I often hear people complain that they can’t keep up with their email. On some of the personal productivity blogs I read, they provide tips for keeping email organized and report on companies that have successfully implemented policies such as email free Fridays. Not to mention, there are plenty of books on the subject of organizing your inbox.
I’ve never had these troubles people keep talking about. I don’t think I’ve ever had more than 100 messages in my inbox, though the number of messages generally hovers around 5 – 10. How do people accumulate thousands of messages in their inbox, many of which they never even open? Probably the same way I accumulate mountains of clutter on my desk: No one will clean up after me.
Though I’m terrible at keeping my desk nice-and-neat my email tends to be a pinnacle of organization, mostly because I don’t organize it myself. No, I’m too lazy for that. My computer does it for me. Always has. With that in mind, I present my simple little system for effective email organization…
Step 1: Eliminate
If you get newsletters, unsubscribe. If you get spam, get a spam blocker. If your crazy aunt keeps forwarding you meme emails, create a rule to automatically delete them or move them to a “low priority” folder (I also call this the “some day” folder). Links to instructions on setting up rules are in step three.
Step 2: Replace
What about those newsletters you actually want to read? Unsubscribe to the email, then subscribe to the RSS feed. No RSS feed? Use Gmail to get it via RSS anyway.
Step 3: Organize… automatically.
Create folders or labels. Setup rules to organize, flag, forward, etc. Gmail is my favorite way to read email (I even get my Art of Progress email via GMail) because you can label emails without moving them from the inbox. However, most email clients will indicate unread items in folders other than your inbox.
It’s important not to go too crazy with organization. Remember that, unlike paper filing systems, you can easily search for items. For example, instead of creating ten different folders for your various insurance companies, create one called “Insurance” and use your email program’s searching, sorting, and grouping features to find the message you’re looking for.
I’ve taken this concept a little further: A few months ago I eliminated my Insurance, Utilities, and other folders to combine them into one “Personal Accounts” folder (I also have a “Business Accounts” folder). It’s easy enough to find messages in this folder without separate categories and if it ever gets too cumbersome, it only takes a minute to change.
Don’t know how to create a rule? The internet is your friend. Here are instructions for some of the most popular email clients:
Tips
You don’t have to perform these steps sequentially and it’s probably a waste of time to do them all at once (unless you’ve got nothing better to do). Instead, perform them as they come up. In other words: Don’t spend time hunting down each newsletter you subscribe to, just wait for them to come to you and then unsubscribe. Don’t go hunting through decade-old emails for filing, just set up folders and rules as you read new messages (just be sure to apply those rules to previously received messages). But DO it. When a message comes in that needs a rule, set it up immediately.
Still overloaded? Try an auto-responder.
If the volume of email you receive is truly immense, setup an auto-responder to let people in on the rules you have setup and make them write emails in such a way that it is automatically organized and prioritized for you. Further, encourage them to make their emails useful and refer them to information that is already available elsewhere. Here’s an example:
Hi!
Thank you for your email. Due to high volume, I probably am unable to respond to your message right away. If this is an emergency, please call (555) 555-5555. To help me respond faster in the future, please include the full project name (for example: ‘jamestharpe.com’ not just ‘your website’) so that your message will be automatically categorized and therefore be easier to find and respond to. If you are inquiring about a project status, please visit http://projectsite/projectname/ for the most recent information. If this is a technical issue, please review the FAQs available at http://projectsite/faq_list/.
Regards,
-James
You can use the auto-responder any time it’s needed, which may be for your own personal e-mail free Friday or just while you’re out of the office. Unless you’re receiving more than a thousand messages daily, you probably won’t need to enable the auto-responder every day.
As a technical guru, the subject of automated organization is especially interesting to me. If you implement some or all of the above advice, I’d love to hear about your results.
