Let’s say you have a bunch of e-mail floating around your inbox and they are all from the same person / company. Gmail makes this really easy to do with the use of filters. Whenever I first begin the clean-up process on a new inbox, I typically start by bulk organizing as many of the e-mails as possible. You can also use a service like to help with the unsubscribe process – it’s super easy! Bulk Organize with Filters If you don’t need it and you aren’t reading it, unsubscribe to save your inbox. While you’re at it, unsubscribe to any newsletters that no longer serve your needs. Trust me, you won’t miss those pesky newsletters and the other promotional e-mails! Get delete happy. If you are using the tabbed version and prefer to keep it that way, go through each of these tabs now and delete anything you don’t need. I prefer to turn those off as I find having to manage three micro-inboxes a bit tedious. If you have the tabbed version of Gmail’s inbox, you will likely have the three most commonly used tabs set up - Primary, Social and Promotions - by default. You can also access your complete archive, any time, by clicking “All Mail.” Trash It! You can use similar search parameters to Google and add in multiple keywords to narrow down your search results. To access your archive, you can use Gmail’s powerful search functionality and search for any keyword you are looking for. If you can create a "bucket" for all of your processed e-mails, it's far easier to find them later than if you put them into individual folders that aren't searchable across the board. If it's done and doesn't require my attention, I archive the e-mails so that they remain searchable but don't distract me.Ī lot of people use complicated folder management systems in e-mail clients like Outlook but they are often overkill and finding e-mail later on is next to impossible. What's in there are e-mails that require my attention and couldn't be processed using one of my methods below. I use my inbox sort of like a to-do system. The archive button is a button that lets you move e-mails out of your inbox and into one giant folder that is incredibly search-friendly. If you're using Gmail (or, if you switch after reading this guide), you'll want to get to know about the "Archive" button. Let’s get started, shall we? The Archive Function in Gmail You likely won’t need more than an hour or two, even if your inbox is currently out of control. There may be hundreds or thousands of e-mails in there that need your attention and getting through them is overwhelming, to say the least.įortunately, I have a really easy system to help you get through that initial clean-up phase and I do recommend that you devote some time to this. A lot of people look at their inbox and freeze up. Step #2 – Sort What’s in Your Inbox NowĬleaning up your existing account is going to be really, really vital to your future e-mail success. Regardless of the tools you use, you will want to look for something that allows you to filter incoming e-mails and archive e-mails without deleting them (or having to over-sort them). this tool is great for unsubscribing from a lot of newsletters at once and/or "rolling up" your newsletters into a daily digest Gmail - my personal setup is that I access it through a web browser on my laptop and using the Gmail app on my mobile devicesīoomerang - I used to use Boomerang to schedule e-mails to go out later (for example, if you're working late but don't want folks to know you're online, you can set your responses to go out the next morning) but Gmail has built in new "Schedule Send" features which are very useful and do the same thing Whether it's Gmail, Apple Mail or Outlook, all of the tactics in this guide can be used (with a few variations) to help you get a handle on your e-mail overwhelm. Take a look at the tools you are currently using to manage your e-mail inbox. The first thing you want to do is audit your existing setup. The features in Gmail are undeniable though, especially when you get into power usage, so it may be worth looking at for your setup, too. While this guide uses Gmail as the base, you can apply a lot of the techniques to whichever mail platform you use. Buried in e-mail? This guide will help you to ditch the e-mail overwhelm and start hitting inbox zero - the state of having zero e-mails in your inbox - consistently.
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