Tag Archives ⇒ Outlook

Site Creation – Email

· Brandon Hann

We obviously know what email is, so this one’s going to be short. However, it’s how you use it that makes the difference. The difference between your company looking professional and looking like a fly-by-night operation. How many times have you seen an advertisement, sticker on a car or a business card that had a company name followed by an email address from hotmail.com or yahoo.com?

How much better would it look to have an email address from your company’s domain name? As an example, if you changed your email address from YourName001293@hotmail.com to YourName@YourCompany.com you just took your image to a whole new level.

If you’ve been using an email address from a free web service, you need to change it now. And if you’re stuck on the idea that you can check your email anywhere there’s an Internet connection, you no longer have to worry with a service called IMAP. Let’s take a look at some differences in email services.

Types of email services

  • POP3 – POP email is the most basic of email services that allows you to simply download your messages to a third party software program such as Outlook, Entourage or Thunderbird. This is a great advantage given the fact that your email is stored on your computer, but this can also be the downside because if you’re not around your computer, you won’t have access to it. The major drawback, however is that if have more than one computer and you download your email on one computer, you won’t have access to it on another.
  • IMAP – IMAP allows you to use your third party software to map it to your email account(s) on the server. This means that all your emails are synced between your software and your server. You still need your computer and an Internet connection, but unlike POP3, your email isn’t moved from the server and therefore can be accessed on multiple computers that contain your mail settings. One drawback with IMAP is that your email always stays on the server until it’s deleted, which can fill up any storage quota you may have.
  • Webmail – All web hosting plans and services you can buy come with free webmail services. This is the best choice for getting your email if you like the idea of being able to access email truly anywhere. This service works exactly like Hotmail or Yahoo!, but it may be limited in features. One of the only drawbacks with webmail would be storage limits. You can also use webmail and IMAP together since any changes you make on one or the other will affect both.

When running a business, you always want to be in contact with your customers. If you have to, get yourself a smartphone so your messages can come is as soon as they’re sent. After choosing your preferred way to get email, stick with it as you don’t want to become confused later or have email stored in more than one location.

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How to import Outlook Express into Outlook

· Brandon Hann

This process is super simple if you’re installing Outlook on the same computer that has your Outlook Express on it. However, if you simply want to backup your Outlook Express data from an older computer and import it into Outlook on a new computer, it’s not as simple as it should be. The problem is that when you start an import process from Outlook, it looks directly on the pc for all your Outlook Express files. Since it won’t find them, there’s no way it can import them because for some reason, Outlook doesn’t give you the choice of manually importing store folders from Outlook Express.

The only workaround as far as I know is to import your mail into Windows Mail first and then use Outlook to import from Windows Mail.

If you click on the link above, it’ll tell you how to import mail into Windows Mail. Once you have this done, follow these steps:

1. Open the import/export wizard within Outlook:

Outlook 2007 Import Wizard

2. Click on the option to import from another program or file.

Outlook 2007 Import Wizard

3. Click on the option to import from Outlook Express or Windows Mail.

4. Wait for the import process to complete.

How to import Outlook Express mail into Windows Mail

· Brandon Hann

When you import your mail from Outlook Express to Windows Mail on a system where both programs are installed and configured is very simple in that all you have to do is open Windows Mail and use the import feature. Windows Mail will automatically locate and import all your Outlook Express mail and settings in one shot.

However, if you’re simply wishing to import your mail from a different source (like an external backup), you have to do a few things to get it to work properly.

First things first; you need to properly backup your Outlook Express mail. Now, if you had Outlook, this is as simple as exporting a .pst file with all your personal folders inside. With Outlook Express, the only export options are your address book (which you also might want to do) and exporting individual messages. To get everything (except addresses) you need to find the location of this data on your computer. The easiest way to do this is to open Outlook Express and follow these steps:

1. Click on Tools and then Options. Click on the Maintenance tab and then click Store Folder:
Outlook Express Store Folder location

2. Now that you know where the files are stored, open that file location and copy the entire contents of this folder to a source you’ll be using on the new computer to perform the import. You’ll see a series of .dbx files designating your different folders (Inbox, Outbox, etc.).
Outlook Express DBX files

3. Once you have all these files backed up, open Windows Mail on the new computer and following these steps.

Importing Mail into Windows Mail

1.

Open Windows Mail by clicking the Start button, clicking All Programs, and then clicking Windows Mail.
2.

Click the File menu, point to Import, and then click Messages.
3.

Click Microsoft Outlook Express 6, and then click Next.
4.

Make sure Import mail from an OE6 store directory is selected, and then click OK.
5.

Click Browse, find the Outlook Express folder you copied to this computer, and then click the folder once to select it. (Do not open the folder when you select it.)
6.

Click Select Folder, and then click Next.
7.

Click All folders to import all the folders, or click Selected folders and select which message folders you want to import, and then click Next.
8.

Click Finish.

I’ve had experience with the process being problematic in the past when you try and locate the store folders you backed up and when you click the right location, it places the path into the import field, but when you click Next, it tells you that it can’t find any Outlook Express data. If you now look at the path, you’ll see that Windows Mail has placed a second Outlook Express folder into it.

For example, if your data files are located in: X:/Backup/Outlook Express and you navigate to this location, Windows Mail might turn the path into: X:/Backup/Outlook Express/Outlook Express

I’m not sure how or why this happens, but its simple to fix. You just need to go to your backup location and create a second Outlook Express folder and place the data into it. This must be done with the import window still open. When you go back to it, just click Next and it’ll now find the right data!

All that’s left to do is wait for the import to finish and then you can import your contacts. Check out the guide to importing Outlook Express into Outlook if you need help there too.