With webmail providing excellent service to manage all your messages, it's getting tougher for Microsoft's Outlook mail client to keep its place in the sun. And yet, the application is still one of the most popular around, mainly due to the fact that it comes pre-installed on PCs but also because Exchange remains a reference in professional messaging and collaboration.

Notes, contact lists, filters and calendar...Outlook has just about everything you need to handle your emails then. Still, you can install a few add-ons to add some functionality to the mail client. WinZip Companion allows you to automatically zip or unzip any attachments you receive. Lookout adds a little search bar to your Outlook interface. Even though its been discontinued since June 2004, the add-on still displays results fairly quickly. Mailinfo will alert you every time an email you've sent has been received and read. Great for sending formal emails. If instead you worry more about incoming messages, how about using Mail Alert? Every time you receive a new message this plug-in will display all the essential information. Skype users can set up Skylook, which integrates Skype commands into Outlook, saving you the hassle of opening up the VoIP app every time. It can even archive and record your calls. Finally if it's a real upgrade your looking to give to Outlook you can try out Bells and Whistles for Outlook. This add-on has no less than 19 productivity tools available, among which email notes, automatically adding new contacts to directory or message exchange tracking.