Importing contacts from Excel into Outlook 2003

[cady0021]

Am I doing something wrong? I have a spreadsheet with first name, last name,
address, company name, title, phone number, and e-mail and no matter what I
do to import that file into my contacts folder, it will not work. I've even
talked to a computer expert who says there is nothing wrong with the Excel
file but it won't import in to her contacts list either.

Any suggestions?

 

[Brian Tillman]

Am I doing something wrong? I have a spreadsheet with first name,
last name, address, company name, title, phone number, and e-mail and
no matter what I do to import that file into my contacts folder, it
will not work. I've even talked to a computer expert who says there
is nothing wrong with the Excel file but it won't import in to her
contacts list either.

You must select the range of data and give it a name.

 

[cady0021]

Thank you SOOO much, Brian. It took me a while to understand "select the
range of data and give it a name" since I had been doing that up to this
point - naming each range in COLUMN format, i.e. "FirstName, Last Name, etc",
but hadn't named the WHOLE range of data something like "Contacts".

Thanks again, you have fixed a month or so's frustration with one simple
response!

Emily

 

[Barbara Clements]

How do you select the range? The information I have found is not very clear.
I have named each column as well. Now what?

Thanks- Barb

 

[cady0021]

I agree - the information for importing contacts both in the program's help
function and online is pretty sparse and very hard to understand.

To select and name a range, simply highlight all the data you want to import
and then in the upper lefthand corner of your spreadsheet where it normally
lists the cell number (C6, B15, etc), name that range whatever you want - no
spaces (which is why I recommend Contacts as a name).

I would recommend naming each column (using Row 1 to name the columns "First
Name, Last Name, etc) so Outlook knows where to put the data, but I would not
recommend naming each range of column as it can be confusing when importing.
This means, "title" the columns with the cells in Row 1 with "First Name,
Last Name, etc) and then highlight ALL the data you want to include in the
Outlook contact, and name that RANGE "Contacts" or something easily
recognizable.

If none of this makes sense to you, feel free to e-mail me and I can send
you detailed instructions as to what I did. I was very frustrated trying to
figure it out and now that I have, I feel like I have the Golden ticket!

(e-mail address removed)

Hope this helps, Barbara!

 

[jico]

You said,"you must select the range of data and give it a name." I can't
find in the excel help how to do that.

 

[Brian Tillman]

You said,"you must select the range of data and give it a name." I
can't find in the excel help how to do that.

Use your pointer to select all the rows and columns you wish to include in
the range. Then in the Name field (in the upper left, just to the left of
the formula bar), enter some name; it doesn't matter what. Then save the
spreadsheet. When you perform the import, you'll be given a chance to
select the name.

Alternatively, save the sheet as a comma-separated values file (.csv). Then
you won't need to worry about a named range.

 

[jico]

I did as you said, but when I tried the import, nothing got imported. Could
it be that I am using Outlook 2003 and Excel 2007? Outlook was in Office
Student 2003 but not in Home & Student 2007. If so, would a solution be to
save Excel 2007 files as Excel 2003?

Also, I have many commas in my data so comma delimitted won't work, so I
used tab delimitted .txt file and it didn't recognize the tabs for each
field. Any suggestions on that?

thanks,
Jico

 

[Brian Tillman]

I did as you said, but when I tried the import, nothing got imported.
Could it be that I am using Outlook 2003 and Excel 2007? Outlook was
in Office Student 2003 but not in Home & Student 2007. If so, would
a solution be to save Excel 2007 files as Excel 2003?

That should work. Not

 

[Brian Tillman]

I did as you said, but when I tried the import, nothing got imported.
Could it be that I am using Outlook 2003 and Excel 2007? Outlook was
in Office Student 2003 but not in Home & Student 2007. If so, would
a solution be to save Excel 2007 files as Excel 2003?

My prior message should have said:

That should work. Not even Outlook 2007 can import from an Excel 2007
spreadsheet.