person’s address…

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