1. Make plans to determine which data fields you’ll be using in your source and target documents.

Determine how you want the final document to look, so that you know which fields are necessary to accomplish the merge. For example, if you are creating a postcard that will be mailed to customers, you might want to use the following data fields:

<<Company Name>><<Address>><<City>>, <<State>><<Postal Code>>

Your spreadsheet or database might look like this:

2. Save the data source file—usually a spreadsheet or database file—as a comma-delimited (.csv) or tab-delimited (.txt) text file.

Make sure that your data source file is structured in such a way that you can include the appropriate fields in your target document. For example, the top row of a spreadsheet should contain the field names that you’ll use in the target document, such as “Company” and “Address.”

For more information, see About data source files.

3. Create a target document that includes text and other items that remain the same in each version of the target document.

For more information, see About target documents.

4. Select the data source using the Data Merge panel.

For more information, see Select a data source.

5. Insert fields from the Data Merge panel into the target document.

You can add data fields to either a document page or a master page. If you add data fields to a master page, you have additional options.

For more information, see Insert data fields and Adding data field placeholders to master pages.

6. Preview the records to make sure that the target document will look the way you intend.

For more information, see Preview records in the target document.

7. Merge the target document with the data source file.

For more information, see Merge records.