Introduction (WD 330) People are more likely to open and read a letter than a generic letter addressed to sir, madam or to whom it may concern. Word provides the capability of creating a letter, which is an easy way to generate mass mailings of personalized letters. Project Form Letters, Mailing Labels, and a Directory To generate form letters, you: Create a for the form letter Create or specify a, or blend, the main document with the data source to generate a series of individual letters Identifying the Main Document for Form Letters (WD 333) The first step in the mail merge process is to identify the type of document you are creating for the main document. Word supports five main documents: To Identify the Main Document for the Form Letter Click the tab on the Ribbon. Click the button. Select Step by Step Mail Merge Wizard, which displays the Mail Merge task pane. Step One of the Wizard is to Select document type for the main document. The option is selected by default. Step Two of the Wizard is to Select starting document where we chose to Start from a template and used the template.
To Enter the Sender Information (WD 337) Enter the sender information at the of the letter. Replace the name with the sender name. the content control that contains company name because the sender is an individual instead of a company. Enter the sender s in the third content control. Creating a Data Source (WD 339) A data source is a file that contains the data that changes from one merged document to the next. A data source is often shown as a table that consists of a series of rows and columns. Each row is called a. The first row of a data source is called the because it identifies the name of each column. Each row below the header row is called a. The data source for our practice project contained five data records. Each data record identified a different potential employer. Thus, five form letters were generated from this data source. Each column in the data source is called a, which represents a group of similar data. Each data field must be identified uniquely with a. In our practice project, the data source contained data fields: title, first name, last name, organization name, address line 1, address line 2, city, state, ZIP code, position, and employer type. To Create a New Data Source (WD 340) Click Next to begin Step Three of the Wizard, which is to Select recipients for the data source. Click Type a new list in the Mail Merge task pane. Click the link to display the New Address List dialog box.
Click the button to edit the data fields included in the list. o You can delete, rename, or add new data fields. Enter information into the New Address List dialog box for each data record. To Save a Data Source when Prompted by Word (WD 345) When you click the OK button in the New Address List dialog box, Word displays the Save Address List dialog box so that you can save the data source. Give your list a file name. Navigate to the appropriate folder. Click the Save button. Editing Records in the Data Source To add or edit data records in the data source after it has been saved, you would click the button on the tab of the Ribbon. Click the data source name in the Data Source list, then click the button to display the data records in a dialog box. This is also where you can sort or filter the data source list. Composing the Main Document for the Form Letters (WD 347) Enter and format the text in the main document for the form letters using these steps: 1. Enter the. 2. Edit the block. 3. Edit the line (salutation). 4. Enter text and insert. In the Mail Merge task pane, click Next to start Step Four of the Wizard, which is to Write your letter. Merge Fields (WD 348) In the main document, field names linked to the data source are called merge fields because they merge, or, the main document with the contents of the data source.
When a merge field is inserted in the main document, Word surrounds the field name with merge field characters, which are << or >> that mark the beginning and ending of a merge field. Most letters contain an and. For this reason, Word provides an AddressBlock merge field and a GreetingLine merge field. To View Merged Data in the Main Document (WD 349) Go to the tab on the Ribbon. Click the button. To Edit the AddressBlock Merge Field -click the AddressBlock merge field to display a shortcut menu. Click Edit Address Block to display the Modify Address Block dialog box. Scroll through the list of recipient name and then click the format, Mr. Joshua Randall Jr., because that format places the title to the left of the first and last name. To Insert a Merge Field in the Main Document (WD 353) On the Mailings tab, click the button arrow to display the menu. Click the data field to insert the selected merge field into the document at the location of the cursor. IF Fields (WD 354) An IF field is an example of a Word field. One form of the IF field is called an If Then: which means: If a is true, then an action. Another form of the IF field is called an If Then Else: If a is true, then perform an action; or else perform a action. The example we used in our project was as follows complete the table by labeling each item as the condition, true text, or false text. IF Employer_Type = C practice school
To Insert an IF Field in the Main Document (WD 355) Click the button on the Mailings tab. Select the rule, in this case If Then Else To Display a Field Code (WD 358) The instructions of an IF field are called, and the default for Word is for field codes not to be displayed. To show a field code: -click the field results (in this case, the word practice ) Choose Toggle Field Codes on the shortcut menu. Merging the Data Source with the Main Document to Generate Form Letters (WD 360) Click Next in the Mail Merge task pane window to proceed to Step Five of the Wizard, which is to Complete the merge. Click the Edit individual letters link. Choose All to view all letters. To see all the letters at once, display the tab to Zoom to the Many Pages option. To Save the Merged Documents in a File (WD 363) The merged letters open in a separate window from the main document. Click the Save button on the Quick Access Toolbar to display the Save As dialog box. Merging All Data Records to a Directory (WD 378) You may want to print the data records in the data source, which can be done by merging all data records in the data source into a single document called a directory. To accomplish this task, the following steps are required: Change the page from portrait to landscape. Create a directory layout by placing a separating character (comma) between each merge field. Merge the directory to a new document, which creates a list of all records in the data source. Convert the directory to a, using the separating character as the identifier for each new column. Format the table containing the directory.
To Merge to a Directory (WD 379) Go to the tab on the Ribbon. Click the button. Click on the menu. On the Ribbon, click the button and select Use existing list to open the Select Data Source dialog box. After opening the list, click the button arrow to display the data fields available. To Merge to a New Document (WD 381) Click the & button on the Mailings tab. Select Edit Individual Documents on the menu. Click All in the dialog box and click OK. To Convert Text to a Table (WD 382) Press + to select the entire document. Go to the tab on the Ribbon. Click the button. Choose Convert Text to Table in the menu. Check that the correct number of columns is displayed. Click to window, which fits the table and contents. Check that Commas are selected under the Separate text at section. Click OK. FOR ADDITIONAL PRACTICE TO REINFORCE YOUR KNOWLEDGE OF THIS CHAPTER S CONTENT, VISIT: SCSITE.COM/WD2010/LEARN