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jnayes, Computer Support
Category: Microsoft Office
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Experience:  Network Administrator
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Am using Office 2007. Am doing a mail merge

Customer Question

Am using Office 2007. Am doing a mail merge of 98 records from an excel file into a word letter that gets sent in an Outlook email message. One of the fields in the excel file has the email addresses. Some records have one email address in a cell and some have up to 6 email addresses in the cell. Word/Outlook are okay if only one email address is in the Excel cell, but when it encounters multiple emails separated by semi colans (;), it doesn't recognize them. It is placing a quote " mark at the beginning of the emails which is throwing off Outlook. I've tried formated the cells containing multiple emails as text, numbers, email links and nothing works. I tried exporting from Excel to a CSV file format and performing the import and the problem persists. Againl, I using 2007 versions of Word, Excel and Outloook. Can I make this work?
Submitted: 1 year ago.
Category: Microsoft Office
Expert:  jnayes replied 1 year ago.

There's two ways I know of to do this. As you've learned, separators do not work (semi colons for example). Mail merge reads the entire cell, the semi colon will be treated as part of the email address.

So how do we get around this.

Easy, in the excel data source, create a field titles emails or whatever. And put each email in its own cell below it.

When merging, select send e-mail messages. You will have to select the field "email messages".

Alternatively, you can set up mailing lists (I actually prefer this method), in Outlook. I'm currently using 2010, so I'll have to link you to the specific instructions:

It'll allow you to keep it more visual/organized in Outlook. I know it seems a bit overwhelming at first, but once you do it once you'll get the gist of it. Just remember, to my knowledge, there is no separator available to put emails in one cell, it's how it reads the cell that causes the issue. This applies to ALL versions of office.

Let me know if I misunderstood the question. If everything works out and once you're completely satisfied, please remember to return and rate my answer. If not, or you need some clarification/assistance, don't hesitate to ask via the REPLY button.

Thank you.

Customer: replied 1 year ago.

I a bit confused. I have 95 lines of data in Excel. The data in each line gets merged into a MS Word letter that will get emailed to the distribuiton list found in one cell for each line. For example line 1 gets sent to 3 people and I did have their email in 3 separte fields, but when you go to mail merge to email, you can only select one field. Which is why I joined the three emails and placed them in one cell thinking Outlook would read that cell but the error message says it doesn't recognize my string. I'd prefer not to have to set up 95 dist list in outlook to send these. Any other suggestions?

Customer: replied 1 year ago.

The question was locked and customer service unlocked it, are you still working on this question?



Expert:  jnayes replied 1 year ago.
There was an issue with the site, it sent your question to a category I was unable to answer questions in.

I have a better understanding of what you mean, but my point still stands. You will not be able to put all the email addresses in one box. It's silly, I know, and it makes very little sense that they didn't implement it (even in 2010 by the way which is what I run).

Each email address needs to be in it's own cell, under whatever field of your choosing.

I can send this question to the programming department if you wish, and one of those guys might be able to write a script or give you some better insight on this. Just let me know and I'll send it over there. And once again, very sorry about the delay.

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