As one can do a mail merge in MS Word with an Excel data sheet, is this type of action possible in Lotus Notes client, e.g., sending an ‘individualized’ mailing to several hundred individuals without having to do it one at a time?
Subject: Mail Merge Excel to Lotus Notes (must download Print Merge Reporter)
Yes, this can be done. In the last year I have tried several different mail merge code posted in forums which is similar to the Word “Mail Merge to E-mail Messages” feature. I got some of them working, but for the most part they are not very user friendly, initially require Domino Developer set-up, offer insufficient mail merge logging, and a nightmare to maintain since not centrally controlled – meaning not allowing the end user to cripple your network with an email blast festival. LOL. It would be nice to enable/disable the user’s mail merge access with a single click which seems to require a 3rd party add-on…
Anyway, a 3rd party product seems to make more sense unless you plan on doing a one time “small” mail merge email blast. My customer needed to allow multiple users to send email merges to 100’s of people on a monthly basis. We started using Print Merge Reporter which was user friendly and most importantly centrally controlled with nice logging. The web site is below, but since the software also has other functionality such as reporting and stuff this press release we got is easier to understand: Press Release: Print Merge Reporter 6.1 for Notes - Crucial Notes tools - HCL BP NotesMail
http://www.notesmail.com/PrintMergeReporter
FYI
For those of you interested in importing Excel data into Notes here are some tips I learned over the last year while doing email merges. This will save you some headaches and hair. 
Enjoy and “stay thirsty my friends”…
INSTRUCTIONS for importing Excel data into a Notes database
- You will first need to save the Excel spreadsheet in Lotus 1-2-3 (.WK4) format. If you are using an Excel verion earlier than 2003 SP3, then simple click File - Save As - Lotus 123 (.WK4). If you are using Excel 2003 SP3 the default security options blocks saving the spreadsheet as Lotus 1-2-3 (.WK4). You can unblock as seen below. If you are using Excel 2007 or higher it no longer supports savings as 1-2-3, so you must either (1) copy/paste the spreadsheet into another spreadsheet application (i.e. Lotus 1-2-3, Quattro Pro) to save it as Lotus 1-2-3 (.WK4) format, or (2) Save it as a CSV file, then open in another spreadsheet application to save it as Lotus 1-2-3 (.WK4) format.
Instructions to enable Excel 2003 SP3 to save as Lotus 1-2-3 WK4 format:
A. To re-enable Excel file types only, save the following file to a folder on the computer:
http://download.microsoft.com/download/2/8/B/28B644CE-9A30-4D99-AFEF-830A4FB5B839/UnblockExcel.reg
B. Double-click the file that you saved in step A.
C. Click Yes to confirm the installation of the file.
D. If an Office program is running, restart the Office program.
After you install the update, the registry settings will be updated to allow you to open and to save all file types that are supported by Microsoft Office 2003. These file types include the file types that are blocked by default in Office 2003 SP3.
(More Info: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/938810/)
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Create a Notes view in a database that has the same number of columns as the Excel data columns. Each Notes column should have a unique field name assigned to it.
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Open the Notes view, then click File - Import. Select the folder containing the the Lotus 123 (.WK4) you saved in step 1. Click Files of type “Lotus 1-2-3”, then select the file and click Import - OK.
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Subject: Mail Merge from Notes
Microsoft Word, a Microsoft product, does not support direct access to Lotus Notes databases as a mail merge data source. However, Word is able to accept various other input file formats, including CSV. It’s easy to produce CSV files either by manually exporting a Notes view, or (better) by programming the export so that a special view is not required.
Exporting from Notes documents to spreadsheets (without an export view)
Word also has an OLE automation API, but it’s probably easier to use the built-in mail merge functions rather than coding the filling-in of all those cells.
Subject: There are some third party products that will do this
We have a product called Mail Merge that will merge a Notes memo with data from a Lotus Notes database or an Excel spreadsheet.
There are other merge products available as well.
If you want to take a look at ours you can download a free trial version from http://www.helpsoft.com