10 Tips to Control Your In-Box

Meet organizing professional Marcia Ramsland, who can help you upgrade your email efficiency.

Marcia says an abundance of emails in your In-Box is “the beginning of a complicated life."

“Clean up your In-Box,” she said, “and leave each day relaxed knowing your email is under your control.”

Marcia’s 10 Email Tips to Deal with Email Efficiently:  

1. Read and Respond. Decide what to do the FIRST time you open an email. Do it now or it will double the time it takes to respond. The key is to pause and decide what action is needed.

2. Clear it Out. Once you’ve read and responded, move it out of your In-Box with “Delete or Archive.” In “Archive” it’s still there to search by key word. Gmail now has a “Send & Archive” button that does the work in one click.

3. Rely on the “Search” feature to pull up emails. Instead of creating an elaborate File Folder system, learn to search by the person’s name or email.

4. Tame Your “Reading” File. Keep the good blogs &newsletters in this file that pass your way. Read them mid afternoon or at the end of the day. Delete the file contents daily or weekly.

5. Create No more than 6-10 Key Email Folders. “Responded,” Holding”, or “Archive” are great for once you’ve responded. Move out emails prior to 3 months ago “Archive before (date).”

6. Don’t “Over File” with too many specific folders. Create no more than 6-10 folders by program, action steps, or project. It’s time-consuming to put them into any more folders than that. Rely on the “Search” feature to pull up emails.

7. Create “Rules” in Outlook or “Filters” in Gmail. This lets email bypass your In-Box and land in a folder you want to keep such as: the name of an organization, “Coupons” from Costco, Barnes and Noble, or Amazon, or “Personal” for interesting forwards.

8. Keep a “Follow-up” folder if needed. This is for emails you respond to but you need to know the other person did their part. Check it at the end of the week to see if everything’s taken care of or forward the email and ask if they got it.

9. Set times to do email and don’t let it become your To Do list! Twice in the morning and twice in the afternoon are adequate.

10. Begin and end each day by getting your email down to your Target Number. A single digit or number under 20 email in your In-Box puts you in the driver’s seat of your life.

Set a Goal to Cut Your Email in Half each Week!
Get there by keeping track on your calendar of how many you leave in your In-Box each day. Intentionally whittle down the count.

Marcia Ramsland is well known as "The Organizing Pro" for her practical skills and tips to manage busy lives. She is an author, speaker and national media guest in magazines, radio, and TV. One of her popular books, Simplify Your Life, is now an Online Class series, "Simplify Your Life: 7 Weeks to a NEW Organized You!" For more resources from Marcia, visit organizingpro.com.