Outlook Power Series: Boost Productivity with Templates and Blocks

Certain time-saving tricks can completely change your workflow and save you minutes per day and hours per week. These generally involve repetitive tasks that you do often, such as emailing a new contact your product information or sending weekly reports to your department head.

While most people don’t think of Outlook first when it comes to productivity tools, it does have two distinct features that can be real time savers - templates and Quick Parts blocks.

The average worker spends 209 minutes each day checking work email, which is about 3.5 hours per day. If you can shave even 30% of that time off by optimizing how you utilize Outlook, that can be significant savings.

To look at that in productivity dollars, say someone makes $25 per hour. If they spend one hour less on email per day, that’s $125 per week or roughly $500 per month in productivity savings just by being more efficient on one program.

Understanding the cost savings that comes from technology optimization is part of what Brain Stomp does when we provide IT consulting services. Technology is such a big part of every industry now that a few efficiency tricks can make all the difference. 

So, let’s take a deep dive in to templates and blocks in Outlook and find out how they can help you reduce the amount of time you spend in your email inbox each day.

How to Set Up Email Templates in Outlook

First, we’re going to look at email templates. These are entire emails that you save and can be used later at the click of a button. 

Say your design firm needs certain information from a new client in order to draft up a proposal. Instead of typing that in every time or trying to find an old email to copy/paste from, you could set up an email template that has all the details the client needs to know that you could send at the click of a button. 

Besides making the template itself, there are ways to use template that can also shave minutes off each email message. 

How to Create an Email Template:

1.    On the Home tab, in the New group, click New E-mail

2.    Type the email message, apply formatting, etc. 

3.    Once it’s done, click the File tab in the message window

4.    Click Save As

5.    When saving choose Outlook Template from the Save as type list

6.    Give the template a name and click Save

TIP: Don’t add your signature if you already have your email signature coming in automatically each time you create a new message. It will autofill in the template when you use it.

How to Access an Email Template:

When you get ready to use a template to send an email do the following:

1.    Select New Items > More Items > Choose Form

2.    Under Look In, click User Templates in File System

3.    This will open the default templates folder (c:\users\username\appdata\roaming\microsoft\templates)

4.    Browse to the template you want and select it.

5.    You can now make any edits needed, add To, CC, BCC, etc. 

Make it Faster with the Quick Access Toolbar

You can add the “Choose Form” command to the Outlook Quick Access Toolbar to make it even easer for you to grab a template when you need it.

Just click the New Items > More Items

Right-click the Choose Form item, and in the menu that pops up, choose Add to Quick Access Toolbar

How to Use Quick Parts (Blocks) in Outlook

Do you have a particular block of text that you use often in different types of email? For example, you may have to continually provide the color options that your paint shop offers when speaking with a variety of different clients about different projects. 

This is where Quick Parts come in. Quick Parts are reusable text blocks that you can insert in email messages. They can even include images and text formatting, like bullets. A few examples of potential uses include: 

·      Cancellation policy

·      Directions to your office

·      Answers to frequently asked questions

·      A holiday promotion

·      Links to details about a product

When you’re typing an email and get to the part where you need to add that frequently used bit of text, you can just click to insert your saved Quick Parts block. 

How to Make a Quick Parts Block

1.    From the message that contains the text you want, highlight the text to save

2.    On the Insert tab, in the Text group, click Quick Parts

3.    Click Save Selection to Quick Part Gallery

4.    Fill out the requested information (name, gallery, category, description, insert options)

You’ll be able to set one of three different insert options, which include:

·      Insert in its own paragraph

·      Insert content in its own page

·      Insert content only 

How to Use a Quick Parts Block

1.    Have your cursor where you want to insert the saved text block in your email message

2.    On the Insert tab, in the Text group, click Quick Parts

3.    Right-click the gallery pane, select the block you want and click Insert

You can use Quick Parts blocks as well when you’re creating an email template in Outlook.

Find Optimizations to Save You Time & Money 

Brain Stomp can sit down with you and take a look at the types of workflows you’re currently using and identify areas of optimization that will save you time and money. Make your day more efficient and learn some cool Office tricks at the same time!

Schedule a free technology optimization consultation today! Call 260-918-3548 or reach out online.