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Setup a separate Outlook profile for a shared resource mailbox or mail merge

Setup a separate Outlook profile for a shared resource mailbox or mail merge

May 21, 2021

An Outlook profile can be setup to access a shared mailbox or to send “mail merged” messages to a list from an Excel spreadsheet from a shared resource mailbox email address.  Follow the steps below to setup an Outlook profile for the shared resource mailbox as the primary mailbox in Outlook.  Student employees often configure Unit resource mailbox using this method.

Setup an Outlook profile for a shared resource mailbox

  1.  Go to Control Panel.  In the search box enter:  Mail

  2.  Select Mail (32-bit)

  3.  Select Show Profiles

  4.  Select Add

    1. Enter a name for the profile being created.  (You will use this name setting up the shortcut below)

  5.  In the new window

    1.  Blank out the “E-mail Address” field

    2.  Enter the Resource Mailbox email address:  <email address of the resource mailbox>

    3.  Blank out the “Your Name” field

    4.  Leave the password fields blank and select the Next button

  6.  A window will popup asking for username and password

    1. For the username (first box) enter your primary Office 365 email address 

    2. In the password field, enter your EID password

    3. Select the box "Remember my credentials" 

  7. Wait for a few minutes until you have all green check marks and select Finish

  8. Choose whether you would like this to be your primary profile by selecting "Always use this profile."

Setup Shortcut on your desktop to open this new profile (Usually for mail merge cases only)

  1. Note the profile name for the resource mailbox you created above.

  2. Right-click on your desktop; Choose New>Shortcut

  3. Enter the following, for name-of-secondary-mailbox use the name you chose in the step 1.

    1. If you have Office 2016 (32-bit version),

      1. "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\Office16\OUTLOOK.EXE" /profile profile_name_of_resource_mailbox

    2. If you have Office 2019 (64-bit version)

      1. "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\root\Office16\OUTLOOK.EXE" /profile profile_name_of_resource_mailbox

  4. Enter the name you would like to appear on the shortcut

    1. In order to do a mail merge,

      1. Create your mail merge document in Word

      2. Create the Excel spreadsheet of names and addresses

      3. Close Outlook – make sure there is no Outlook icon in the bottom right corner of the taskbar

      4. Double click on the shortcut you created on the desktop

      5. Open your word document and complete the mail merge using the Excel doc.  Any messages sent will have the “reply-to” address of the Outlook mailbox profile that is open. 

      6. Test first!

For more information on mail merge:   https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Mail-merge-using-an-Excel-spreadsheet-858c7d7f-5cc0-4ba1-9a7b-0a948fa3d7d3