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 Mail Merging
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| Using SoftBooking you can send letters and emails to your clients via the system using many details stored on the system. This can be used to send a single letter to a single client or a mass mailer to all or a large volume of your clients, for example, an annual newsletter.
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| Creating a letter to send
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| To create a template letter to send to your client(s) first press the text line Mail Merge/Documents situated in the general options menu on the sidebar.
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| A separate screen will then open showing a list of template letters (if there are any previous ones on the system) which you could send. To create a new letter you have options; you can either write a brand new letter or import a letter you have already written.
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| Create a new letter
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| · | To create a new letter, press the button at the bottom of the screen titled 'create new letter', you will then be prompted to enter a name for the new letter, type in the name and press OK. The system will now open into MS word, with a blank letter format.
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| · | The right hand side of the screen will also have a sidebar titled Mail Merge.
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| · | First write the letter you wish to send and then you can add the fields you wish to attach to the letter from SoftBooking.
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| · | To attach field from SoftBooking, such as address, name, etc use the sidebar titled Mail Merge – pressing address block will add a clients name and address; for more specific details select the option More items this will give you a list of available fields you can add to your letter.
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| · | Once you have written your letter and attached all the fields you want you can then preview what it will look like by pressing the text line Next: preview your letter at the bottom of the Mail Merge side bar in MS Word.
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| · | If you are satisfied with the letter then close MS Word and save the document, you will then be returned to SoftBookings mail merge screen and your new letters title will be displayed in the list.
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| · | The letter is now prepared and ready to be sent to one or more clients.
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| Creating envelopes and labels
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| If you wish to create a template envelope or labels to be printed on, create a new letter, by pressing the button titled create new letter from the Mail Merge/Document screen.
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| On the sidebar in MS Word titled Mail Merge press the text line right at the bottom titled Previous: select recipients, then press the text line right at the bottom titled Previous: starting documents, and again press the text line right at the bottom titled Previous: select document type.
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| Then from the sidebar select either Envelope or Labels and press the text line right at the bottom titled Next: starting document, Now press the text line Envelope/label options and select the appropriate Label/envelope and press OK.
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| Now on the sidebar press the text line right at the bottom titled Next: Select recipient then press the text line right at the bottom titled Next: Arrange your envelope.
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| Now add the fields you want on your envelope as described above.
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| Import an existing letter
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| · | To import a letter into SoftBooking press the button titled 'Load Letter to List', this will open a screen titled open, from here you must locate the prewritten letter to load, once you have found the letter select it and press the Open button.
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| · | The letter will now open into MS Word with a sidebar titled Mail Merge, follow the steps above to add fields such as address to the letter.
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| Sending a letter
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| To send a letter to a selected client or a group of clients you must first have produced the letter, as outlined above, then it is a matter of selecting who you want to send the letter to.
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| To select recipients to send a letter to you must first highlight them on the main client screen grid; to select multiple clients press and hold down the Ctrl key on your keyboard and using the mouse click on each client you want the letter to be sent to, the selected recipients will be highlighted in blue.
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| Once all the desired clients are selected press the Mail Merge/Documents text line on the sidebar under the grid options menu. The Mail Merge/Documents screen will open, now single click on the letter you want to send and press the button titled Run Merge. MS word will now run and build the letters for you; you can then select to print from MS Word.
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| Once a Mail Merge has been run from SoftBooking the clients Record/CRM tab on the clients card will show what letter was sent and when (date).
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| When your letters are printed you can close MS Word, you will be asked if you wish to save, if you press yes this will save a copy of each letter sent and can be saved anywhere on your PC.
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| Sending an email
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| If you choose to send a letter to each client via email rather than post you should select the clients you wish to send the email two as outlined above, press the Mail Merge/Documents text line on the sidebar under the grid options menu. The Mail Merge/Documents screen will open, now single click on the letter you want to email and also tick the box titled Send document as an email which is located at the bottom of the list of pre-built letters, then press the button titled Run Merge. MS word will now run and build the letters for you, to release the letters via email you then need to press the text line titled Electronic mail, a small box will open up titles Merge to E-mail, press the OK button at the bottom of this box and the emails will be sent.
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| You can now close MS word you will be asked if you wish to save, if you press yes this will save a copy of each letter sent and can be saved anywhere on your PC.
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| Sending an SMS text message
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| SoftBooking enables users to send SMS text messages to one or more clients, to complete this function you must first select the client(s) you wish to send the SMS text message to select recipients to send a SMS to you must first highlight them on the main client screen grid; to select multiple clients press and hold down the Ctrl key on your keyboard and using the mouse click on each client you want the letter to be sent to, the selected recipients will be highlighted in blue.
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| Once you have selected the clients to send your message to, press the Mail Merge/Documents text line on the sidebar under the grid options menu. The Mail Merge/Documents screen will open showing a list of template letters available. Above this list are two tabs, the first is titled MS Word Merge and is the tab you are currently on, the second tab is titled Send SMS Text; click on this tab.
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| The screen will now show a free text box in which you can type in what you want the text message to say, you can also add personal fields such as client name by pressing the button titled Add Client field, this will bring up a list of fields that can be added to the text message, press the button titled insert to add a field and Cancel to close the list. Once you are happy with the message and want to send it press the button titled Run Merge. A text message will now be sent to all the clients you selected to their mobile number from the client card.
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