How to automate emails and invoices from Excel datasheet

**chalcott** · 04-18-2010, 10:09 AM

I would appreciate any help or tips please. I'm not an expert Excel user, and can just about make the most simple worksheet with references to Excel 2007 bookds,

I have the office 2007 Suite, in case anyone needs to know. what want to do is this.

I have a small business, where i sell online mostly. I'm creating a simple spreadsheet using Excel 2007, a workbook that has simple financial statements.

I'm creating a list of customers along with what they order, what they paid, how they paid, (paypal, cheque) etc,

The first column is the invoice number, and each is unique to each customer. I add as i get orders. so my list of invoices has the following fields as column headers

Invoice Number Customer Name, Paid by Paypal, Paid by Cheque, Amount, Cusotmer email, Customer address,

There are more and i won't list them all, but you get the idea.

Now each time i send an order, i have to fill in the excel worksheet. I then create the invoice separately in Word 2007 which i print to send to the customer with the order in the mail. The third step is sending an email to the customer upon despatch, using Outlook 2007.

I don't want to use accounting software as that is too complicated for my simple little business.

What i do want to do however is combine all three tasks instead of having to open different programs and copying and pasting between them. I'd like to be able to add the data to Excel either using a form (ideally) or direct, then i'd like to be able to click on the "customer email" field to send a confirmation email to the customer, and also to be able to have an automated invoice, either in excel or Word, which draws the information automatically for each invoice, so that i only have to print it.

At the moment i'm doing all 3 tasks separately, when i know they can be automated.

In short, can anyone give me clear steps in simple language how to do the following

1. I have about 20 columns of data for each invoice, ideally i'd like to be able to enter them from a form as it gets cumbersome going through them all in Excel. The form could be either in Word or Excel, which would be easier?

2. Using the invoice number as the unique field, how can i create an invoice that would draw out the required fields from the Excel data automatically, just by clicking a button? I dont' mind using either Excel or Word, whichever is easier, and i do have Access too, but i don't know if i should use that, or not. I don't need to draw any other data. I only want to print invoices and send confirmation emails.

3. After printing the invoice and posting the order to the customer i sent them an email confirming. Again i have to manually enter or copy and paste data in the email, which i know could be automated, if i create a template, and have some fields that are automaitcally populated using the fields in the date already entered.

These fields ususally include the total paid, currency paid, address, name and how many ordered. All of this could be automated, but i'm not sure how to do it.

Thanks in advance for any help.