Welcome to another of our Microsoft Outlook Tips. This tip will hopefully help you organise your email categories via a selection of colours which will make the categories themselves more eye catching

To organise and add colour to all of your categories, first of all you need to select the ‘Categorize’ icon on the toolbar (highlighted in orange in the picture below)

Then if you select ‘All Categories’ you can rename existing categories or add additional ones if you wish. You can also assign a shortcut to the particular category, meaning that they can be accessed with just one click of the mouse. Here is where you choose which colour you want your category to be.

Are you interested in reading more tips? Then visit our Microsoft Outlook Tips page.

Would you like to learn more about Outlook? Then come along to one of our Microsoft Outlook Training Courses.

While working in Outlook you may have a situation when you need to save dozens of outlook messages in a single document. Of course, you can open each message and use copy and paste to assemble them in one document. Well if you copy 12 messages, you will need to do it 12 times!!!

There is a quick way to came to the same result!

1. Select the messages that you want to save in a file using <Shift> or <Ctrl> keys when necessary
2. From the Standard Toolbar click on File and choose Save As option
3. In the Save As dialog box in File Name enter a filename you would like to use ; check that the Save as File option displays the file type as Text Only (.txt) and click on the Save button
4. Using any text editor such as Word open the saved file (for example, right click on the file and choose Open With and then Microsoft Office Word). If you get File Conversation dialog box, click OK. You will get the similar result.

If you want to comment on this tip or share your own Outlook tips, please post a comment or email us.

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Do you find yourself sending out regular emails such as newsletter which all use the same layout but you find yourself having to type out and spend time getting the layout right each time that you want to send the email to your subscribers?

Well then you need to set yourself up a template to make the task so much easier and save yourself possibly hours of work time. Follow these simple steps to help you create a template in Microsoft Outlook 2007.

Step 1: Open up your Outlook and start writing a new e-mail, add any contacts and a subject for your template. Then input all the content before finalizing any other formatting you choose.

Step 2: You have to then save the email as a template. Click the Microsoft Office button and then click Save As. From the Save As Type drop down list, select Outlook Template and then just give the template a name and select where you want the template to be saved to before you click on Save.

Step 3: To use your new template, go to the Tools menu and select Forms. From there, select Choose a Form. From the Look In drop-down list, select User Templates in File System. Navigate to the location where you saved the theme if it isn’t in the Templates folder. Select your template. Make any changes, such as updating the message body content or subject line, or adding or removing recipients, and then click Send.

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There is nothing worse than going to check your emails one day and finding out that for one reason or another that you have lost everything. If you rely heavily on emails for business, this can turn into a major drain on your company unless you spend a couple of minutes every so often to create a back-up of your Outlook folder. Here are 3 simple steps to follow which could save you hours of work time if something goes wrong.

Step 1: In your Outlook Shortcuts menu, right click on the Outlook Today icon and then select Personal Folder Properties before clicking Advanced.

Step 2: What you need now is the Path from the path menu. Copy this and then open Windows Explorer. Paste the path into the address bar and press Enter.

Step 3: Look for the Outlook.pst file which is located in that folder and copy it by right clicking it and select copy. Then paste the copy onto your back-up disc.

Using Outlook 2007? Then this article is for you! When Good E-mails Go Bad! Solution: BACK UP!

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So, you have more than one email account relating to your website but you are fed up with having to go to different places to check for new mail? Well Microsoft Outlook has the perfect answer to your email woes, by letting you add new email accounts to it so all you have to do is add your existing email account.

To do this, follow these simple steps:

Step 1: Select the ‘Tools’ tab at the top of the page and scroll down to ‘Account Settings.

Step 2: Click the ‘New…’ tab above the list of email addresses and another box will show up asking you which Service you would like. Select ‘Microsoft Exchange, POP3, IMAP or HTTP’ and click Next.

Step 3: Once you clicked Next, a screen will show asking you to input your email details. Use the password which your Internet Service Provider has given you to gain access to your email in the password section.

Once you have put in your details, click ‘Next’ to let Outlook start configuring your details and set your account up. This could take up to several minutes to complete.

Once this process is complete, your new email account will be checkable through Outlook Express.

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How many times have you done it? You’ve sent an email to someone and realised that either you forgot to attach an important document or you sent it to the wrong person!

