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Word Data Merge

  1. First check your data source, by opening in Excel.



  2. Make sure there are no empty rows or empty columns in your data source or "alienated" data may not appear in you final document.

  3. Save your document ( Files directly exported from Filemaker will not merge to Word, you must save from Excel first. ).

  4. Close the Excel document ( When performing a merge you cannot have both the source document and the template or "destination" document open at the same time. )

  5. Open Word and select "Data Merge Manager" from the "Tools" menu. You must have a open document to use the Data Merge Manager.



  6. This window should appear on your screen.



  7. Under the "Main Document section", choose "Create" and select which type of document you would like to create. In this example we will create form letters. Labels and envelopes follow similar procedures with a few additional dialogues, see below.



    If you chose a Label Merge

    1. You will see this additional dialogue:



    2. Make sure you select the correct label type (usually 5160 at Help One Child) and click "OK".

    If you chose a Envelope Merge

    1. You will see this dialogue:



    2. If you are printing on Letterhead envelopes (which have the return address pre-printed on them be sure to check the "Omit" return address check box.



      If you wish to use you own address uncheck the "Use my address" check box (which populates the return address field with you address from Entourage if you use it, and enter your own address in the box



    3. When you're done click "OK"

  8. Under the "Data Source" section, choose a "Get Data" and select a method of getting data. In most cases this will be "Open Data Source..."



  9. If you choose "Open Data Source..." you will see the following dialogue requesting that you locate the file you wish to use data from. (Perhaps you exported data from Filemaker) select the proper Excel file.



  10. After selecting your Excel file, Word will ask you which of the worksheets you wish to draw your data from. Select and click "OK."



  11. Here the procedure differs for Letter, Label and Envelope merges:

    For a Letter Merge

    1. Under the "Merge Field" section, select and drag the proper fields into the document to create a template.



    2. In this example the address fields were positioned in the document to form the header of a business letter.



    For a Label Merge

    1. You will see the "Edit Labels" dialogue:



    2. Select the correct merge fields until the label looks like you desire. Remember to add returns, spaces and commas where appropriate.


    3. When you press "OK" you will see how the word document reflects the format of the label stationary.



    For a Envelope Merge

    1. Very similar to letter merge only there is a target box in which to drop the merge fields.



    2. When you are finished you may need to adjust the box size to accommodate your field names. But it should look something like this:

  12. Under the "Preview" section, if you click on the <<ABC>> icon the word document will show you, record by record, how your data populates the template.



  13. Under the "Merge" section, select the "Merge to New Document" icon.



    This should create a multi-page document with each of the records in your data source populating a page (or multiple pages) with it's data.



  14. Print away!

    ** There seems to be a strange quirk with Word merged documents which does not allow you to easily select a specific range of pages to print from the merged document. I've found the easiest way to circumnavigate this limitation is to copy and paste the desired pages to a new document or re-merge the data for the specified records (from a new Excel worksheet containing only the desired records).