Mailmerged

Just thought I would share my mailmerge challenges with you.  Was trying to get pictures included in my mailmerge.  Have figured it out.  If you are having same problem here you go,

MAILMERGE INCLUDING PICTURE

1)      You will require your contact list

2)      You will require your pictures, named appropriately

3)      Put you contact list and pictures in the same directory

4)      Create your document template in the same directory as contact list

5)      Create your template and document strucuture

6)      Insert word fieldcode INCLUDEPICTURE and insert the mailmerge field for your picture location

7)      Create mailmerge document

8)      If you save the mailmerge template, on opening you will need to enter the picture mailmerge field again as Word will select the picture for whichever record you are on and use same for all mailmerge records

9)      Once mailmerged you will have message that field is undefined, where your picture should be. Highlight whole document and press F9 to force update the fieldcodes

10)  Your pictures will appear in document.

See the example below for further help.

A number of files are in the directory.

The photos to be used in JPG format, a draft template and the contact list.

Your template can be created from new.

In this example the files are in a folder, D:\temp\mailmerge

Firstly open your contact list and ensure that there is a column for the photos/pictures

In this example the photo location is shown in column D “ext file ref absolute”

Ensure that the file reference is shown as X:\\location\\file.jpg

Where X is your drive letter.  Notice the double backslashes, these are important!

Save your contact list.

Open a Word document, link to your database and create your template using the word mailmerge fields.

For the picture you will need to use a Word field “INCLUDEPICTURE”.  To get the {} brackets you have to either use CTRL+F9 or use the Insert – Field option from the menu bar. Do not just type the {} brackets, it will not work.

Insert your mergefield for the picture column in the INCLUDEPICTURE field.

Now Merge to a new document.

Your picture will not appear but an error message will, similar to “Error! Filename not specified.”

Select the whole document, ALT+A and press F9 to update the document.

Your pictures will appear.

Ensure it is done this way otherwise you may find the same picture appearing for every mailmerge letter.