Wondering what to do? You can either just recall the original message or recall and replace it. The success or failure of a recall depends on the recipients’ settings in Microsoft Office Outlook.

Follow this procedure:

1. From Mail, in the Navigation Pane, click Sent Items.
2. Find the message that you want to recall and open it.
3. On the Message tab, in the Actions group, click Other Actions, and then click Recall This Message.
4. Click Delete unread copies of this message

 

Or

 

Click Delete unread copies and replace with a new message. Click OK, and then type a new message and/or include the attachment. Click Send.

 

You may want to clear the Tell me if recall succeeds or fails for each recipient box, if you are sending the message to a large number of people.

 

The above does not guarantee that the recall will be successful, however it is worth to try!

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In Why to Use Microsoft Office Diagnostics we discussed the benefits and diagnostics options available. Here we are going to discuss how to use the diagnostics.

Before you start the diagnostics:

• Run the diagnostics when you do not need to use your computer
• Make sure you are connected to the Internet
• Close other programmes
• Make sure you have Microsoft Office installation disk in case there are problems and your program will need an access to the disk to repair

If Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint or Access are still working then to start the Microsoft Office Diagnostics follow the steps:

1. Click the Microsoft Office Button , and then click Word Options (or Excel Options or PowerPoint Options or Access Options)
2. Click Resources
3. Click the Diagnose button
4. Click Continue, and then click Run Diagnostics.

If InfoPath, OneNote, Outlook, Publisher, Project, SharePoint Designer, or Visio are still working then to start the Microsoft Office Diagnostics follow the steps

1. On the Help menu, click Office Diagnostics.
2. Click Continue, and then click Start Diagnostics.

If any of the above programmes has crashed so badly that they not start, you can run Office Diagnostics from the Start menu.

1. In Windows, click the Start button
2. Point to All Programs, then to Microsoft Office and then to Microsoft Office Tools
3. Select Microsoft Office Diagnostics

To check which tests are available read Tips and Tricks: Microsoft Office 2007 – Why Use Microsoft Office Diagnostics?

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If you are fed up with moving junk mail to the Junk Folder do the following:

1. On the Tools menu, click Options.
2. On the Preferences tab click Junk E-mail.
3. Select the Permanently delete suspected junk e-mail instead of moving it to the Junk E-mail folder.

Your messages will be deleted immediately, which means you will not be able to restore them.

Fed up receiving junk email? Then, configure the Junk Email Filter!

The Junk Email Filter is designed to catch the most obvious spam and send it to your Junk Email folder.

The Junk Email Filter analyses each incoming message according to several factors, such as the time when the message was sent, the content and structure of the message to evaluate the message on ‘spamness’. The Junk Email Filter is turned on by default, and the protection level is set to Low. This level is designed to catch the most obvious spam. You can increase the level of protection by changing it.

Follow the following steps if you want to reduce the amount of junk email:

1. In Microsoft Outlook from the Menu bar, go to Tools and choose Options.
2. On the Preferences tab, click Junk Mail.
3. Under Options tab select the level of protection:

• High – If you receive a large number of junk email messages, but do not wish to restrict the messages you see to only those from senders on your safe lists, select this option. However, you should periodically review messages moved to the Junk Email folder, because some legitimate messages may be moved there as well.
• Safe Lists Only – If you receive a large number of email messages, you can alternatively select this option, which will cause any email message that is sent neither from someone on your Safe Senders List nor to a mailing list on your Safe Recipients List to be treated as junk.

You finally installed Office 2007 and guess what? You cannot find commands you are used to in the Menu!

It will certainly take a while to adjust to a new Menu. So what you can do to locate where your favourite Office 2003 commands are in the new Office 2007 interface?

Microsoft developed visual, interactive reference guides to help you quickly learn where things are. You can download and install them on your computer.

The only downside to it is that you have to download these guides for each of the Office 2007 Applications.

If you are not sure if it will help it, try an online demonstration from one of those listed at Microsoft Office Online.

If you are happy to proceed, use the following links to download command reference guides for each of the Office applications:

Word 2003 to Word 2007 interactive command reference guide

Excel 2003 to Excel 2007 interactive command reference guide

PowerPoint 2003 to PowerPoint 2007 interactive command reference guide

Outlook 2003 to Outlook 2007 Interactive Command Reference Guide

Access 2003 to Access 2007 interactive command reference guide