Are you maximizing the Category feature in Outlook?

If you use Microsoft Outlook, chances are you are like a lot of people who do not take advantage of many of the features that are available.

As s Virtual Business Support Professional, one such feature that I find many people overlook is OUTLOOK’S 2007 CATEGORIES feature. Categories provide an efficient way for you to manage several functions like mail merge, distribution lists etc., messages, etc

For example, using Categories, you can send personalized emails (using documents or plain email) to a group of contacts at once. You can also create Distribution Lists using Categories.

To make the most out of the Outlook Category feature, you should assign every contact in your Outlook address book to a Category. Some categories might be: Family, Clients, Prospects, Acquaintances, East Coast, etc. Additionally, you can assign categories to e-mail messages, meetings, appointments etc.

To further enhance your use of Categories for Contacts, in addition to the e-mail address, you may compile general contact information, such as:

• Postal address
• Street address
• Telephone contact
• Fax number
• Web address
• Instant Messaging address
• Web page URLs.

Click on the GENERAL tab to see these fields.

Outlook Contacts - General Information

You can also compile more detailed business information such as:

• Department
• Profession
• Manager’s name
• Assistant’s name

Click on the DETAILS tab to see these fields:

Outlook Contacts - Biz Information

Additionally, you can also store detailed personal information including:

nickname
• Title (Mr/Ms etc.)
• Suffix (M.D., Esq etc)
• Spouse/Partner
• Birthday
• Anniversary
• Address

And still further, you can add, in note format, information like the contact’s activities, and even a picture! (which shows up every time you receive an email from that contact! (How kewl is that ????)

See below to find the ACTIVITIES tab:

Outlook Contacts - Activities Tab

Remember, when you set up your contacts, you should always assign them to a CATEGORY

SETTING UP CATEGORIES:

• Go to Contacts
• Click on any contact or if there are none in your address book click anywhere on the contact screen
• Select the CATEGORIES tab near the top

Outlook Contacts - Categories

From there you will have the flexibility to color code and name each category (or you can leave the color code default name if you prefer although I highly recommend using your own names).

Now that you have set up your categories, you can add existing contacts to the desired category by simply highlighting the ones you want to add to a single category, right click then select the category. You can now sort your contacts by category at anytime as well as do some other awesome functions which you can find in under the categories menu in Outlook.

Going forward, adding a new contact from anyone sending you an email is just a click away. Open the email, then from within the opened email, select the CATEGORIZE tab, select the category and click OK. Or, if you wish to start a new category for the new contact, select New Category from the list and proceed as above.

Happy Categorizing!!!!

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