I was working on a project with an administrator recently which involved mailing out to a long list of contacts. This was the second time that the organisation had mailed this list, but the administrator was typing in the address from scratch again!

My advice would be, if you are going to type the list anyway, you may as well type it up into a sheet of labels in Word, and then you can print it out as often as you like later. This would be my suggestion for someone with limited word processing skills.

For those with more skills, or more willing to learn them, I would suggest typing the list into a spreadsheet, with each line of the address in a new column. Here's an example of the layout:

You can then use this spreadsheet of data to create labels, letters and contact lists. When you need to update the data you only need to update the one Excel file, rather than a number of lists and letters.

Setting up a list in Excel

A spreadsheet has rows across the page, and columns down the page. By creating a list in Excel you are actually creating what is called a database, even though it is in a spreadsheet package. Each address in the row is called a record. Make sure that each separate line of address is in a separate column (this is called a field in database language). It is particularly important to put the postcode or area in a separate column because you can then order your list into geographical areas or postcode areas. While you may not need to have this function right now, you might find in the future that this would be very useful.

Give your list relevant column headings, avoiding spaces. This will ensure that you can mailmerge the list later on. Make the column headings bold so they stand out.

In my next post I will use an Excel list to mailmerge to a letter.