There are a horde of options available in Word that many of us are aware of but seldom make use of. These useful tools can help you optimize your usage of Word. Let's take a closer look at some of them:

WORD ART: Whether you want to jazz up your title or watermark or make any other text in your document stand out make use of Word Art. With this tool, you can make an impressive impact on your documents. WordArt enables text effects such as skewing, shadowing, rotating, and stretching in a variety of shapes and colors. You can even include three-dimensional effects. You can access this option from
the Drawing toolbar. Go to "View I Toolbar Drawing". Click on the "Insert WordArt" button. WordArt displays a window with 30 built-in Word Art effects from which you can make your choice.

AUTO-TEXT: This is a very useful tool in case you want to reuse text or graphics without having to manually type or insert them. Each selection of text or graphics is recorded as an AutoText entry and entries are divided into categories such as Salutation or Closings. If you want to save text, select the text and go to "Insert I AutoText I New". Word will use the name of the text as the default name, accept
it or type a new name with at least four characters, as Word inserts an entry only after four characters have been typed. In case you want to rename an entry, go to "Tools I Templates and Add-ins". Click on "Organizer" and select the "Auto Text' tab. From the "In Normal" box on the left, click the entry you want to rename, and then click "Rename". In the "Rename" dialog box, type a new name for the entry. Click "OK" and then click "Close",

MAIL MERGE: Here's a great feature that creates a set of documents that are the same but each document contains unique elements. For example, you want to send
a letter to several people announcing a launch of a new product. By using mail merge, you can have your company logo and the text about the product appear
in each letter and you can change the address and greeting line of each letter. Mail merge allows you to create labels for envelopes, letters, e-mail messages, or faxes. How to use this feature? Open a new Word document, go to "Tools I Letters and Mailings I Mail Merge" to open the "Mail Merge" pane. Use the hyperlinks at the bottom of the task pane to navigate through the mail-merge process.

MACROS: Macros are there to help you repeat a process using a shortcut key, without you having to manually repeat every step of the process, You can create a macro by using a macro recorder to record a sequence of actions. Go to "Tools I Macro I Record New Macro". Enter the name for the macro under "Macro name".ln the "Store macro" box, click the template or is assigned a unique name. The text document in which you want to store the macro. You have the option of assigning the macro to a toolbar, menu, or shortcut key. If you don't want to assign the macro to either of them, click "OK" to begin recording the macro. But if you want to assign the macro to a toolbar or menu, go to "Toolbars I Customize" then click on the "Commands" tab. In the "Commands" box. click on the macro you are recording, and drag it to the toolbar or menu you want to assign it to. Click "Close" to begin recording the macro. To assign the macro to shortcut keys, click on "Keyboard". In the "Commands" box, click the macro you are recording. In the "Press new shortcut key" box, type the key sequence, and then click "Assign". Click "Close" to begin recording the macro. Now perform the actions you want to include
in your macro. Note'i:hat when you record

a macro, you can use the mouse to click commands and options but not to select text. Use the keyboard to record these actions. For example, use F8 to select
text and press END to move the cursor to the end of the line, To stop recording your macro, click "Stop Recording".

SPELLING & GRAMMAR CHECKER: This is probably one of the most popular features of Word. As you type, Word automatically checks your spellings and the correct usage of grammar, Possible spelling problems are underlined with red wavy lines and wavy green underlines indicate grammatical problems. You can also run a spelling and grammar check in one go, By default, Word checks both spelling and grammar. If you want to only run a spell check, go to "Tools Options" and select the "Spellings and Grammar" tab, Check the "Grammarwith spellings" checkbox and click "OK".