Working with Word templates — the key techniques

You can build templates in the panel's editor, but Word, Pages, and Google Docs give you full layout power. These are the techniques that make a template merge perfectly on the first try.

Merge tags

A tag is a field path in single curly braces:

{Opportunity.Name}
{Opportunity.Account.BillingCity}
{Opportunity.Amount | currency}

Don't guess paths — copy them. Open Edit template, connect to your org, Browse fields, and use copy tag on any field (or copy Name on a lookup to get e.g. {Opportunity.Owner.Name}). Paste into your document.

Reusing Conga or Drawloop templates? Load them as-is. DynoMerge auto-detects {{double-brace}} (Conga) and <<chevron>> (Drawloop) tags — no rewriting needed.

The #1 silent killer: smart quotes

Word and Google Docs "helpfully" convert straight quotes to curly ones, which breaks filter arguments like dateformat("%B %d, %Y").

• Google Docs: Tools → Preferences → uncheck Use smart quotes.
• Word/Pages: AutoCorrect settings → uncheck "Straight quotes" with "smart quotes" — or type the tag in a plain-text editor and paste.

If a filter mysteriously doesn't run, this is the first thing to check.

Repeating tables (line items, related records)

Build a normal table. In the row that should repeat:

• FIRST cell starts with the opener: {#LineItems}{Product2.Name}
• LAST cell ends with the closer: {TotalPrice | currency}{/LineItems}

That one row duplicates for every child record. The opener and closer must live in the SAME row — opener at the start of the first cell, closer at the very end of the last cell. (Adding a column later? Move the closer into the new last cell — the panel's table tools do this automatically.)

Two parts make child tables work: the tags (what to print) AND the data setup (what to fetch). In the panel, browsing a child relationship and clicking ➕ Add table to setup does both at once. If you hand-write the tags in Word, make sure the template's data setup includes that child table — tags alone print nothing.

Alignment conventions that read professionally

• Text columns: left-aligned. Counts/quantities: centered. Money: right-aligned.
• Headers match their column's alignment.
• Vertically center all cells.
• Totals rows: label right-aligned in the second-to-last cell, amount in the last.

Totals under a table

{LineItems | count} items      {LineItems | sum("TotalPrice") | currency}

Aggregates work on any child list — sum("Field") accepts formatted values like "$1,250.00" and plain numbers.

Fonts, colors, logos

Static styling (fonts, colors, sizes, images, headers/footers) is yours to design in Word — DynoMerge preserves the run formatting where each tag sits. Style the TAG itself the way you want the VALUE to look: make {Opportunity.Amount | currency} bold red 14pt and the merged amount will be bold red 14pt.

Test loop

1. Save as .docx (File → Save As, or Google Docs File → Download → .docx).
2. Load it in DynoMerge and check the tag list it detects.
3. Preview against a real record. Fix, re-export with the SAME filename, re-import — same-name imports update the saved template in place.