Utilities Tips & Tricks
- Use the Custom Report Export Utility to compile
a mass email list
- [Show Me] How to use the
Internet Updater
Use the Custom Report Export
Utility to compile a mass email list
Let's say you want to send a mass email to all of your homeowners.
You can use the Custom Report Export Utility to compile your own
email list in the email program of your choice. To do so, you will
need to have a copy of Microsoft® Access, or another ODBC compliant
database program. This process takes approximately 10 minutes to
complete:
- In TOPS, select the community and click Utilities, Custom Report
Export Utility.
- Click Process, and wait. When the data is finished exporting,
you will get a message box that tells you the location of the
newly exported file.
- Minimize TOPS, open Windows® Explorer, and navigate to
and open the file.
- In the database, find the table named Owners File. The email
addresses are located toward the end in the "Email Address"
field. From here, we can export straight to a format your mail
program can read, or copy the data to Excel so you can play with
it.
- Copy to Excel: You can copy the entire
table into Excel by right-clicking the blank heading button
in the top left hand corner, and choosing copy. Paste the
table into Excel. Now you have the data in a format that you
can play with. If you want you can delete any fields you don't
need, or you can just leave them alone. Next to get them into
the address book format...
Go to File, Save As... Down at the bottom, click the down
arrow for Save File as Type, and choose Comma Separated (CSV).
Choose a location to save the file and then click save. Click
OK on the message about multiple sheets not working in CSV,
and Yes on the incompatible features message. Now you can
close Excel and Access.
- Export from Access: In Access, go to File,
Export... Down at the bottom, click the down arrow for Save
File as Type, and choose Text Files (TXT, CSV...). Make sure
you name the file with the CSV extension, for example, "OwnerEmails.CSV",
Choose a location to save the file and then click Save All.
Click Next, Checkmark "Include Field Names on First Row,
click Next, and then click Finish. Now you can close Access.
- Open your mail program, (I am assuming you are using a Microsoft
mail program, my instructions are based on Outlook® Express
but should also work in Outlook®.) and open the Address Book
(Addresses button in Outlook® Express, Contacts in Outlook®).
- Unless you want all of the new contacts to get imported into
your main address book (and getting mixed up with all the addresses
you already have in there), I recommend that you create a new
category in which to store the imported emails. Unfortunately,
Outlook® Express will import the emails to the "Main
Identity's Contacts" folder, no matter what you have selected,
so if you have a lot of addresses in that group, it might be smart
to create a new folder in the address book and move them there
temporarily.
- Click File, Import, Other Address Book... select Text File
(Comma Separated), and click Import.
- Click Browse to locate the file you just saved and double click
on the name to select it. Click Next.
- Now you have to create a map for the data format. Since this
is just an owner email list, you really only need a few fields,
so go down the list and checkmark Owner 1 Full Name, which should
map to the Name field. Email address should already be activated
for you by Outlook, so you should not need to map any other fields
unless you want to include their address or phone numbers or something.
- Click Finish, and you will get a message that the import is
complete. Now if you go back to your address book, all of your
owners should be in there.
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