How to send all your buyers onboarding links using mail merge

Overview

These steps help you send one personal email to each buyer, with their own unique onboarding link to activate their Candid account. This is called a mail merge. You write one email, and your email program fills in each buyer's name, company, and the onboarding link for you.

It takes about 20–30 minutes the first time. You'll need:

• The spreadsheet Candid sent you (reach out to support for this)
• Your work email account (Gmail or Outlook)
• The email text in the "Email template" section below

Note that each buyer's onboarding link is unique to their company. So you will want to be careful not to send one buyer's link to another buyer.

Before you start

1. Save the spreadsheet somewhere easy to find, like your Desktop. Don't rename the column headings. The email program uses them to fill in each email.

2. Open it and look it over. The columns are:

3. Make any changes you want. You can fix a first name, delete a row for anyone you don't want to email, or add a second contact at the same company by copying that company's row.

4. Pick your email program. If your email address is on Gmail or Google Workspace, follow Option A. If you use Outlook, follow Option B. Not sure? If you log in to email at mail.google.com, you use Gmail.

Option A: Gmail or Google Workspace

You'll use Google Sheets and a free add-on called Mailmeteor. It sends each email from your own Gmail account, so replies come straight back to you. The free plan sends up to 50 emails a day (Mailmeteor email quota). If you go over the daily limit you can send the rest on the next day.

Step 1: Put the list in Google Sheets

1. Go to sheets.google.com and sign in with the email account you'll send from.

2. Click Blank spreadsheet.

3. Click File → Import → Upload, then choose the CSV we gave you.

4. Choose Replace spreadsheet and click Import data.

5. Check that row 1 has the headings (First Name, Email, Company Name, Onboarding Link and so on).

Step 2: Install Mailmeteor

1. In the spreadsheet, click Extensions → Add-ons → Get add-ons.

2. Search for Mailmeteor and click it.

3. Click Install, then Continue, and allow access when Google asks. Mailmeteor needs this to send emails from your account.

Step 3: Write the email

1. Click Extensions → Mailmeteor → Open Mailmeteor. A panel opens.

2. Check that the recipients column is set to Email.

3. Click Create a new template.

4. Copy the subject and body from the "Email template" section below and paste them in.

5. Keep the words in double curly brackets exactly as written, like {{ First Name }}. Each one must match a column heading exactly, including capital letters and spaces. Mailmeteor swaps them for each buyer's details.

6. To make the link a clickable button or underlined text instead, highlight your link text, click the link icon, and type {{ Onboarding Link }} as the web address.

7. Click Save.

Step 4: Test it

1. Click Preview. Click through a few buyers and check that the name, company and link change each time.

2. Click Send a test email to send one to yourself.

3. Open it in your inbox and click the link. It should open a Candid page for that buyer's company.

Step 5: Send

1. Click Send emails.

2. Mailmeteor adds a Merge status column to your sheet. Each row will say Email sent once it's gone out.

3. Keep this sheet. Later it will show you who opened the email.

Option B: Outlook

You'll use the Mail Merge tool built into Microsoft Word, which sends through Outlook. You need the desktop Word and Outlook apps on the same computer, with Outlook set up and signed in to the email you'll send from. Outlook on the web can't do this. On Windows, use classic Outlook: if your Outlook has a "New Outlook" switch at the top turned on, turn it off first.

Step 1: Start the merge in Word

1. Open Word and create a Blank document.

2. Click the Mailings tab at the top.

3. Click Start Mail Merge → E-mail Messages.

Step 2: Connect the list

1. Click Select Recipients → Use an Existing List.

2. Find the CSV we gave you and click Open. (If you can't see it, change the file type box to All Files.)

3. If Word asks how to read the file, choose Comma as the separator and click OK.

4. Optional: click Edit Recipient List to see everyone and untick anyone you want to skip.

Step 3: Write the email

1. Paste in the body from the "Email template" section below.

2. Delete each item in double curly brackets, like {{ First Name }}, and put in the matching Word field instead. Put your cursor where it goes, click Insert Merge Field and pick the field. Word replaces spaces with underscores, so you'll see First_Name, Company_Name and Onboarding_Link.

3. Fields show up like «First_Name». That's correct.

Step 4: Preview

1. Click Preview Results, then use the arrows to step through a few buyers. Check that the name, company and link change each time.

2. Click Preview Results again to turn the preview off.

Step 5: Send

1. Click Finish & Merge → Send Email Messages.

2. Set To to Email.

3. Type the Subject line. Word can't put merge fields in the subject, so use the version without the company name, e.g. "Activate your (insert your business name) wholesale account."

4. Set Mail format to HTML and Send records to All.

5. Click OK. Outlook sends one email per row. You'll find them in Outlook's Sent folder.

Word can't send a test to just yourself. Before Step 5, add a row to the spreadsheet with your own name and email, and copy a real buyer's link into it. Then use Edit Recipient List to send to only that row first. Check the email, then send to everyone else.

Email template

Copy this into Mailmeteor or Word. Change the wording and the sign-off as you like. Just keep the words in double curly brackets, because they're filled in for each buyer.

Subject (Gmail): {{ Company Name }}, your (insert your business name) wholesale account is ready

Subject (Outlook): Activate your (insert your business name) wholesale account

Body:

Hi {{ First Name }},

We've moved our wholesale ordering to Candid, and we've already set up an account for {{ Company Name }} so you don't have to start from scratch.

Activate your account here: {{ Onboarding Link }}

Once you're in, you can browse our full catalog and place wholesale orders, all in one place.

It only takes a minute to set up. If you have any questions or run into any trouble, just reply to this email.

Thanks for being a (insert your business name) retail partner!

After you send

• See who's signed up. In Candid, go to Selling → Customers and click Download: Companies. Any buyer whose Onboarding Link column says Active has set up their account.
• Follow up after about a week. Re-send the same email to buyers who aren't Active yet. Delete the Active buyers from your sheet first. In Mailmeteor, also clear the Merge status column, or it will skip rows already marked sent.
• Answer replies like any normal email. They come to your inbox.

If something goes wrong