Make Outlook highlight important e-mail

My favorite productivity guru, Michael Linenberger, has a great post on setting up Outlook to de-emphasize or highlight e-mail messages as they appear in your inbox.



The video shows how to turn e-mail with the user on the cc line silver (it's still bold until read) and then e-mail where the user is the only recipient on the to line. But you could apply any rule to automatically highlight or de-emphasize e-mail based on just about any characteristic.

For instance, an attorney might want to highlight e-mails from clients. Using the method demonstrated, just click From, and you can set the formatting rules based on the sender by selecting individuals. Or, in the Advanced tab, you add a condition that formats based on letters contained in a sender's e-mail address, like the domain of a client.

Find the video at Linenberger's site here:
http://michaellinenberger.com/blog/formatting-inbox-to-hightlight-important-mail-video/

I highly recommend Linenberger's book Total Workday Control Using Microsoft Outlook.