Top 10 Tips for Microsoft Office Tools

After our series of top 10 hacks and tricks to better your experience with Microsoft Office - Word, Excel, Powerpoint and Outlook,  we decided to provide you the best hacks and tricks for Microsoft Office tools. The office programs like word processor, spreadsheets, presentation and email are most frequently used applications than any other application on computer. Well, all of you are not exponents in using the Microsoft Office tools. Moreover, the intricate web of menus, toolbars and buttons gets overwhelming rather than making it user friendly. Even if you are accustomed to MS Office tools, there are still some tips that might save your time and bother. Whether its a new feature in Microsoft Office or an unnoticed productivity tricks, the tips are always handy. Explore our top tricks to make your life easier with Microsoft Office. Take a look at our list of top 10 tricks for Microsoft Office tools.

Tips for MS Word

1. Shortcut Key for Macro

Macro offers a great way to automate your work in Microsoft Word. You can use Macro in two ways to record the sequence of actions, or create Macro from scratch by entering Visual Basic for Application code in the Visual Basic Editor.

You might create a lot of Macros and searching for them consumes a lot of time. Well, you need to assign a macro shortcut key access it directly from the keyboard. Look for the steps below

Step 1: From the Tools menu select Customize

Step 2: Customize dialog box, click Keyboard

Step 3: Select Macros, in the scroll box beneath the Categories label

Step 4: In the Macro scroll box, find the name of the Macro to which you wanna assign the shortcut key

Step 6: In case, there is a keystroke assigned to Macros, it would appear in the box below the Current Keys label

Step 7: If you would like to create a shortcut key to Macros or change the existing one, click on the Press new shortcut key

Step 8: Now enter the keystroke that you would like to reassign to the Macro.

Step 9: In the drop down box beside the label Save changes in: select Normal to apply the change to all documents created in Word.

Step 10: Click Assign

Step 11: Click Close

Step 12: Click Close on the Customize  dialog box

2.  Simple formatting

Suppose you are creating a number of similar documents that are similar in appearance. It would better to use styles to format text rather than formatting it yourself. This would ensure that you can change it easily throughtout the documents whenever needed. make use for the Format Painter to copy the formats from one paragraph to another.

Follow the steps

Step 1: From the Word toolbar, select the Format Painter button

Step 2: Click on the portion of the text from which you wanna copy a format. Drag the pointer over the selection that you wanna apply the formatting to.

3. Scraps

Well, have your heard of Scraps in MS Word? Of course, I’m not about Orkut scraps.  Scraps are small blocks of text from a document. In any open document you can highlight a text and drag it to the Desktop. This document appears as a scrap on the desktop. Next you can arrange and rename your scraps on the Desktop. If you need you can simply drop them back into Word documents. What’s more the scraps can be pasted into any other applications.

Tips for MS Excel

4. Smart Tags

In Microsoft XP you get Smart Tags. These Smart Tags provide intelligent links to websites or locations on your PC’s hard disk. Excel recognizes certain words and shows Smart Tag action buttons next to them. Go to the AutoCorrect options parts of the Tools menu and select Smart Tags to the words it would recognize.

To use the Smart Tag feature download and install it from the Microsoft Office website.

5. Import finance data

As you all know its easy to import data from most online banks and finance programs into Excel. But, its as easy to open the same document in Excel. Usually it is in Comma Separated Value (.csv) format. To open the document in Excel go with the steps below

Step 1: Click on the File Menu and choose Open.

Step 2: Choose Text Files (*.txt, *.prn, *.csv) from the Files of type box.

Step 3: Select the CSV file that you obtained from the website

Step 4: Once it opens adjust the column width

6. VLookup Function

VLookup is one of the most commonly used Functions in Excel. Most Excel users find it difficult to understand the VLookup function.
Basically, the Excel VLookup function searches for value in the left-most column of table_array and returns the value in the same row based on the index_number.

The syntax for the VLookup function is:

VLookup( value, table_array, index_number, not_exact_match )

In the syntax

value stands for the value to search for in the first column of the table_array

table_array is the columns of data sorted in ascending order

index_number is the column number in table_array from which the matching value is returned.

not_exact_match states the exact match based on value. You need to enter FALSE to find the exact match. Else, to find an approximate match enter True

Let’s see how to use the Vlookup Function

Although the function panel might intimidating with the terms, but it’s doesn’t involve much intricacies. Follow the provided steps

Step 1: Add new column on the original spreadsheet that would show the info extracted from the Lookup table. Suppose you add a column Elephant Party  in column D. Enter insert the  Excel

Step 2: Position you cursor in the first blank cell in that column

Step 3: Go to the Insert menu, select Function. You will see the Insert Function dialog coming up.

Step 4: In the Search for a function - text box, type vlookup. Click on the Go.

Step 5: Highlight VLookup and click OK.

Now you must define the Vlookup values

Once you click on the OK, Excel’s Function Arguments dialog appears. Here you have to define the four values -

Lookup_value: This is the field from where you start

Table_array: This field defines the range of your lookup table

Col_index_num: It defines the number of the column on your lookup table that has the information you need

Range-lookup: It defines the how close a match should exist between your Lookup_value and the value in the leftmost column

Tips for MS PowerPoint

7. Override the master slide

Sometimes, you need to exclude what appears on the master slide. For instance say you wanna show a full-screen diagram or photograph. To do that follow the steps

Step 1: Go to the Format menu and choose Background

Step 2: Tick the box marked Omit background graphics from Master

8. Insert Comments

While collaborating with someone on a presentation it’s feasible to insert comments into the slides to share notes and ideas. PowerPoint offers a Comments feature that also allows you to control how they would look like. To insert the text see the following steps

Step 1: Select the Comments box

Step 2: Click the Draw menu and click on Change Autoshape

Once done, you will be able to make important comments stand out using arrows or other shapes.

Tips for MS Outlook

9. Assign categories

Often its difficult to keep track of projects and other engagements if your Outlook is clumsy. The easiest solution for this is to assign categories to your contacts, notes, appointments and mail.

Step 1: Right-click on any item and select Category

Step 2: To view items by category go to View>Current View>Customize Current View

Step 3: To add or remove categories click on the Master Category list

10. Add an Address

You might have clients whom you have to email frequently. An easy way to accomplish this is to set up a toolbar button for that address. Let’s see how to do it

Step 1: Go to Tools>Customize. Select the Mail Message command in the File category
Step 2: Drag it to the toolbar and release it
Step 3: Right-click on it and rename it using the menu. Make sure that you select Image and Text or Text Only
Step 4: In the same menu choose Assign Hyperlink and then Open it. Fill in the email address and a default subject.

Step 5: Close the dialog box and message would be instantly launched