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Office 365 (Outlook 2016) - Email Merges Using Word

This document covers the process of email merges in the new Office 365--using a Word 2013 document and CSV list of recipients

Mail Merges in Word & Outlook 2016

This document covers the process of mail merges in the new Office 365--using a Word 2016 document and CSV list of recipients, we'll create multiple Outlook 2016 e-mails and show you how to set up a rule to delay sending these e-mails until you've had a chance to review them. This same process can be adapted to create physical letters, labels, and other types of documents.
To begin this tutorial, you'll want to have the text of your e-mail composed in a Word document and your list of e-mail recipients in a CSV or Excel spreadsheet.



Selecting the type of output document

First, open your Word document and click on the Mailings tab, then click the Start Mail Merge icon and select the type of document you'll be creating - in this case, E-mail Messages. Note that you can also receive step-by-step instructions by choosing the Step-by-Step Mail Merge Wizard option at the bottom of this list.

Choose "Email Messages"  from the dropdown list.




Selecting recipients and populating merge fields


On the Mailings tab, then click the Select Recipients icon and select Use an Existing List. Browse to the location of your CSV / Excel file and double-click to select it and return to the Word document.

Click on "Select Recipients" and then "Use an Existing List"



Adding merge fields to your document


Place your cursor where you'd like to put your first merge field and click the bottom half of the Insert Merge Field icon:
 Click lower half of the "Insert Merge Field" icon

Click on "Insert Merge Field"

The available fields from your CSV file are displayed, as shown to the right. Click your desired field to add it to your document.



Previewing your mail merge documents


When you've finished adding your fields to your e-mail text, click the Preview Results icon to replace the field names with the data from each row of your CSV file.

Click "Preview Results"

In preview mode, you can page through the output documents using the arrow icons to the right of the Preview Results button:

Click arrow icon to move through the preview of documents



Delayed sending in Outlook 2016


Former Thunderbird mail merge users may have been used to the delayed sending behavior, where e-mail merge messages are placed in your e-mail outbox and not immediately sent. You can create a rule to duplicate this functionality in Outlook with the following steps. If you want to send your messages immediately, skip this colored box and proceed with the instructions below.
Open Outlook 2016, and on the Home tab, click Rules and select Manage Rules and Alerts:

Click on "Manage Rules & Alerts"


In the upper left corner of the window that appears, click the New Rule button to bring up the Rules Wizard pop-up window.
Toward the bottom of the list, select the Apply rule on messages I send option, then click next.
Check the with specific words in the subject check box, and click the specific words link at the bottom of the window to define the subject of the e-mail you'd like to filter:

Start from a blank rule.  Edit the rule description

In the popup window that appears, enter the subject you'll be using for your e-mail messages and click the Add button. You can add multiple subjects here if you'll be sending different types of mail merged e-mails.

Search text box

When you're done adding subjects, click OK and note that your subject is added to the bottom of the window:
Click OK and note that your subject is added to the bottom of the window

Click the Next button and check the defer delivery by a number of minutes checkbox, then click the a number of link to define how long you'd like to hold e-mails - anywhere from 1 - 120 minutes.

Enter your desired time and click OK to return to the Rules Wizard and update the rule text at the bottom of the window as shown to the right. Click the Next button.

Apply this rule after I send the message with "Sample Mail Merge Email" in the subject, defer delivery by 60 minutes

Select any necessary exceptions to this rule, and click the Next button again. Give your name a rule and ensure that the Turn on this rule checkbox is selected, then click the Finish button. You'll be informed that this rule will only work in the Outlook desktop user; click the OK button to confirm.
Click the OK button again to save your changes and close the Rules and Alerts window.

Click OK to save changes and close Rules and Alerts

The next time you send e-mails with this subject, they'll be held in your Outlook Outbox for the specified duration of time.
To edit or preview a message in your Outbox, just double-click it. Please note that when you preview a message, you'll need to click the Send button again to queue it up in your Outbox.



Sending merged e-mail messages


When you've finished reviewing your mail merge documents, click the Finish & Merge icon in the Mailings tab of Word 2013 and select the output type - in this case, Send Email Messages - to bring up the message options pop-up window:

Click the "Finish & Merge" icon   Select the output type.


Set the To: dropdown to the column in your CSV file which contains the e-mail addresses of your recipients. Type the subject line for your e-mail - if you set up the delayed sending rule, make sure this field matches the subject line you provided in Outlook. Keep the mail format as HTML, and select if you'd like to send all of merged e-mails or to a subset of the recipients.

When you click OK, your messages will be sent right away (and can be found in your Outlook Sent folder) or will be sent to your Outbox for the duration you specified.