People are always looking for a better and easier way to keep their email inboxes in order, customize their email signatures, and improve group communications. The good thing is that Microsoft Outlook has these features built-in, you just need to know where to look.

Clean Up your inbox

No matter how properly organized your Outlook inbox is, there is always room for improvement. From your Inbox, click the Home tab and select from Outlook’s three Clean Up options:

• Clean Up Conversation – Reviews an email thread or a conversation and deletes superfluous text.

• Clean Up Folder – Reviews conversations in a selected folder and deletes superfluous messages.

• Clean Up Folder & Subfolders – Reviews all messages in a selected folder and any subfolders, and deletes superfluous messages in all of them.

Ignore (unnecessary) conversations

An overfilled inbox is normally caused by group conversations that are not relevant to you. The Ignore button supports you organize your inbox and focus on relevant emails.

• Click a message, then click Home > Ignore > Ignore Conversation. Or you can open the message in a new window and click Ignore under the Delete function. To recover an ignored message, open the Deleted Items folder, and click Ignore > Stop Ignoring Conversation.

Send links instead of a file copy

Send a link to a cloud version of a file instead of the file itself to help your colleagues save storage space. This is mainly useful when sending big files. You can also set permissions to allow recipients to edit and collaborate on linked files in real time.

• Upload the file or document you want to send on OneDrive and send it to your recipients. In the message box, click on Attach File > Browse web locations > OneDrive.

Improve meetings with Skype and OneNote

Outlook permits you to add Skype’s HD video and screen-sharing features with OneNote’s project planning and organizational functions. It’s easy:

•  Go to the Meeting tab in Outlook, then select Skype meeting and send the link to the participants. When the meeting starts, select Meeting Notes (under the Meeting tab) and select whether you want to Take notes on your own or Share notes with the meeting.

Tag contacts

To get the attention of a precise person in a group email message, use the @Mention function. This works especially well for emails sent to multiple recipients or if you simply need to convey the urgency of your message.

• In the meeting request or email body, type the ‘@’ symbol followed by the name of the person you want to tag (e.g., @firstnamelastname).

• To search for those emails you are tagged in, click Filter Email from the Home tab and choose Mentioned, then choose Mentioned.

These are just a few tips and tricks for getting more out of Microsoft’s email platform. To know Outlook’s more features, you need the support of our certified IT professionals. Contact us today.