Automation of Data and Mail Merge

Question: Describe the Exceptionally logical analysis throughout, Persuasive arguments included throughout the work supported by appropriate selected evidence. Convincing conclusion included. Answer: Introduction This report discusses the meaning of mail merge in detail and its application in an organization. This study goes into detail on the automation of data and emails and its effectiveness. This report is supported by an Excel spreadsheet accounting the costs of iMac, MacBook, iPad and Microsoft Office Package including and without Vat tax, and its accompanying screenshots are provided here. Investigation Mail Merge According to Lu, Martinez and Ranjan (2014), mail merge is a process by which data is pulled from the spreadsheet, database, or other forms of structured data and inserting them into documents such as emails, letters, spreadsheets, etc. It is a feature within Microsoft Dynamics CRM and can be used with Microsoft Word. The main document and the data source are connected by common sets of data called merge fields. One can create personalized merge fields specific to the required data source, or the predefined set provided by Word can be used (Jha, 2014). With the Mail Merge functionality, one can quickly pull dynamic data from fields that exist on any entity in Dynamics CRM. It is also available as Easy Mail Merge for Outlook. Advantages for employees using Mail Merge for: Microsoft Word Simpler Mass Communications As opined by Miller and Rosenorn (2015), when there is a task of sending a message or an email to many people in a group, it can prove daunting if the individual has to rewrite the same for every person. With Mail Merge for Word, one can create a template file and then only add the names, address and other details manually, which saves a lot of time. Coordination with Microsoft Office Once the basic letter is completed, then merge fields can be added easily which are needed to identify personalized details (Cherry and Latulipe, 2014). These merge fields coincide with the field names in Microsoft Outlook, Excel, Access, etc. It increases flexibility for input data. Conditional Methods Using conditional expressions such as IF along with documents provide more options for customization. It helps mail merge to treat data differently based on certain conditions(Viripaeff, 2013). Easy Mail Merge for Outlook As mentioned by Lambert (2016), employees of an organization can leverage the Easy Mail Merge in Outlook as it comes with some unique benefits: It is easy to learn, and one does not need to invest too much time learning it like the mail merge for Word. Microsoft Word is not required for making mail merge sessions because it is already integrated with Microsoft Outlook. It supports a variety of sources like Outlook distribution lists, Outlook Contacts, or other mail merge fields kept in Windows CSV files. Safety features built within includes delay period between outgoing emails, and the numbers of emails to be sent at a time. Its interface is very user-friendly, intuitive and easy to navigate like a regular Outlook mail. It supports unlimited mail merge cases with IF-ELSE logical scenarios. Speed and Accuracy of Automation of Recipient details in Business Context Computers have made data processing much faster by outputting large quantities of input data with a certain speed, precision and time. Automation of data is same as manual input of data only it is done by a computerFor inputting large quantities of information in an organization with thousands or more customers, the manual process can prove to be hectic; errors can show up, accuracy decreases and not to mention the time taken is much more(Shengjie, 2013).. Automation of data can avoid all those errors while processing large quantities of data especially and prove to be very time-effective, especially, if it includes calculations and comparisons which can be almost impossible in the manual system. Automated emails are personalized, timely and relevant to the recipient, and as a result, they are clicked and opened much more frequently, which brings more revenue to the business (Walters, 2015). It is set up once and then automatically sent to the specific user when the person meets a pa rticular requirement or trigger. Email automation works on the principle of trigger and action system. The person who is automating the emails can focus on the creativity and business side of things. Research has shown that 96% of visitors are not ready to buy from a website, but since they have shown interest, getting them to subscribe to the email list is much easier than just handing money for purchase (Park and Wang, 2013). Principle of a template document that calls data from an external source file According to Gerth (2013), mail merge is not written from Outlook but is written and managed from Microsoft Word. An excel file provides the data to be merged into the email. Each column of the file is set up with headings with email being the first column. Therefore, the columns may read like Email, First Name, Surname, etc. The fields which are present in this excel file will be merged with the working document (Kachinskeand Kachinske, 2013). It is necessary to follow this set up carefully, and email needs to be in the FIRST column. The emails should be sent from the default Outlook account. Signature is automatically added in Outlook by default and therefore it is needed to remove, especially if the signature is an image. If generated email messages are grayed out then, it means the computer has not been restarted after setting Outlook as the default mail reader (Bhalekar and Penwala, 2015). If it gives an error saying Word was not able to mail the document and that the mail progr am is not configured correctly, then the computers should be restarted in safe mode, which clears the cache and solves the issue. Recommendations Automation of data especially emails is not only essential but is necessary if a firm wants to organize its business more efficiently in handling the large volume of customers. It also helps the employees and managers in the company to focus more on the business side of things. Shopping cart application: Automation of emails can be a powerful tool if used as a trigger for the abandonment of shopping cart, so when a person adds things to the cart and forgets to buy it then the person can be reminded of the forgotten purchase through an email workflow. Set up mailing list with proper formats: The key to an efficient mail merge is to set up a mailing list before proceeding with it. The more appropriate the excel spreadsheet holding the mailing list, the better the process. It should be made sure the column for ZIP codes is text formatted so as to retail all the zeros. Mail merge envelopes: Mail merge option additionally provides facility for printing envelopes. Other triggers include reawakening inactive contacts, providing the visitors with more contents based on certain page visits. Conclusion From this study, the automation of data is discussed and found that it not only increases the overall workflow on the business side of things by focusing on creativity and plans but also automates a lot of manual tasks which are almost impossible by manual means. Automation of emails works by setting triggers which are just specific conditions. Mail merge is the merging of fields of fields from different sources of data into word, and the mail is sent through the default Outlook account. Mail merge increases speed, accuracy of the volume of emails sent and reduce chances of any error through manual intervention but is needed for some aspects of inputting data. References Cherry, E. and Latulipe, C., 2014. Quantifying the creativity support of digital tools through the creativity support index. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction (TOCHI), 21(4), p.21. Gerth, C., 2013. Business Process Models. By Springer-Verlag Berlin-Heidelberg. Jha, N., 2014. Teach Yourself Microsoft Word 2013. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform. Kachinske, E. and Kachinske, T., 2014. Maximizing your sales with Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0. Cengage Learning. Lambert, J., 2016. Microsoft Outlook 2016 Step by Step. Microsoft Press. Lu, M.J., Martinez, E.A. and Ranjan, S., Microsoft Corporation, 2014. Mail merge integration techniques. U.S. Patent 8,661,342. Miller, R.G. and Rosenorn, M., Microsoft Technology Licensing, Llc, 2015. Graphical creation of a document conversion template. 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