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Email Shortcuts

Do you regularly send email to a list of customers, salespeople, family or friends?

Have you ever received an email addressed to 50 or more email addresses (yours included)? Do you find it a bit annoying (if not impersonal) seeing all of those other addresses included in the email?

Would you like to have one or more email icons on your desktop that would enable you to send an email to a list of specific addresses without having all of the addresses appear in the email?

There are actually a number of ways to accomplish this, but the method described below requires nothing more than your present email client (Netscape Messenger, Outlook Express, etc.) and a bit of your time.

But first, here are some email basics. Unless you have just a few people with whom you regularly correspond, you should set up an address books for specific addressees. I have a number of address books in my Netscape Messenger (to keep this as brief as possible, I'll be describing how to perform these tasks using the Messenger email client, as that is my preferred choice): one for customers, one for salespeople, one for family, one for friends and still another for my special buddies.
  1. From either Netscape Communicator or Messenger, to send an email to all addresses in a specific address book, click on COMMUNICATOR from the menu bar at the top and choose ADDRESS BOOK from the drop-down menu.
  2. In the left window, click on the address book you want to use as the basis for your email.
  3. If you want to send the message to everyone in this address book, click on any address in the right window, then choose EDIT and SELECT ALL from the drop-down menu.

    Next click NEW MESSAGE from the menu bar and it will open your send message window with each email address in that address book designated as a recipient of your message. Then, fill in your subject line, type your message and click SEND.
  4. If you want to select specific addresses (not everyone), click one and while holding down the CONTROL key, click on each of the others to whom you wish to send your message. Then, click NEW MESSAGE, type in your subject and copy and click SEND.
OK, this got your 'multiple address' email out, but it will be one of those that includes all of the addresses to which it was sent. Not very personal...right? Right...so let's do one to the same list that just shows from whom the email was sent and isn't cluttered with a whole bunch of email addresses. But first here are a few important words from Office Helper!
  1. Perform all of the steps outlined above, except this time before you send your message, change the "To" designation to "Bcc" for each address. Do this by simply clicking on the "To" next to each address and then choosing "Bcc" from the drop-down menu.
  2. "Bcc" stands for Blind Copy which means there will be no "To" address in your message. It will just show from whom the message was sent...much more personal!
This is probably an acceptable routine if you are sending occasional 'multiple address' emails to just a handful of recipients, but if you need (or want) to send regular email to big lists, it's time consuming and awkward. Here's a better and much faster way, but it requires some initial preparation.
  1. First, create a comma-delimited database for each list (or group). A simple method to accomplish this is to use Windows' Notepad. (Start, Programs, Accessories, Notepad) Open Notepad and enter each email address you want to include in the list. Enter each address separated by a comma, no spaces. Do NOT press the ENTER key. Just type them in one after another (let them string together), but don't forget the comma between them!

    It should look like this: bill@aol.com,mary@sonic.net,oh@officehelper.com,jones@sonic.net No spaces, just commas between addresses.

    Although a bit more time-consuming, you may want to consider entering addresses in alphabetical order as it will make editing the list much easier when it comes to making additions, deletions and changes in the future. When you have finished your list, save it to your DESKTOP (let's call the one in this example. CUSTOMERS.TXT).
  2. Right click on your DESKTOP, choose NEW>, then from the popout menu choose SHORTCUT. On the COMMAND LINE, type: mailto:?bcc= then click NEXT. Under SELECT A NAME FOR SHORTCUT, type in a name that will identify the group of email recipients to whom this shortcut refers (i.e. Family, Clients, etc.), then click FINISH. In this example, let's call this shortcut icon, CUSTOMERS.
  3. Next, find the CUSTOMERS icon on your desktop. RIGHT CLICK on it and then click on PROPERTIES. On the URL line, under the WEB DOCUMENT tab you will see: mailto:?bcc= which will be highlighted. Click anywhere to the right of the = sign to unhighlight the selection.
  4. Double-click on your CUSTOMERS.TXT icon on your DESKTOP to open this file. Using your mouse, highlight all of the addresses by DOUBLE-CLICKING anywhere in the copy.
  5. From the menu bar at the top, choose EDIT, then COPY (or press the Ctrl+C key combination on your keyboard). This copies all of the addresses in the file to your Windows Clipboard.
  6. Now PASTE this copy onto the mailto:?bcc= line by placing your cursor immediately to the right of the = sign. RIGHT CLICK and choose PASTE. Finally click OK to save this email client shortcut with all of the new addresses.
When you are ready to send an email to this list, it's simply a matter of DOUBLE-CLICKING on the CUSTOMER email icon. This will open the SEND MESSAGE window. All you need to do is put something on the subject line, type your message and click SEND!

That's it. Everyone on your list receives your message and they don't see the other 75 or 100 email addresses of those who are also on this list, plus you didn't have to spend a whole bunch of time doing it the manual way described at the beginning of this article.

When you need to edit your list, DOUBLE-CLICK on your CUSTOMERS.TXT icon to open the NOTEPAD file. Make your changes, additions, and deletions. SAVE the file, but before you exit it, copy its contents to your clipboard as described in Step 4 immediately above.

Next, update your CUSTOMER email icon, by RIGHT CLICKING on it and choosing PROPERTIES. Delete everything on the URL line except mailto:?bcc= then PASTE in the new copy as described in Step 6 above and click OK to save the changes.

We, at Office Helper, appreciate the opportunity to bring you Everything Office. Don't forget to check out this week's great tip on our website at Officehelper.com If you have questions, please email me.

- Rich Poremba
richp@poremba.com

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