Blogs

2014/01/20

One of our clients is changing the name of their company. It is a minor change, but updating this in all of our Outlook contacts is going to take some time. Is there a find and replace option or something similar that can save us some time?

There is not a find and replace option in Outlook contacts, but fortunately there is a quicker way to change the company name for a whole bunch of people.

1. Start by going to Contacts.
   • In Outlook 2007
     go to the View menu and point to Arrange By. Point to Current View and then select a table view such as By Company. Go back to the View menu and point to Arrange By. Point to Current View and select Customize Current View.
   • In Outlook 2010
     go to the View tab and click on Change View in the Current View group. Pick a table view, such as Phone or List. Click View Settings.
2. The rest of the steps are the same for all Outlook versions. Click the Group By button and then click the Clear All button. Choose an option in the Group Items By list, such as Company. Select All Collapsed in the Expand/Collapse Defaults list. Click OK twice.
3. Expand just the group for which you want to change the company name. Open the first contact in that group, change the company name and click Save and Close. This will put only that contact into its own category.
4. Grab the heading of the group and drag it onto the heading of the newly created group with the changed company name. Drop it there and voila! All of those contacts now have the new company name.

You can change any aspect of your contacts this way. For example, if a company changes their fax number or website address, change it on all of the appropriate contacts with a drag and a drop.