Overview
Did you know the average person spends 28% of their work time dealing with email? That’s almost 1.5 days a week! When you combine that with the other repetitive tasks people often do in Outlook like managing meetings, personal calendars, and contacts, there are many opportunities to save a LOT of time.
In this article, we’ll look at ten tools that leverage Excel to automate common Outlook tasks. These are all tools available in the XLEV8 Excel Add-in. Give them a try today!
Why Use Excel
It might sound a little crazy to use Excel like this, but think about how often Excel is used to import and export data for efficiently setting up all kinds of apps. We can take that same approach with Outlook! Excel provides a great grid to make lists with and perform actions in “bulk” – a word you’ll see a lot in this article. There are four key benefits with using Excel in this way:
- Familiar Excel tools like formulas, copy/paste, filter/sort, and find/replace can be used to populate quickly, and avoid hundreds if not thousands of menu and button clicks.
- The fields used to set up data can be linked to inputs (such as dates) so you can quickly update and reuse template files. So much of what we do is cyclical and repetitive – we can save a lot of time by templatizing that.
- With this approach, you can not only save time for yourself, you can share the lists you create with colleagues, family, and friends so they can leverage them as well, multiplying your time savings.
- When you automate what is normally lots of clicks and typing, you’re freeing up time for valuable tasks, and also reducing potential errors that could go uncaught or create lots of rework.
The Ten Tools
1. FILE YOUR EMAILS
| What: | Automate the process of filing your emails into folders to keep them organized (and compliant, if needed). Use logic to suggest the folder to file them in, based on basic rules and similarity between the email subject text and your email folder names. Keeping a clean inbox is important for staying organized and ensuring you don’t miss the important stuff. |
| Why: | It saves a tremendous amount of time over clicking and dragging in Outlook, letting you reuse your filing logic over and over. Unlike Outlook rules, this suggests the folders to file them in. After a quick scan and filling in gaps, they can all be filed in one bulk step. |
| How: | Learn more about how this works here. |
2. BULK OUTLOOK RULES
| What: | Add, update, delete, or just export your Outlook rules in one bulk step. Outlook rules are a great way to automate email tasks like filing, forwarding, replying, flagging, categorizing, etc. It can take a lot of clicks to add or edit them, especially if you’re using a bunch of them. This tool lets you easily manage them in bulk using Excel’s helpful tools and grid. |
| Why: | It saves a lot of time from typing and clicking by being able to copy and paste your rules in one place. It also gives you an easier way to review them all in one place to make changes over time. |
| How: | Learn more about how this works here. |
3. BULK EMAIL FOLDERS
| What: | Add, update, delete, or just export your email folders in one bulk step. Email folders help keep things organized and in some cases with steep regulatory requirements – it’s required. See this article for some insights on different approaches to structure those email folders. |
| Why: | It saves a lot of time from typing and clicking by being able to quickly make a list in Excel. It also gives you an easier way to review them all in one place where you can easily filter and sort in a larger window. |
| How: | Learn more about how this works here. |
4. EXPORT EMAILS
| What: | Export a list of key email details (subject, date, sender, etc.) from one or more email folders and from a defined date range. Use this to review and follow up on open items. It can also be helpful for managing support team shared email accounts. This tool also lets you assign categories to the exported emails. |
| Why: | A list of emails is a common request for review and tracking purposes. This lets you do it quickly and easily directly to Excel where you can search, filter, and even open emails from the list to get further details/attached files. It also gives you an efficient way to apply categories to several messages at one time. |
| How: | Learn more about how this works here. |
5. CREATE EMAILS IN BULK
| What: | Create and/or send emails in one bulk step using one of two methods: 1) Send basic messages to one or more recipients with or without attachments, optionally scheduling the delivery date/time. This works great for repetitive messages like reminders or sending reports. 2) Send full-format, tailored messages using a Word file as a template for the message body and/or attachments (Word/PDF) using as many placeholders as you’d like. This works great for needing to send a tailored message or letter to several different people, such as invoices, Christmas notes, etc. |
| Why: | Drafting repetitive emails is one of the most time-consuming tasks many of us do. These two options allow you to draft emails in one bulk step, leveraging the power of Excel to apply logic and link to inputs like dates. Then reuse that effort over and over again by tweaking the few things that change. This saves a tremendous amount of time and ensures the right information gets to the right people. |
| How: | Learn more about how option #1 (basic message emails) works here and how option #2 (full-format messages with placeholders) works here. |
6. BULK APPOINTMENTS
| What: | Add, update, delete, or just export your appointments in one bulk step. Keeping your calendar up-to-date is crucial so you don’t miss something important or get double-booked. This tool lets you easily manage them in bulk using Excel’s helpful tools and grid. |
| Why: | It saves a lot of time from typing and clicking by being able to leverage formulas, copy/paste, filter/sort, and find/replace for creating or updating appointments. Many people choose not to add a lot of items to their calendars simply because of the effort, and this offers an efficient approach to overcome that. |
| How: | Learn more about how this works here. |
7. BULK MEETINGS
| What: | Create and/or send multiple meeting invites to one or more people in one step, with optional attachments. This is a great approach for when you need to send out several related meeting requests for one project (i.e. discovery calls) or send a repetitive meeting request with a slightly different title/message/attachments (for example, link those details to the date inputs). |
| Why: | It saves a lot of time from typing and clicking through the various meeting request fields by being able to leverage formulas, copy/paste, filter/sort, and find/replace for listing the meeting details. I often use this approach just for one meeting because it’s linked to a date input where all the fields update based on that. This ensures you send out correct meeting details. |
| How: | Learn more about how this works here. |
8. BULK CATEGORIES
| What: | Add, update, delete, or just export your Outlook categories in one bulk step. Categories help keep your appointments, contacts, and emails organized. |
| Why: | It saves a lot of time from typing and clicking by being able to quickly make a list in Excel. It also gives you an easier way to review them all in one place where you can easily filter and sort in a larger window. |
| How: | Learn more about how this works here. |
9. BULK CONTACTS
| What: | Add, update, delete, or just export your contacts in one bulk step. Keeping your address book up-to-date is crucial so can get a hold of people when you need them, and know who’s calling! This tool lets you easily manage them in bulk using Excel’s helpful tools and grid. |
| Why: | It saves a lot of time from typing and clicking by being able to copy/paste and filter/sort contact data that you likely already have in Excel. When you switch laptops or move organizations, it’s extremely helpful to have a backup of your contact data you can import quickly. |
| How: | Learn more about how this works here. |
10. BULK CONTACT GROUPS
| What: | Add, update, delete, or just export your contact groups in one bulk step. Contact groups are a great way to easily send messages to the right people. |
| Why: | It saves a lot of time from typing and clicking by being able to copy/paste and filter/sort contact/group data that you likely already have in Excel. This also makes it easy to transfer contact group data between computers or reuse when you switch companies. |
| How: | Learn more about how this works here. |
Video Walkthrough
Summary
Regardless of the type of role you have, you probably spend a lot of time in Outlook dealing with email and other tasks. These tools give you the ability to not only automate those tasks by performing them in bulk, but reuse your efforts over and over again! Excel is such a powerful tool when you use it creatively like this. These tools are a cost-effective way to free up a lot of time for those valuable tasks you probably struggle to get to today. The next time you find yourself clicking away in Outlook, remember these tools!
What are your favorite time hacks in Outlook? Let us know in the comments below!
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