Have you subscribed to my RSS feed yet?. Thanks for visiting!

Do you ever feel like you are drowning in information overload, and that your email inbox is a huge burden on your time?

If this sounds like you, I have some tips and tricks I want to share with you, so that you can finally get back in charge of your inbox, instead of your inbox being in charge of you.

As someone who is constantly learning and studying business and Internet marketing strategies, I regularly buy new software tools, information products, download free reports and subscribe to free newsletters.

As a result of this, I have found myself on multiple email lists from many different Internet marketers all over the place.  I am currently on at least 100+ lists, and I stay subscribed to them because I want to keep up to date with what’s going on in my niche, and study the methods and sales tactics of other marketers.

As you can imagine, I get a ton of email each day, but I manage to keep on top of all information hitting my inbox, because I’ve organized my email very effectively.

Here Are 5 Useful Tips To Help Stop You
From Having An Email Inbox Nightmare:

1. Set up folders for every list/free newsletter that you want to stay subscribed to.  When the email comes through to your inbox, just drag and drop it over to the relevant folder, and keep your inbox clear of clutter.
2. To help automate things, you should set up automated rules, so that your email gets put into the correct folder automatically.

   If you use email software like: ‘Outlook Express’ (available to download from Microsoft.com), you can set up automated email rules very easily.

   Select the ‘tools’ menu, then ‘message rules’, then ‘mail’.

   When you access the mail rules window, you have a number of options open to you.  You can set up rules based on:

   ‘who the email is from’
   ‘who the email is sent to’
   ‘text in the subject line’

   There are other options, but those are the three that I personally use.  When you subscribe to someone’s newsletter or list, they will usually always send you email using the same email address.

   Set a new rule, to look out for email from someone’s list you are on.  Use the exact email address they use to send you email.

   Then you add which folder you want the email to be automatically sent to, and click finish.

   Repeat this process of setting up a separate folder and creating a rule for every email address you want to stay subscribed to.  Instead of having a huge unmanageable inbox full of email, everything will be arranged automatically for you, with all the right email in the correct folders.

   In Outlook Express, each folder is highlighted bold when a new unread email goes into each folder, so you don’t have to worry about missing important email.  You can see at a glance which folder has new email, and manage your time to check each folder accordingly.

3. Get an anti-spam tool to help cut out unwanted spam emails.  One of the most popular spam tools is ‘Norton AntiSpam’.  What I particularly like about it is that is works nicely with Outlook Express.  Once installed, Norton AntiSpam creates a separate spam folder in Outlook Express, and will catch most of the obvious spam and dump it straight into the spam folder.

   In addition to this, Norton also installs a spam button in the Outlook Express toolbar, so you can easily highly anything the normal spam filters miss, and then click the spam button to transfer it from your inbox to the spam folder manually.

   It gives you the option on sticking an email address onto your ‘not allowed list’, and then puts every future email from that address into the spam folder.  On the flip side, you can also ‘white list’ email by putting it on your ‘allowed list, to make sure it always gets past the spam filters.

4. If you manage your own websites, you probably have more than one email address set up, and probably multiple email lists of your own.  If that’s the case, you should also make sure you have separate folders for each of your websites, so that all the communication for each different site is stored in a separate folder.

   This will help you to manage service issues, and email conversations relating to each site, much more effectively.

5. Set up sub folders to fine tune your email filing system.

   For my own websites, I like to split up the email further so that I can identify the type of email I’m getting, to help prioritize when I read it.

   On my newsletter site, I get email from my autoresponder when someone is added to my list, when someone posts a comment on my blog, when someone uses my contact form, sales notifications, and from normal email to my main email address.

   Instead of having everything go into one big folder, I create additional sub folders, and automated rules for the email to go directly into each sub folder. Again, this helps to speed up the time spent on email, and I don’t have to wade through less important email to get to the stuff that may need a quick reply.

Setting up automated email rules in Outlook Express does take a little bit of time to do in the beginning, but the future benefits far outweigh this initial hassle.  Just remember, you don’t have to set everything up all at once.  You could just set up a few new rules a day as you go a long.  By the end of the week/month, I’m sure you’ll find your inbox so much easier to manage and less time consuming.

I hope this helps to free up some of your time, and relieve a bit of stress. 

Jason Lewis