“I couldn’t open the Word document you attached. Can you send it in another format?”
We get lots of emails with attachments in a variety of formats. Text documents are one of the most common attachments. Unfortunately, not all text documents are alike. A Word document emailed to a recipient who does not use Word – or even your version of Word – will not format correctly. Any document that contains a font that a recipient might not have will not format correctly, either.
Whether you work with Microsoft Word or Apple iWork’s Pages, the best way to insure that your text document arrives in the form you intended is to send the document as a PDF.
PDF (Portable Document Format) embeds all fonts and any imagery or graphics included in your text document, ensuring that the document displays correctly across all platforms. Adobe is the software company that authors Acrobat, the application that creates PDFs. Most computers feature Adobe Reader, the program that reads PDFs. If you don’t have it, you can download the free Reader here:
How do I create a PDF?
For Mac…
OS X natively has a “PDF” button in the lower left corner of the Print window. You can export anything you are printing as a PDF. You can also save images in the Preview application in a PDF format.
For Windows…
For Windows users, there are several other options. One way is to purchase a copy of Adobe Acrobat, Adobe’s program that is specifically designed to create PDFs. Adobe Acrobat enables a function that creates PDFs from Word in a single click operation. It will also install a Windows printer driver that will allow you to create PDFs from any application that can print. Adobe also has an on-line solution that will allow you to create PDFs called “Create Adobe PDF Online.”
http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/
http://createpdf.adobe.com/
If you Google “create a PDF,” you will find several options ranging from free to a full-priced version of Adobe Acrobat Standard (currently $299 for the full standard version).
Although I have use a Mac, which enables me to create a PDF of any document I print, I invested in a full Pro version of Adobe’s Acrobat, which enables me to produce industry-standard multi-page PDF presentations for things like digital booklets for recording artists’ albums. It all depends on your needs.
But at the end of the day, in terms of sending (and ensuring) perfectly formatted text documents in an email… the PDF is king.
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