How to quickly make a dent in your email inbox

My inbox is not looking its best.

I have 36 in my personal/ business box and before I put these tips I’m about to share with you into practice last week, I had 57 (I’m now down to about 12 – 15) in my work box.

They’re all read – I marvel at the restraint some people show in not reading emails immediately. Or maybe I’m just insanely curious.

 

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So this is not a post about how to empty out your inbox and keep it that way. That’s what Conquer your email is for.

It’s just that I seem to have a lot in my boxes (relative to my normal 10 – 15 comfort level), some colleagues were also discussing this with me last week (the one person was saying he could seriously just process email the entire day and never get any “real work” done… and STILL not get through it all) and one of my clients also has some email goals.

Here’s the quick-fix emergency inbox fix… just so you can breathe again:

1. Disable all the social media notifications

If you haven’t already turned off all the notifications, take a minute or two to go into each of your social media accounts – Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, etc. – and turn off the email notifications.

Most things aren’t urgent and you’ll be on the respective site later today or in a few days’ time anyway.

2. Check on conversations

Click the Subject/ Conversation tab on the email menu bar. Your inbox is now filtered by conversation.

If you’ve been talking to the same person and the conversation’s gone back and forth, there may be some older emails you can quickly delete. Oftentimes when I do this step (it’s not my preferred default way of organising my inbox), I can delete about 4 – 6 emails very quickly. Everybit helps.

3. Do you really need to answer the email?

Click the date tab on the email menu bar once or twice so that the oldest emails appear on the top.

Look through the oldest messages. Do you really need to answer them?

If you can see that those people aren’t waiting for a reply, just delete.  If this feels too drastic for you, set your timer for 10 minutes and write SHORT replies to as many people as possible.

4. Copy down information quickly

I’m very guilty of this myself. I sometimes keep emails because I need to store the information somewhere else. E.g write a friend’s new address on an envelope to send off something.

If you need to save addresses, websites, telephone numbers, recipes (another of my guilty email mistakes!), copy them to your contacts/ addresses or with my recipes, copy and paste into a Word document and delete the email.

5. Add items to your master to-do list

Some of us see our email inbox as our master lists. Rather drag to a task, or if you’re old school like me, write it onto your proper master to-do list. E.g. I need to go into my kids’ blog and change the footer. It will take more than 2 minutes so I should add it to my list and get to it. Instead it’s in my inbox.

Hope this helps!

What are your favourite tips to empty out your email?

ps, here’s the link to buy Conquer your email for those of you who have a chronic problem with your email 🙂

{31 days of easy organising solutions} – email

Confession time – both my email boxes (home and work) have been full to overflowing… for me (50-odd emails) … for the last month or so.

The reasons were valid at work – too many meetings and so on – but at home I realised that my email basics had slipped.

I took a couple of hours to put some things back into place and I’m breathing easy again.

1. Check Pinterest and Facebook notification settings

I unsubscribed from all the Pinterest and most of the Facebook notifications. I now only get messages, notes on my wall and photo tags from Facebook. I haven’t received Twitter notifications for years but I hardly use Twitter anyway. Maybe 3 times a year? And that’s really only to quickly “chat” to one or two people who are very active on there but not very email-responsive 😉

2. Evaluate Facebook groups

I’m being very conscious about joining groups. At the moment I’m only in the one active Facebook group, the Everything launch team for Mary de Muth’s new book.

Just this morning, I had to tell a friend (very nicely) that I can’t join her group because I don’t have the time to participate. Of course it wasn’t comfortable but it was honest and 100% in integrity.

3. Get off lists you don’t read

I realised that I skimmed over a lot of newsletter lists and hadn’t actually looked forward to or read them for months. Time to get off those lists.

I said a few months back to my newsletter subscribers that I take no offence if my newsletter is one of those they need to unsubscribe from.

After all, we all go through seasons in our life.

Don’t just delete the email; take a few seconds longer to click through and unsubscribe on the website in question.

4. Make decisions immediately

I noticed that I’d get pics or documents that I wanted to save but I’d hang onto the email instead.

Why?

Laziness, I suppose. Laziness to make appropriate decisions.

From now onwards, I will stop, pause for a few seconds to make a decision as to where I want to save it (if I do) and just do it there and then.

5. Focus

Quite honestly I could write a whole article on the power of focus.

But as it relates to email management, this is what typically happens. I start answering an email and another pops into my box. I see the little window at the corner of my screen so I click on it to open. My mind is now focussed on that email and I’ve forgotten about the first one.

I’m learning to ignore the bright, shiny emails and focus on what I’m doing until completion.

These 5 steps are really the back-to-basics of effective email management for me.

Do you need to take back control of your email box too? Start by putting into place these 5 steps and let me know if you need more help.

I have FOUR one-hour sessions available from now til the end of November. You can use them to pick my brain about anything… from how to leverage your time better, how to set up your own e-courses, write your book, delegate effectively, get your kids organised, get control of your time, etc. They’re $197 each – first come, first served.

Read more here and book your spot today.

If your goal is to get your home organised, then get the revised (and cheaper!) Organise your Home system for just $47 now.

 

Have you checked out my book, Live Organised, yet?

 

PS I know that a lot of you have the luxury of a closet but in South Africa we don’t have them. Some people do have a dressing room with tons of space but again, rare.

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