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brokerexecutivesFlag for United States of America

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How can I eliminate the category coding from Outlook

The coding below works like a charm, but is it possible to eliminate the need to always having to select a category when emailing? Below is a picture of what I'm doing each time I send an email. It would be nice if I could just send my email without having to select what category the contact was under to update "Date of Last Contact". Please advise.

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Private Sub Application_ItemSend(ByVal Item As Object, Cancel As Boolean)
    'Change the category name as needed'
    Const TGT_CAT = "MassMail"
    Const MACRO_NAME = "Item Send"
    Dim olkFolder As Outlook.Items, olkContact As Outlook.ContactItem, olkProp As 

Outlook.UserProperty
    '--- Turn off error handling ---'
    On Error Resume Next
    '--- If the item being sent as an email ---'
    If Item.Class = olMail Then
        '--- If the item being sent is a member of the target category ---'
        If InStr(1, Item.Categories, TGT_CAT) Then
            '--- Get the Cotnacts folder ---'
            Set olkFolder = Session.GetDefaultFolder(olFolderContacts).Items
            '--- Was the contacts folder found? ---'
            If TypeName(olkFolder) = "Nothing" Then
                '--- No ---'
                MsgBox "Could not find the Contacts folder", vbCritical + vbOKOnly, MACRO_NAME
            Else
                '--- Yes ---'
                '--- Get the contact associated with the recipient email address ---'
                Set olkContact = olkFolder.Find("[Email1Address] = '" & 

Item.Recipients.Item(1).Address & "'")
                '--- Was a matching contact found? ---'
                If TypeName(olkContact) = "Nothing" Then
                    '--- No ---'
                    MsgBox "Could not find a contact with the address " & 

Item.Recipients.Item(1).Address & " in the first email address slot.", vbCritical + vbOKOnly, 

MACRO_NAME
                Else
                    '--- Yes ---'
                    '--- Update the Last Contact property ---'
                    Set olkProp = olkContact.UserProperties("Date of Last Contact") '<- Change the 

property name as needed'
                    olkProp.Value = Now
                    '--- Update the Attempts property ---'
                    Set olkProp = olkContact.UserProperties("Number of Attempts")   '<- Change the 

property name as needed'
                    olkProp.Value = Int(olkProp.Value) + 1
                    '--- Save the changes ---'
                    olkContact.Save
                End If
            End If
        End If
    End If
    On Error GoTo 0
    Set olkFolder = Nothing
    Set olkContact = Nothing
    Set olkProp = Nothing
End Sub

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Avatar of David Lee
David Lee
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Yes, we can eliminate the need to select a category if you want the code to fire for every message you send.  If not, then the code needs some means of discriminating between those it sohould run for and those it shouldn't run for.  That doesn't have to be a category, the category was just a convenient means of accomplishing this.  

Should the code process all emails or only certain ones?
Avatar of brokerexecutives

ASKER

90% of the people I contact are in my Outlook contacts. What harm would it do if the email was sent and a contact didn't exist?

I would love the code to work all the time. I'm constantly updating contacts with Date of Last Contact, so that would save me a ton of time.

I also attempted to do a mail-merge right now and couldn't find anywhere to select a category, so I think it would be necessary to not have it defined by category in order to send mail-merge.  
ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION
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David Lee
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HAHAHHA. It worked! You are a genius! Like, I said, I owe you more than just point. You send me an email and I'll send you some cash. Seriously. Thank you sir! Big Smiles over here in Arizona!
It worked like a charm. Thank you BDF.