5 Ways I Manage My Email Inbox

Most people have 1 or 2 email inboxes and probably get anywhere from 3-7 emails a day. If you’re one of those then most likely you have a handle on your life in general 🙂 However, if you are a Type A personality like me then you’re probably already freaking out about your many emails while reading this post. This post is dedicated to you and me!I have a business, blogs, school, PTA, kids, and my household to manage, with a total of 9 inboxes and approximately 50-350 emails on any given day. (During my business peak season I can get up to 500+ a day).

1. Folders

Folders are your friend, whether you use Hotmail, Gmail, Yahoo or any email service there will be folder options accessible for you to create, label and categorize to your liking.

You can label these folders as you fit to match your lifestyle. Some folders I’ve created are:

• Invoices by year
• File for later ( new subscriptions, login info, important dates/events, etc.)
• School/class emails with each child’s name
• Family emails with photos

You can customize or color code these so they are easy to find.

2. Multiple Email Addresses

So for those of you with businesses, blogs or work at home moms, you know that things can get hectic and confusing quickly when you’re managing your emails. You never want to have the same email for household management and work. It’s just not professional or you increase the risk of sending an email to the wrong person as well. Believe it or not, you are more productive when organized.

Create 1 or 2 emails for your business or blogs, use your personal email address for household purposes, if you subscribe to a lot of newsletters, subscriptions, services or coupons then consider creating an email just for these.

3. Unsubscribe

Speaking of newsletters and subscriptions, if you find yourself not clicking to open some of these or just deleting them as soon as you see them… do yourself a favor and scroll to the bottom and unsubscribe! Every newsletter sent from businesses have to include a unsubscribe link at the bottom of their emails or give you the option to manage your subscription and you can change the frequency (daily to once a week or once a month).

4. Hit Delete

Say it with me, DELETE DELETE DELETE

My rule of thumb:

• it stays in my inbox if I have yet to read it or if I have yet to reply to it.
• it goes into one of my folders

If it doesn’t fit into one of those 2 categories then I hit DELETE and you can too 🙂

5. Sync Your Devices

Most of us have mobile devices with us, iPad or smartphone. Setup your email accounts on your mobile device so you can reply, move to folders, delete as soon as you can instead of waiting for the emails to pile up in your account all day or for days. This way you also get notifications in case of an emergency or something pending gets taken care of right away. I get a lot of mini 5-minute spare time through my day when the baby is napping or I’m on hold with someone that I use this time to go through my inbox.

You can add all of your many email addresses and accounts to your mobile device and some will even let you customize it with an email signature. Your receiver will never know it was sent from your mobile device.

Bonus Tip

If you’re worried about filing away your emails into folders, then remember that most if not all email providers have a search feature. if you don’t remember where you saved a particular email or message go ahead and search using a keyword, subject line, or sender and voila!

What other emails or inbox tips do you have? Feel free to share in the comments below!