How to be more efficient with Outlook

Posted on: January 30th, 2020 onPlatinum

We spend so much of our time each day in Outlook. Make your day more productive and organised with a few tips to help you be more efficient with Microsoft Outlook.

1. Turn notifications off

Notifications are distracting. If you are in the middle of doing a task, you will lose focus when an email notification pops up. By turning email notifications off in Outlook, you can focus on the task at hand and reply to any emails when you are finished. This also eliminates double handling – where you read the email as it comes through, then reread it again later when you have the time to reply.

2. Create Rules

If you receive a lot of emails that you usually move straight into another folder, you can create a Rule to do this automatically in Outlook. They are very straightforward to set up – right-click on an email in your inbox, go to Rules and select Create Rule.

3. Schedule emails to send later

Do you need to send an email later today or in a few days? You can use Outlook to delay an email to send at any day or time, instead of just sending it straight away or saving it as a draft and potentially forgetting about it.

4. Use the search feature

No matter how many folders you use to organise your emails, old emails still manage to go missing. If you are wasting time by scrolling through your emails, you could save some time by using the search feature. Searching in Outlook is the most efficient way to find an email. You can search your entire mailbox or a specific folder. For the best results, enter specific keywords, the sender’s name or email address.

5. Create Quick Parts for messages you regularly send

If you find yourself typing the same answers or messages all the time in your emails, you should utilise the Outlook Quick Parts tool. Quick Parts allows you to insert text into an email with just a few clicks. You can save any text as a Quick Part and access it through the Insert tab.