Essential Tools and Tips for MS Outlook Efficiency

Do you, as I do, use Microsoft Outlook throughout the day? If so, you can probably save yourself a lot of time and even avoid disaster by arming yourself with some free and inexpensive tools. In this post, I’ll cover some of the choices that work best from me and round up some good efficiency tips for Outlook as well.

EZ Backup Outlook Pro from Rinjanisoft is a $14.95 application that lets you quickly save your mail, settings and address book to a local drive, network folder, CD/DVD or a remote FTP server. This is the main tool I use to keep my Outlook inbox trim, which greatly boosts performance when doing things like searches. It also protects your e-mails in the event of disaster.

Products competitive to EZ Backup Outlook Pro, such as Totalidea Software’s Outlook Backup Pro cost over $50, and EZ Backup Outlook Pro gives you all upgrades free after you purchase the product. Especially if you get a lot of mail, it’s worth the price.

If you use Gmail constantly, in conjunction with Outlook, Google has a brand new Calendar Sync application that is a must-have, and it’s free. If you’ve ever trashed your Outlook calendar trying to keep it in sync with Gmail, you’ll appreciate it.

Finally, I’m always surprised at how Outlook users often don’t know many of the basic tips that make using the application more efficient. Looking at calendars from an aerial view, setting reminders to follow up on messages and many other simple actions can save a lot of time. If you’re rusty on your Outlook skills, spend just a few minutes brushing up. Also, make sure and pick up some good tips from the reader comments in the post I just linked to. The practice time will pay dividends.

Do you know of any good tools or tips for Outlook?

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