How can you 'mail merge' on Facebook?

Question

I have an event on Facebook that a number of people are attending. I'd like to send a message to each of the attendees, and I'd like the message to start with 'Hi !'.

This is similar to the old concept of mail merge where you have a list of recipients whose data you fill in to a template message before sending it to them.

Any ideas on how I could go about doing this? Any 3rd-party tools that you can use to script Facebook?

Answer 1

Cannot be done natively through Facebook.

Your only hope is to be able to export your Facebook contacts and run them through a mail merge on your local.

Or try and upload/import the contacts list to Gmail and use Google Docs as a way to send out personalised mass emails.

If you wanted to try your hand at the Gmail & Google Docs method, "Create a Mail Merge with Gmail and Google Docs" has some steps. They are roughly thus:

1. Create a new Google Docs Spreadsheet
2. Select "Mail Merge" from the menu and allow authorisation access to Gmail and/or Google Contacts
3. Create a new group on Google Contacts with the emails and details of those you want to send to
4. Click Mail Merge → Import Google Contacts and select the name of the new group. The details should import.
5. Compose the email as desired
6. Go to the Mail Merge menu and click Start Mail Merge. The sending will begin and update.

There's a little more nuance in the link mentioned, but listed here is the general step direction you'll be taking.