Many of us find we have lots of people in our Windows Live contact list, but we really spend our time “talking” to just a handful. Sometimes it gets a little daunting to sort through all those contacts. Fortunately, there are a couple ways to help organize your contacts: Favorites and Contact Categories.
Favorites are just what they sound like. These are the folks you IM with the most or exchange e-mail with the most. When you make someone a favorite, they go to the top of your Messenger list and are easier to find in Hotmail too. To create a favorite, just click on the People link at the top of any Windows Live page, and then click on the star icon next to any contact. The star will turn gold and that person is now a favorite.
You can think of Categories as your own personal contact groups, where you can decide how to slice and dice your contact list into more manageable pieces. Categories make it easier to IM or send e-mail with groups of people all at once. For instance, instead of typing in all seven of your family members names into an e-mail message that includes that great new photo you just took, you can just send to your “family” category.
I know a lot of people create categories for family, friends, and coworkers, but how you do it is totally up to you. You can see in the image above that I’ve created several categories – Comblu (a great company I work with), Community, Coworkers, Family, Friends, Partners, etc.
Here are the quick and easy steps involved in creating a contact category and sorting your contacts.
First, click on the People link on the top of any Windows Live page, then click on Manage categories. Then you should see a page that looks like this, but yours might not have any categories listed:
Now, click on New to create a category. Give your category a name, and then you can start typing in the names or e-mail addresses of the members you want to add to this category. Windows Live will help you fill these in based on your overall contact list. In my example below, I’m creating a new category called “Neighbors” with three people in it that live in my neighborhood:
Note how Windows Live found two contacts that started with “don”. I just need to click the one I want.
After you’ve created all your categories and favorites, you’ll see them inside Windows Live products and services like Hotmail and Messenger. For example, when composing e-mail in Hotmail, just click on the To: button, and you can select Categories or Favorites as your intended recipient:
With Windows Live Contact Categories and Favorites, it’s even easier to stay in touch with people.
- Marcus, Windows Community Manager 
