Letter writing and/or document production is still a large part of many businesses, particularly professional service firms. What if the outline of your letter can be substantially automated. That would leave you the writer to focus on the important parts of the communication. Well, it can be by creating a letter macro using free or inexpensive Mac automation tools. This leads to increased productivity, reduced mistakes and improves overall efficiency.
Watch this screencast to show how easily this can be achieved. And this is only the start.
Letter Macro Vs Template or Copy & Paste (C&P)
Problems with Templates
Template formats are usually locked down to ensure that the document always comes out in the correct format. This often causes problems with field sizes which are often too short to allow text to be inserted. Alternatively, they are too long which can result in the writer having to do final formatting once the body of the document has been completed. This is not an efficient use of time and in some respects defeats the objective of using a template.
Problems with Copy and Paste (C&P)
If used carefully C&P can be a really useful tool for document writers. However, it is not best used for complete documents such as letters, reports etc. The most common problems are forgetting to amend key pieces of information such as the date, the heading and the name of the addressee. These mistakes serve to create a bad impression with the recipient of the letter or report. Making these changes is time-consuming and risks the loss of formatting referred to above.
With a letter macro the results are easy to edit – it’s just a Word document after all.
