Using Tracking and Voting Options and Stationery in Microsoft Outlook

Important messages can be tracked using what's called a "Read Receipt" in order to ensure that the recipient opened the e-mail, an indication that the communication was read. Read Receipts deliver, to the sender, an e-mail confirmation that an e-mail was opened, and presumably read.

1. To send a read receipt for an e-mail, from within the e-mail locate and press the "Options..." button in the E-mail Toolbar. The Message Options dialog box will appear.

2. Look for the heading labeled "Voting and Tracking Options." Place a check next to the box that reads "Request a read receipt for this message"

3. Press "Close" to return to the e-mail.

Voting Options

Outlook can also be used to solicit feedback from a user or a group of users by using Voting Buttons. This feature is also enabled on the Message Options dialog box.

1. Return to the Message Options Dialog box.

2. First, check the box that says "Use voting buttons:"

3. Use the drop down list to select the voting options that the recipients will use; or write your own voting options in the space. Make sure that each option is separated by a semicolon ";" without spaces.

4. Press "Close" to return to the e-mail.

By following these steps, both tracking and voting can be used in e-mail messages in either Microsoft Outlook 2003 or 2007!

OUTLOOK STATIONERY

In Outlook, stationery is a background image that gives the message the appearance of having been typed on a stylized piece of paper.

Using Stationery

In order to select stationery, begin by navigating to Tools -> Options... -> Mail Format tab. From here, select "Stationery Picker..." to bring up the Stationery Picker dialog box.

From here, highlight any stationery from the list and press "OK."

Open a new mail message to see your stationery.

Customize your stationery

To even further personalize your e-mail, you can customize the stationery. To begin, return to the "Stationery Picker" dialog box.

With your desired stationery highlighted, press the "Edit..." button; the Edit Stationery dialog box will appear.

Note: The remove option deletes the Stationery profile.

Edit Stationary

From the Edit Stationery dialog box, a number of options are available:

Change font... - Stationeries have specific font schemes associated with them. This button initiates the Font dialog box and allowed the user to edit the font.
Picture - With the Picture radio button selected, a user and browse through a dropdown menu of available backgrounds, or use the "Browse..." button to locate an image in another folder or on a different drive.
Color - If the Color radio button is marked, a dropdown list of colors becomes available. From this list, a background color can be selected.

Turn off Stationery

To remove the stationery and resume using no backgrounds in your e-mail, return to the Mail Format Tab of the Options dialog box.

From the dropdown menu under the label "Use this stationary by default," select .

But I only want to change my stationery for just one e-mail

Using stationery for an individual e-mail is possible to do without changing any global settings by using the "Actions" menu.

Select Actions -> New Mail Message Using -> More Stationery...

The Select a Stationary dialo box will appear.

This tool can be used to select a desired stationery. Once chosen, press "OK" to be taken to a new e-mail message using the stationery.