Top 20 Microsoft Outlook Tips & Tricks

hi everyone kevin here today i want to show you my top 20 favorite tips and tricks in microsoft outlook if you want to jump around feel free to use the timestamps in the description otherwise let's jump on the pc and get started tip number one you can now insert a poll into an email message this is a brand new feature that's just now rolling out in the past microsoft outlook supported something called voting buttons but let's be honest they never really work that well so how do we insert a poll well first off we need to open up a new email message so let's go up to home on the ribbon and click on new email once a new email message appears to insert a poll let's go to the top ribbon and click on insert over on the left hand side of the insert ribbon there's a new option called poll let's click on this this opens up a pane on the right hand side and i can enter a question and then i could enter a few different options i'm going to start off by inputting my question my question is what's your favorite cookie company now i could insert a few different options and the first option is going to be miss fields and i'll go through and add a few more i've now added several different options and i can continue adding more options if i want to i could even set it so people can select multiple answers but we know there's only one correct answer so i'm going to leave it to select a single answer once i'm all done configuring my poll i can insert the poll into my email this now inserted the poll into my email message i can remove the poll if for whatever reason i decided i didn't want it and if i click here i can now vote on the different options clicking on this link opens up my web browser where i can see my question and all of the different options and then i can enter my email address so it tracks my response now like i mentioned before there's only one correct answer and that's the kevin cookie company next i'm going to enter in my email address once i'm all done typing in my email address i'll click on vote this drops me on the results page where i can see a compilation of all of the results and just like i expected a hundred percent of respondees selected the kevin cookie company tip number two did you know that you can create your very own distribution group or list in microsoft outlook what can you do with that well let's say that you always email the same five or six people and instead of typing in each individual email address you'd rather just type in a group name and then it'll send it to all of those individuals to set up a distribution list let's go down to the bottom left hand corner and click on people this opens up the people view and in the top left hand corner i have the option to create a new contact group let's click on this option this now opens up a window where i can create my very own distribution group up above i need to type in a name for this group so let me type something in i entered the kevin cookie company senior leadership team i email the leadership team quite often and i really hate typing in each individual email address to add members to this group once again i'm going to go up to the top ribbon and click on add members right here i can select from address book this shows me everyone in my organization and i can now go through and choose members for this i'm going to go through and i'm going to select all of the directors to be part of this distribution list and i'll include the president as well once i'm all done i'll click on ok i can now see all of the members who are part of my distribution list all of this looks good so i'm going to click on save and close back in my inbox to send an email to my distribution group i need to click on new email this opens up a new email message and i can now send an email to my newly created distribution group i simply click on the 2 line and here i'll type in the name of my new group the kevin cookie company senior leadership team when i select this option you'll see that it's a distribution group if i click into it i can view all the members who it's going to send an email to tip number three you can turn on dark mode in microsoft outlook to make it a little bit easier on your eyes to turn on dark mode let's go to the top left hand corner and click on the file menu within file let's go down to office account within office account about midway down you can select your office theme by default it's set to colorful when we click on this we can set it to dark gray which makes the experience a little bit darker i can also go to black if i want to make it as dark as possible one thing to note when you turn on dark mode this turns on dark mode across all of your different office applications once i'm done let's click on the back arrow back within my inbox let's click on a new email message and you'll see that everything is dark including the ribbon and the message itself up here on the message ribbon i have the option to turn on white for the email message so here i have a brighter background or i could simply switch the background so everything's in dark mode tip number four you can very easily add an email signature to all of your emails that you send out maybe you want to show your contact information or maybe you want to promote something going on in your company to add one let's go up and click on new email when we click on new email on the message ribbon about midway through there's the option for signature let's click on this and then within this menu let's click on signatures this opens up the signatures and stationary dialog and we can now create a new signature to create a new signature click on new and give your new signature a name i've entered a name then click on ok over on the right hand side you can choose what email account this new signature is associated with you can also set whether you use this signature on all new messages i want to do that so i'll select my new signature you can also decide if you want to use a signature on replies and forwards i want to do that as well so i'll select the kcc flagship promo for that down below i can type in my signature so i'm going to type in something this is going to include a thanks at the bottom of my message and then i also want to use it as an opportunity to promote our newest flagship kevin cookie company location in times square and it wouldn't be much of a promo unless we had cookie monster as part of it this all looks good i'll now click on ok back in outlook when i click on new email you'll now see that my new email signature appears as part of the message just like i wanted it to tip number five you can use quick parts in microsoft outlook to insert pre-formatted text what do i mean by that well let's take an example to see how this works i just received an email from diego and once again he's calling out that customers are complaining about how the kevin cookie company cookies taste and he wants to know the recipe again i don't know how many times i've sent diego the recipe but i seem to be doing it again and again let's see if quick parts can help me here to use a quick part first off let's click on reply