Tips to clean up your inbox - Fast!
Email overwhelm, it’s a real thing. Cleaning up your inbox doesn’t have to be a tedious process. It’s crucial to keep on top of your incoming mail without it getting lost in all the stuff in between.
Subscriptions, carbon copies (cc’s), news updates, someone who only ever communicates with you via email… the list goes on.
Statistics say that professionals receive around 120 messages per day. That equates to about 43,800 emails per year! It’s easy to see how quickly our inbox can get out of control if we don’t manage it.
A full inbox can waste around 27 minutes per day. Schedule some time and use these tips to have a spring clean of your inbox - you could even delegate this task too.
Archive emails one year or older
You leave emails sitting in your inbox because you tell yourself “you’ll get to it” but before you know it, you’ve got months worth of emails ahead of it. Let’s be honest, you’re never really going to read or action an email that’s been sitting in your inbox for over a year.
A simple way to start clearing up your inbox fast is to set up archive folders based on the year of the email that is one year or older. Filter your inbox by oldest (or search the specific year) and bulk move these into the corresponding folders. This way you still have the emails if you ever want to go back and read them.
For now, they’re out of the way and when you have some downtime you can go back through these folders and tidy them up.
Filter your unread emails
Chances are if an email has been left unread it’s because it’s either irrelevant, some type of newsletter, or didn’t capture your immediate attention. Have a glance through your unread emails to make sure there is nothing important you may have missed.
Then you know what to do… hit that delete button!
Set up rules
If you’re not a fan of unsubscribing to newsletters or receiving a bunch of automated emails you don’t really need to see. Set up rules so that these specific emails move straight to a folder.
Here’s how to do it:
Outlook - Click on one of the corresponding emails and go to the Home tab > Rules > Create rule.
Tick the relevant fields and select the folder into which you want to move all future emails into. Select finish and run the rule now.
Gmail: Search for the corresponding emails in the search function.
Select the check box next to the options that specify the behaviour and then select create filter to activate the rule.
Use keywords in the search function
Another way to filter through the noise is to use the search bar to target specific keywords. This breaks down the cleaning process into bite-sized chunks.
You could search words like:
Sale
Invite
Reminder
Attachment
The key here is to just get as specific as you can.
Use the 2-minute rule
Once you’ve worked through the bulk of your emails and removed all the irrelevant stuff you’ll be left with more of a manageable amount. Work your way through starting from the bottom up and only leave the emails in your current inbox if you need to action them or alternatively set up a specific actions folder.
Then use the 2-minute rule - if something can be actioned in less than 2 minutes, then do it.
Now you know it’s quite possible to clean up your inbox without it taking months. Your next focus is to make sure you can keep it at a manageable standard
Consider when subscribing to newsletters and online sites
Make the delete button your friend
Use the 2-minute rule and action things then and there
Try and limit too much back-and-forth conversation
Does this still feel all too overwhelming? Delegate this task to a Virtual Assistant - it’s what they’re here for!
EAssist is a Virtual Executive Assistant business who has great experience in helping professionals maintain their inboxes as well as providing on-going assistance in this area.
Contact EAssist for a no-obligation chat and let’s get rid of the email overwhelm!
