How to keep all letters of a name together when outlining a whole list of names.

Hello-- 

I often have full lists of names that I need to convert to outlines inorder to manipulate them or arrnge them for print or cad cut/vinyl. The problem that frustrates me is when I outline a full list of names the letters do not stay grouped by the name they create, instead all letters become individual shapes in a group as a whole and I have to go through and group together/make compound path of the letters for each name. It takes a long time, espcially with huge lists of names. I was wondering if anyone knew of a cheat, script, or easy way to make letters group together by the word/name they made up when they are converted to outlines and not just a large group of individual letters? Not sure if that exists but fingers crossed that it does! TIA.