this opens up a new email message and now i could type out my message to diego i'm going to say hi diego here's the recipe and then i'll paste in the recipe i've now typed out my email message but i really don't ever want to have to type out the recipe again because i end up typing it so many times i want to turn this into a quick part to do that let's highlight all of this text and then go up to insert on the top ribbon over on the right hand side under the text group there's an option for quick parts let's click on this on this menu i have the option to save the selection to my quick part gallery let's click on that this opens up a dialog to save my quick part i'm going to give it a name i'll call it recipe here i could choose the gallery and the category where i want to save this all of those look good to me so i'll click on ok this now saved my recipe if i ever need to insert it again i simply go up to insert in my email message click on quick parts and here i see my recipe right here if i click on that it'll just automatically insert the recipe again you can use this for any type of pre-formatted text that you want to insert into emails if i go back up above and i right click on the item i can organize and delete all of my quick parts tip number six you can use quick steps to simplify repetitive steps for example here i received another email message from diego and he's curious about how the michelin reviewer tour went did we get our two stars now i absolutely want to follow up with diego but we're in the middle of a tutorial so i don't have time to answer him now what i would typically do is i would mark this message as important and then i would send a quick response telling him that i received it and i'll follow up shortly now i could do that but that's a few steps instead i could use quick steps to simplify this flow for me there are a few pre-created ones that i could start from but i want to create my own so i'll click on create new this opens up the quick step dialog and first off i can give my quick step a name i'll call this follow-up shortly once you type in a name you can now select different actions that you want outlook to take on your behalf i'll click on the drop-down and first off i want to mark it as important next i want to add another action i'll click on the drop down again and if i scroll down the list there's the option to reply i'm going to click on this within reply i can click on show options and i can now fill in additional details about my response i typed in the message text thanks for the message i'll follow up shortly i can also set it to automatically send after a one minute delay i could also go through and i could add additional actions if i wanted but for now this looks good and i'll click on finish now i've created my quick step and up above you'll see a new option for follow up shortly when i click on this it's marked the message as important and it sent a response to diego letting him know that i received the message and i'll follow up shortly tip number seven do you ever spend more time trying to find a meeting time than actually meeting find time can help you eliminate this problem with find time you can find a meeting time that works for everyone once you find consensus on a meeting time outlook will automatically schedule the meeting on your behalf to get fine time let's go up to the home ribbon and all the way on the right hand side click on get add-ins within the get add-ins dialog let's search for find time once you search for find time you'll see the app appear and then you can click on add this is an app that's developed by microsoft and it works extremely well at finding consensus on meeting time if you've ever used doodle before it's very similar to that service tip number eight one of the most annoying things is when new emails arrive you hear a sound your mouse cursor changes and you also get a pop-up notification from windows did you know that you can turn that off to turn it off go up to the file menu and then go down to options within options click on mail and part of the way down there's a section called message arrival you can turn off play a sound you can turn off change the mouse cursor you can turn off show an envelope on the taskbar and turn off the display desktop alert when you click on ok i think you'll find that you have far fewer distractions from outlook tip number nine rules help you manage your inbox much more effectively here in my inbox you see that there are many different messages from the microsoft 365 message center i'd rather place these in their own separate folder first off i'm going to create a new folder for these message center messages i created a new folder called message center that looks good and it now appears as one of my folders next i can right click on this message and i can go down to rules here i can now create a new rule within the create rule dialog i can set it so any message from the microsoft 365 message center gets moved to a specific folder i'm going to select this box to move the item here i could select the folder and i'll select the new folder that i just created once i select the folder i can click on ok and i'll now have my new rule if i click on advanced options i can set all sorts of criteria for what i want to have happen when i receive different email messages for instance maybe if someone specific sends me a message i can have a sound play or maybe if i'm included on the to line and it's about a specific subject i want to be alerted about that with rules you can set up all sorts of advanced notification criteria so you're on top of your email tip number 10 you can set up a unified inbox so you can see all of your inboxes at the same time you see here that i have several different accounts in outlook and each one has its own inbox now i would have to click through each account to see the inbox instead i want to see them all at the same time to do that go up to the search box on top and set it to search across all mailboxes next within the criteria for the search you can type in folder colon and then inbox then hit search this will now show you a view across all of your inboxes and you'll be able to review all the messages that have come in tip number 11 you can very easily create a calendar item from an email here i have this question from diego and i want to schedule some time to follow up on his question i can click on this email and then drag and drop it on the calendar icon down below once i drag and drop it this opens up a new view to create a calendar invite and i can choose the time for when i want to follow up on this message tip number 12 you can very easily add holidays you could add a tv schedule a sports schedule to your calendar very easily to do this we need to go to outlook on the web and within the calendar view over on the left hand side there's the option to add a calendar let's click on that this opens up the add a calendar dialog and just like i mentioned you can add all sorts of calendars to your outlook calendar for instance here you could add holidays by country you could also add different sport team schedules for instance i like the