Sending and organizing emails is not how we want to spend big chunks of our business day. The problem is email communication is essential to most businesses. So how do you save time with this task? Use the categories feature with your contacts when you are organizing your Microsoft Outlook.
Putting your contacts in categories helps to group their information together. You are not limited to one category per contact. Your contact can be both in your “resource” and “advertising” categories for example. When you begin organizing Microsoft Outlook you will see that it provides you with standard categories to use. These can be edited, deleted, or added to for your personal needs.
How does organizing Microsoft Outlook with Categories save time?
- You can drag and drop. Want to email all of your clients about a promotion? When you have spent the time organizing Microsoft Outlook you can just drag your entire clients category over and your To: field will populate with everyone in that category. (remember for your recipients privacy you should cut and paste emails into the BCC area)
- Need to export all of your Vendors into another program? No problem you can grab all of their information at one time.
- Follow up is easy! Want to send out an after event thank you? Create a category for your event, include everyone who is involved. After the event simply drag and drop your category and send your thanks. No going through endless contact lists and checking and double checking for fear you’ve missed someone.
While organizing your contacts into categories may take some upfront time, it will save you much more in the end! Start by making a complete list of the categories you will want for your contacts. Brainstorm them on paper to get a good visual. Once you have a full list go to the Master Categories list and add or edit your categories.