Sorting and grouping messages together based on their content but within a single folder
I’m receiving various notification emails from the same address which I all store within a single folder (I move them there via a rule based on the From address).
Their subjects are non-distinctive but their message body however holds specific information which I like to group them together by within that folder. With grouping together I mean similar as how you can group messages from the same sender together or messages with the same subject.
For instance, our sales system sends out an email that there is a new order, but what has been ordered is stated in the message along with further details.
Is there a way to still group these messages based on what has been ordered without spreading them out over multiple folders?
Directly sorting or grouping messages based on the message content isn’t possible.
However, it is still achievable when you create a rule to assign the message a distinctive Category when the message body holds specific words and then sort or group your folder based on that Category.
Create the Categorize rule
Aside from your original “From sender, move to folder rule”, you must create the following rule for each of your products:
Apply this rule after the message arrives
from people or public group
and with specific words in the body
assign it to the category category
and stop processing more rules
Notes about and explanation of the rule:
Repeating the “from people or public group” condition makes sure that it doesn’t apply to other messages containing these specific words but just the ones sent from your notification address.
For each unique product (specific words), you must of course assign a unique Category which is indicative for that single product (like the name of the product or a shorthand version of it).
Adding the “stop processing more rules” action makes the rule processing go faster when you know you don’t want to apply any other rules to this message when it matches the rules’ conditions.
Leaving the original “From sender, move to folder rule” (without the “stop processing more rules” condition) and listing it above the Categorize rules, will keep you from needing to add the move action to every rule and keep the rules smaller.
To process your already received notifications, you can use the Run Rules Now… command in the Rules and Alerts dialog.
Grouping the messages within the folder
Grouping the messages together within the folder becomes a breeze now via the View tab or menu.
- Outlook 2003 and Outlook 2007
View-> Arrange By-> Category - Outlook 2010 and Outlook 2013
tab View-> option group: Arrangement-> Categories