seattle seahawks and i can add their game calendar to my outlook calendar or maybe you have a favorite tv show here you could click through you could select the network and then you could add that shows schedule to your outlook calendar tip number 13 when you flag emails in microsoft outlook they automatically show up in microsoft to do on your task list here within microsoft outlook once again i have this email from diego and i'm gonna click on the flag icon this message is now flagged and it'll show up on my to-do list here i am now in my browser in microsoft to do and if i click over on the left hand side i can see my flagged email now showing up as a task if i right click on it i could even add it to the my day view in microsoft to do tip number 14 and this is a relatively new feature you can now use at mentions in email messages to get someone's attention for example we are now opening a new flagship location in london and adele on my team is driving this i'm going to insert an at mention and now i can type in adele vance i'll select adele and now i could type in my message i inserted the message what's the status on the store opening in london here you see by at mentioning adele she now appears on the two line once you've been mentioned in a message it's very easy to get back to all of the places where you've been at mentioned within your inbox over to the right of focus and other click on the filters by default there's always been all mail unread and flagged but now there's a new option for mentioned mail so you can very quickly pull up all the messages where you've been mentioned tip number 15 and this is a new feature available in outlook on the web and that's the my day view within outlook on the web up on the top bar there's a new item up here called my day when you click on this you can very quickly get a glimpse of your calendar and all of your to-do's that are coming up one thing you can do as well is you can click on an email and you can drag it over and add it as a new task or you could add it as a new event tip number 16. now let's say you're heading out on vacation you can have an out of office message be automatically sent by outlook to set this up go up to the file menu once you click on the file menu by default you'll fall in the info view click on the option that says automatic replies this opens up a dialog where you can customize what your automatic replies say i'm going to turn on automatic replies you can set a time range for when these responses are sent and here i could type in my message i'm going to enter in i'm evaluating new locations for the kevin cookie company feel free to reach out to cookie monster in my absence you can set it to send to people within your organization and people outside your organization and once you're all done you can simply click on ok tip number 17 you can add a gmail account a yahoo account an aol account any type of account to microsoft outlook it doesn't just have to be an outlook account to add another account go up to the file menu and then click on the text that says add account this opens up a prompt where i can type in another email address i'm going to add a gmail email address once i type in my email address let's click on connect this opens up a prompt from google where i could confirm my account name and enter in my password i need to give microsoft outlook access to my google account all of this looks good next let's click on allow once i'm all done i now see my gmail account shows up on my left hand side where i can see all of my different accounts tip number 18 you can add additional time zones to your calendar to make scheduling meetings easier at the kevin cookie company we're opening a location in london and i need to schedule meetings with those teams in that local time zone now i'm based out of seattle so i see my times up on the side but i want to make sure when i schedule it works well for them to add another time zone to your calendar go up to file in the top left hand corner and then go all the way down to options within options let's click on calendar and then scroll down the calendar view close to the bottom there's an option for time zones now i see this seattle time zone right here i can add two additional time zones if i'd like i'll check this box and i'll type one in for london next i need to select the time zone for london so i'll scroll down the list until i find london on this list here i see london so i'll select that and next i can click on ok now when i look at my calendar i see both london and seattle side by side tip number 19 you can delay the delivery of your emails or to put it another way you can schedule when your emails go out this is one of my favorite ones you can make it appear that you're working in the middle of the night for the people you send the email to here i want to send an email to my team that says is everyone working hard and of course i'm going to send this in the middle of the night to set the delay delivery let's go up to the top ribbon and click on options over on the right hand side there's the option to delay the delivery when i click on that down below i can specify the date and the time when i want the email to be sent out on tip number 20 and this is unfortunately the very last tip of today and that's offline mode in outlook what is offline mode good for well let's say you want to focus and you don't want to receive any more emails for some amount of time you can turn it into offline mode or let's say you're doing a mail merge and you want to validate some of the emails before they get sent out this is also where offline mode comes in handy to turn on offline mode let's go up to the top ribbon and click on send slash receive over on the right hand side you can set it to work offline when you're working offline it'll show working offline down below and you'll no longer get any email messages once you're ready to open the floodgates again you can toggle on work offline and then you'll now be connected to your email again all right well that was a quick look at my favorite top 20 tips and tricks in microsoft outlook if you enjoyed this video please give it a thumbs up if you want to see more videos like this in the future hit that subscribe button that way you'll get a notification anytime new content like this comes out if you want to see me cover any other topics in the future leave a note down below alright well that's all i had for you today i hope you enjoyed and i hope to see you next time bye you

Channel: Kevin Stratvert

Views: 577,594

Rating: 4.9529181 out of 5

Keywords: kevin stratvert, outlook, microsoft outlook, email, e mail, e-mail, mail, inbox, out look, ms outlook, poll, forms, dark mode, distribution list, distribution group, list, group, signature, email signature, quick parts, quick steps, findtime, find time, noise, distractions, rules, calendar, tasks, to do, task, task list, add calendar, flag, flag items, @ mentions, mention, my day, views, view, out of office, auto respond, auto responder, tips, tricks, gmail, live, hotmail, time zones, schedule

Id: edABo0VnHK8

Length: 21min 17sec (1277 seconds)

Published: Wed Oct 28 2020