Time-Saving Shortcuts in Outlook

Do you have days when you feel like all you do is respond to email? There’s no doubt about it, email can be consuming. Fortunately for Microsoft Outlook users, email is about to get a bit easier. In the new version of Outlook 2013, a couple handy tricks can save you valuable time.
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1. AutoCorrect is your friend.

Do you type quickly but not accurately? Slowly but not accurately? Just looking for anything to make the process less tedious? If any of these apply to you, AutoCorrect can help. If proper spelling and grammar slip past you some days, AutoCorrect can catch and fix your errors. Additionally, you can have this feature do some of the heavy lifting for you. Say you have a word or phrase you find yourself typing repeatedly, for example for me it’s Rekall Technologies. I can set up an AutoCorrect shortcut so that every time I type RkT, my abbreviation will be replaced with Rekall Technology.

To explore AutoCorrect in Outlook 2013, navigate to File > Options > Mail > Spelling and AutoCorrect > AutoCorrect Options.

More good news is that if you like what AutoCorrect can do in your emails, you can implement those same techniques in Word 2013 as well.

2. Quick Parts to the Rescue

Another great feature in Outlook is Quick Parts. The name is apt. Think about this as boilerplate paragraphs or chunks of text that you tend to want to include in your emails over and over again. Now there’s no need to type that text in every email or navigate to a Word document and paste it in. Instead, you can save a portion of text on the equivalent of a clipboard that you can access easily from within Outlook.
To create a Quick Part, type a block of text in an email. Select all your text (as much as you want, formatted to your liking). Then go to the Insert tab and click Quick Parts. From there, click “Save Selection to Quick Part Gallery.” You’ll next be prompted to name your Quick Part.

Using your new Quick Part is simple. From within an email, place your cursor where you want your Quick Part to appear, go to Insert > Quick Parts and select your desired text.