7 Best Microsoft Outlook Tips in 2025! Contacts, Calendars, Etc

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If you have a message you want to discuss at a meeting, flag that message for the day of the meeting and mark it with the @Meeting category.



expert Outlook tips by FixTechGuide

If you want to see the tasks that you have pushed out for next week on Monday, arrange by Start Date. If you want to see tasks on the day that they are due, arrange by Due Date. Favorites give visibility fix MFA prompts not working to folders that are otherwise buried in your mail folder list. Search folders are useful for gathering information from across different mail and RSS folders.

  • For example, many messages can be responded to in two minutes or less.
  • If you receive many messages that go back and forth among several different people, change to Conversations view.
  • The default arrangement for tasks is by Due Date, but you might consider changing the arrangement to Start Date, depending upon how you use flags.
  • This is when you respond to those messages that you have deferred.
  • And as projects change, update your Quick Steps so that they are only the things you really do.
  • Sometimes you can’t find a message by only searching in your reference folder alone — it could be a message that you sent or it could have been misfiled.


Delete it



For example, create a calendar on a SharePoint site to keep track of the group's vacation schedules. The tool that you use to collaborate during a meeting depends on the location and access of your participants. A pair of lines and a highlight show the proposed start and end of the meeting. Don’t use Bcc to let a third party (such as your manager) know about a sensitive message. The Bcc recipient might not realize that he or she has received a Bcc and might respond to everyone, exposing that he or she received a Bcc message. The following rules will help you look professional and get your message across.

Which Contact Groups should go to a folder instead of my Inbox?



expert Outlook tips by FixTechGuide

If you aren’t actively using tasks or flags for any purpose, select all of the items, right-click and then select Delete. This action will delete old tasks and remove the flag from flagged messages and Exchange connectivity diagnostic contacts without deleting the items. Reducing the number of places where you read messages doesn’t mean that you should mix your work and personal messages. A best practice is to use separate mail accounts for work and personal communications. You should, however, reduce the number of email addresses that you have to deal with. Fortunately, with Outlook, you can view multiple accounts simultaneously.



Daily review: Managing your time and tasks



Limiting the time you spend reading messages to once in the morning and once at the end of the day could significantly improve your productivity. The Quick Steps feature lets users automate repetitive email tasks with a single click. For instance, if you frequently move messages to a specific folder, you can set up a quick step to move them faster with one click. Rules allow you to move, flag, and respond to email messages automatically. For example, you can create rules that change the importance level of messages as they arrive, automatically move them to other folders, or delete them based on certain criteria.

When to create a Contact Group in Outlook



expert Outlook tips by FixTechGuide

If you find you're regularly creating meetings with the same group of people, create a group in the Navigation Pane so that you can more easily see people’s free-busy information. These groups can also include rooms, which can make it easier to find an available room to meet in. The Room Finder pane contains suggested times for the best time for your meeting (when most attendees are available).

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You might not need to share your calendar, because everyone in your organization can see when you are free or busy but not necessarily see the content or subject of the meetings and appointments. However, you can easily share your calendar with your team if you want them to be able to see all of your meetings and appointments. If you are collaborating with other people or just need more room for your thoughts, consider using a OneNote notebook, which can be shared either through a SharePoint site or on a local server. OneNote provides outlook data file cannot be accessed a richer note-taking experience than Outlook tasks. If you have a message you want to discuss at a meeting, flag that message for the day of the meeting and mark it with the @Meeting category.



Use the Scheduling Assistant to view all meeting attendees availability. Rather than using Bcc to inform a third party of an issue, forward the message after you send it. Use the Bcc feature to remove extra people from an email conversation when you deem that they no longer need the extra email or if the conversation topic has changed.



In addition to your work email account (Exchange Server), you can add other accounts such as Outlook.com or Gmail to the same profile in Outlook. As you go through your task list and your calendar, do similar tasks together. For example, if you have only a few minutes, make all of your phone calls (if you have just a few). Tackle energy-intensive tasks (for some, that might be responding to messages) when you have more energy. Deal with your low-energy tasks, such as reading status messages, later in the day or whenever your energy is lower. By "bulk processing" your tasks, you will make progress on all of your projects simultaneously.
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