Apply Find/Change to multiple records at once?

Hi,

I'm wondering if there is a way to apply the find/change options I select to all the records I've Data Merged into my InDesign file.

The placeholders won't import the spaces in my database, example if I have

InDesign template:     <<bird>>

                                        <<beak>><<beak value>>

.csv:                              bird,beak,beak value

                                     Eagle,beak:        ,hooked

I get

InDesign after Data Merge:  Eagle

                                                 beak:hooked

No spaces came over with the merge.  If there is an option to preserve spaces, that would be the easiest solution. However, I'm not finding such a command, so I'd like to add a special character after my colons in the .csv and then use ID to find/change that character in every one of my records into a space or two.  Any ideas?

Thanks.

edit: Even on a single record, the find/change isn't applying to my output document, either... Its outputting the special character I wrote into the  .csv fields instead of the space it is supposed to change into.

Message was edited by: EX_Achilles