Showing the number of Unread Emails in an Outlook folder AND it’s subfolders

In Outlook, if a folder has any unread emails, then the folder is bold and the number of unread emails is written in brackets BUT… this only reflects the folder itself… what about emails in its subfolders?

This can be a problem if you have (for instance) a folder called Clients and subfolders under it for each client. The Clients folder will not go bold or reflect the number of unread emails in the individual client folders.

The solution to this is to use Search Folders.

If you are not sure what Search Folders are then I recommend that you scroll down and read the section titled What are Search Folders first.

How to create a Search folder to show folder and subfolder contents

• Go to your Inbox.
• Click File-New-Search Folder

If you are using more than one Outlook data file (PST or Exchange), make sure the relevant data file is selected for “Search mail in”.

• Scroll down the list and select Create a Custom Search Folder.
• Click Choose... to display the Custom Search Folder Screen.

• Enter a suitable name (e.g. All Client Folders)
• Click the Browse Button.
• Untick the main data folder from the top and just select the folder that you are interested in. Make sure that Search subfolders is ticked.
• Click Ok, click OK and click OK again to return to your Inbox.

The new Search Folder will be added to your Outlook.

This will show you all emails in your selected folders and its subfolders. You can treat it like any “real folder” in Outlook now e.g. you can change the view to show only unread email if you want.

What are Search Folders?

Search folders are NOT “real” Outlook folders. Instead they allow you to define a search on your Outlook data and then display the results back in what looks like a normal Outlook folder.

The folder will be displayed under a folder called Search Folders (as shown above).

Cool Thing #1: Once you create a Search Folder, the search is saved for you. To do the same Search in the future, you simply click on the folder representing the search which brings us to Cool Thing #2.

Cool Thing #2: You can actually treat the Search Folder like any real folder in Outlook e.g. you can apply views, change displayed columns etc.

Do you use Search Folders to solve other problems? Let us know by leaving a comment on the blog.

Regards,

Sanjay Singh

Standss/Addins4Outlook is now a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner

It has taken a lot of work by the team and help from many of you. We are very excited to announce that …. We are now a Microsoft GOLD Certified Partner!

Why did we bother with all the extra work and what does it mean to our customers?

We have an excellent relationship with most of our readers. You trust our team and our products… I believe that the entire team at Standss has worked hard to earn that trust… and we will never take it for granted… we will do our best to ALWAYS provide the kind of products and support that you need.

But.. our website also gets visited by thousands of new Outlook users every month… users who are not familiar with us yet.

These new visitors result in both sales and requests for more information. Often these requests for information are from large companies and although they like our products, they sometimes have difficulty in convincing management to invest in our software.

Why? We think it may be our location. We love living and working in Fiji… but we do understand that prospective customers, at least who are not familiar with us, may have concerns about the quality of support that we will be able to provide… from Fiji.

We have worked hard to gain our Microsoft Gold Certified Partner status… as one more way of reassuring our existing and future customers that we provide WORLD-CLASS software and support to thousands of customers around the world.

We look forward to serving you with even better products and service in the future.

We’d love to hear any comments from readers of the blog…

(To celebrate, existing customers have been sent a special 10% discount coupon to use before 3rd March 2010. Discount is only for the purchase of new or additional licenses)

Regards,

Sanjay Singh