A big topic these days is controlling email on personal, group or company accounts which, regardless of filters, security and unsubscribe lists, is becoming more overwhelming. Here is a nice list to assist you in truly reducing the time spent on doing this today.
The best way to begin is to create a custom process by which to do this. Use all the input you can and put it into place. You might also consider utilizing my book below. =====================================================
8 Hacks for Better Email Management
BY Atish Davda @adavda
Save hours each week by following these eight tips to
better manage your email.
Your email
inbox is like your desk at work: keep it clean.
If it's
excessively messy, people will notice and eventually it will take a toll on
your career. No corporate professional today can excel, or even get by, at
their job without proper email management.
Yet, so many
people struggle with it. You'll find 1,080,000,000 search results on Google if
you search "I need help with email management." The good news is
you're not alone in feeling overwhelmed at managing your inbox. The bad news is
there are, apparently, a billion different ways to do it.
Below, you'll
find eight hacks to better email management along with real life examples of
how to implement them. With 425 million users, Gmail makes for a good case study, but you may apply the same
concepts to other email services.
I am the
founder and CEO of a VC-backed technology upstart, EquityZen, which allows private investors access to proven
pre-IPO investments. While I'd bet Elon Musk's inbox gets hit harder than does
mine, I work at the intersection of technology and finance, two sectors notorious
for their dependence on email communication.
1) Choose the
Right Tools
This one is
crucial. No one tool is perfect, so use a combination of tools.
Much of your
email is likely consumed over mobile or tablet devices. Pick an email client
that can keep up. I use Mailbox
(now owned by Dropbox). Recently, Mailbox came out with a desktop application
for OS X, which syncs with your Mailbox across all devices where you use it.
When on the
run, use Mailbox on your smartphone. If you live in a city with underground
public transportation, you'll likely appreciate the added benefit: Mailbox lets
you chip away at your inbox even without Internet service and keeps track of
your activity until you resurface and reconnect.
When at your
desk, use Gmail.com; its search
functionality is unparalleled. In addition, if you have a Mac, use Mailbox for
OS X for email scheduling, in addition to using Gmail's web client.
I tie in my
work and personal email accounts with Mailbox, and can tick through them all at
once, or one at a time depending on whether or not I'm working.
2) Schedule
Emails
Mailbox allows
you to schedule emails (bat away irrelevant ones to reappear later) with a
simple swipe. Alternatives include Gmail plug-in Boomerang or Google Inbox, but using
Mailbox has the added benefit of being agnostic to the underlying email
service.
Ask yourself
for every email, "am I going to answer this in the next five
minutes?" If the answer is no, set aside a block of time daily or weekly
and schedule the email to reappear in your inbox at that time.
3) Use Lists
(or "Labels")
Lists
(Mailbox), labels (Gmail), and folders (Outlook), all serve the same purpose:
to organize your emails. Some rely on Gmail's search functionality to avoid
using lists and labels. While the search feature can help you snipe down any
email you're seeking in a matter of seconds, you're leaving chips on the table.
For repeat
emails whose content you tend to consume in bulk (like receiving a trickle of
resumes and ticking through them a few at a time), swipe left all the way to
add emails to a "resumes" list. You can access it via Mailbox at any
time, or via Gmail by searching for "[mailbox]-resumes". Since you
don't plan on reading the resumes one at a time, it's out of your inbox and
neatly stacked in the resumes pile.
4) Cut Through
the Noise: Use Filters
Do you ever get
daily digests? Social media notifications? Weekly newsletters? Enough said. Set
up filters to direct those emails to separate lists and review them in bulk a
few times a day.
5) Don't
Delete, Unsubscribe
A corollary to
using filters is to avoid being a pack rat for truly useless things. If you've
deleted the same email from that e-commerce site five times in a row, what are
the chances you'll want it the sixth time?
A good way to
find emails from which you should unsubscribe is to search for the word
"unsubscribe" among deleted emails.
6) Archive
With nearly
unlimited storage, there is little reason to delete emails: archive if you'll
ever need it again or unsubscribe if you delete the same type of email
repeatedly.
Getting rid of
emails from your inbox that aren't useful right this moment is crucial. If you
intend to deal with them later, use Lists. If they are informative and no
response is required, Archive them. You can always find them again using
search. An inbox that's slightly cluttered gets messy very quickly (see: broken window
theory).
7) Learn
Keyboard Shortcuts
Press 'e' to
Archive, 'Shift'+'3' to delete, 'gi' to go to inbox. Learn other common Gmail
shortcuts to save yourself seconds per email. In Gmail.com, go to
Settings and turn "keyboard shortcuts on."
Learn Keyboard Shortcuts
8)
Read Top Down, Write Bottom Up
Consume emails
by thread in reverse chronological order.
Respond to them in chronological order.
This nuanced
hack takes advantage of the fact that some folks respond to emails immediately,
sometimes triggering an email "tennis match," eating up that hour you
set aside to tackle your whole inbox, and leaving you feeling behind. If you
respond to emails in chronological order, you're less likely to get caught up
in back-and-forth emails, and more likely to stay on track.
Read Top Down, Write Bottom Up
|
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In
addition to this blog, I have authored the premiere book on
Netiquette, "Netiquette IQ - A Comprehensive Guide to Improve, Enhance
and Add Power to Your Email". You can view my profile, reviews of the
book and content excerpts at:
www.amazon.com/author/paulbabicki If you would like to listen to experts in all aspects of Netiquette and communication, try my radio show on BlogtalkRadio and an online newsletter via paper.li.I have established Netiquette discussion groups with Linkedin and Yahoo. I am also a member of the International Business Etiquette and Protocol Group and Minding Manners among others. I regularly consult for the Gerson Lehrman Group, a worldwide network of subject matter experts and I have been contributing to the blogs Everything Email and emailmonday . My work has appeared in numerous publications and I have presented to groups such as The Breakfast Club of NJ Rider University and PSG of Mercer County New Jersey. ==========================================   |
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