In businesses, we have thousands of customers and have to inform them of any updates or changes in our services. Creating a mailing list in Excel helps us to do the tedious work in minutes. In most cases, we have customers’ mailing addresses in an Excel file, and we want to inform them about our company’s address change using those customers’ mailing addresses.
Let’s say our company name is Marigold Sales, and the address has changed from 7 Oak Valley St., Lakeland, Florida 33801 to Marigold Sales, 71 Glendale Ave. Boca Raton, Florida 33428. Now, we want to inform our customers about this incident.
We want to inform them about this incident using a mailing list.
1. Creating Mailing List in Excel Using Microsoft Word Mail Merge
Microsoft Word offers a feature named Mail Merge. We can use the feature to create a template of a mailing list after importing the data from Excel. The data holds all the customers’ Names, Company Names, Company Addresses, and Email Addresses. The Mail Merge will automatically insert a mailing list after we execute the following sequences.
Step 1: As you want to create a mailing list, you have to prepare a written message using Microsoft Word. Open Microsoft Word, Go to the Mailings tab > Select Letters (from Start Mail Merge section).
Step 2: Write down the message according to your requirements (i.e., informing the customer about Address Change). The Blue colored writing will be in accordance with the mailing list you are about to create.
Step 3: Select the Select Recipients (from Start Mail Merge section) > Choose the Use an Existing List (from the options).
Step 4: Selecting the Use an Existing List takes you to your computer folders. Select the required file (i.e., Creating a Mailing List in Excel).
Click on Open.
Step 5: The Select Table window opens. Make sure you check the First row of data contains column headers toggle.
Click on OK.
Step 6: Microsoft Word loads the data. Place the cursor beside the Recipient Name then Go to Insert Merge Field (in the Write & Insert Fields under the Mailings tab).
Step 7: The Insert Merge Field dialog box appears. Select the Database Fields under the Insert section. Then, select any of the fields (i.e., First Name) afterward, Click on Insert as shown in the image below.
Afterward, repeat Step 7 about 3 or 4 times to insert First Name, Last Name, Company Name, City, State, and Zip Code. You can insert any of the fields in your message,
Step 8: Again, Place the cursor in front of the greeting line (i.e., Dear Recipient Name). After that Hover to the Write & Insert Fields section > Select Greeting Line.
Step 9: The Insert greeting Line dialog box pops up. From the Insert Greeting Line dialog box,
Select any format of Customer’s Name. You can put Comma (,) or other delimiters after the Recipient Name. The preview of your actions is displayed under the Preview section in the dialog box.
Click on OK.
Executing Steps 1 to 9 prepares a template of the mail list for each customer in the data file. The template will be similar as depicted in the picture below.
Step 10: If you want to see the preview for any customer. Just Select the Preview Results option (from the Preview Results section).
In a moment, the template transforms into the 1st customer’s mailing letter as shown in the following picture.
You see no space between the First and Last Name of the customer. Simply Put a Space after the First Name as done in the below image.
All the names of the customers will have similar space between their First and Last Names. Click on the direction arrows to move forward and backward among data.
Step 11: You can Edit, Print, or even Email the letter just by clicking on the specific options (i.e., Send Email Message).
Step 12: The Merge to E-mail dialog box appears. Select Email Address in the To command box. Type an appropriate subject (i.e., Address Change) in the Subject Line command box.
Click OK.
You can pick a range of customer numbers to send the Email to.
Read More: How to Send Email from Excel List
2. Creating Mailing List Using Microsoft Outlook Import Feature
In the previous method, we used Microsoft Word to create a mailing list. However, Microsoft Outlook also offers an option to create a mailing box just by importing a certain data type file (i.e., CSV file type).
As we have a data file of customers’ contact in Excel, we just convert the file in CSV format using Excel’s Save As feature. The file conversion is depicted in the below picture (Go to File > Save As > Select CSV from the offered formats> Click Save).
After converting the Excel file into CSV file format, follow the below steps to create a mailing list using Microsoft Outlook.
Step 1: Open Microsoft Outlook. Select File.
Step 2: From the File ribbon options.
Choose Open & Export > Click on Import/Export.
Step 3: The Import and Export Wizard appears. In the wizard, Choose Import from another program or file option.
Hit Next.
Step 4: Import a File command box opens. Select Comma Separated Values (CSV) as Select the file type to import from.
Click Next.
Step 5: Now, in the Import a File command box, Click on Browse to import a file (previously saved CSV file).
Step 6: Choose the previously saved CSV file from the computer directory and Click OK.
Step 7: Outlook loads the file imported in Step 6 and displays. Check the Allow duplicate to be created option and then go Next.
Step 8: You have to select the location (i.e., Contacts) where the imported file has to be extracted then click on the Next.
Step 9: To match the fields, you have to tell Outlook what items it will take as Name, Company, or Email Address. As a result, click on Map custom fields.
Step 10: Drag the value from From (Left side) to To (Right side) to assign them as the same.
Do repeat Step 10 for Company Name and Email Address after that Click OK similar to the image below.
Step 11: You can also change the file destination. If there is no need for such actions, click on Finish.
Outlook takes a second then loads all the contacts. If you want to check the imported contacts, Go to Contacts and all the imported contacts will appear as it does in the following picture.
You can count or cross-check the First Names with the source data. This Outlook creates a mailing list from which you can easily mail each of them instantly.
Read More: How to Mail Merge from Excel to Outlook
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Conclusion
In this article, we demonstrate how to create a mailing list in Excel using the interlink ability of Microsoft Products (i.e., Microsoft Word and Microsoft Outlook). Hope these methods fulfill your quest in creating a mailing list in Excel. Comment, if you have further inquiries or have anything to add.
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