Email management is a major source of overwhelm for many
solo business owners; I only have to read my new subscriber
notices every day to know this! When I ask my subscribers
what their biggest office headache is email is right up
there with the rest of them! Comments such as:
"Emails - yikes!"
"Responding to emails"
"Managing email"
"Emails overload"
Sound familiar?
By cleaning up the flow of emails into your Inbox, you can
then improve the flow of your business, and spend your time
productively!
Below I am going to share with you my top 7 tips for
effectively managing your email so that you can break out
of your email jail.
1. Emails aren't urgent! Don't feel you have to read and
act upon your email the second it hits your inbox. You
don't! It isn't urgent. If there was a real emergency
then your client/colleague/friend would call you.
2. Are all those newsletters you subscribe to really
necessary? Probably not! If this is the case spend some
time going through them and unsubscribing the ones you
don't really want or read.
3. Does your email play distracting alerts, i.e. a sound?
If so, disable it. This is a distraction and you could
quite easily stop what you're working on to go and check
your emails. It will then take you some time to get back
on track again, not to mention the amount of time you've
just lost stopping what you were doing, reading your
emails, and actioning them.
4. Schedule set times to check your emails. Once or twice
a day is enough, say first thing in the morning and again
later in the day. If you subscribe to various industry
groups save reading these emails until you take a break
from your work - maybe at the end of the day when you're
winding down. You can easily get sidetracked reading all
the different topics and replying to them, all of which is
taking you away from your paid work.
5. Utilize email filtering tools. Set up folders and
filters so that your email gets sent to the appropriate
folder as soon as it arrives. This makes organizing and
reading your emails a cinch. You can then decide where to
focus your time on reading your emails. For example, all
emails that have gone into your networking groups folder
you can save those to read later, but emails that have gone
into your Clients folder you can act on straight away.
6. Create email templates to save time. If you're finding
you are responding to the same questions over and over
again, create an email template. Next time you get asked
the same or similar question, simply open your email
template, add the person's email address, and hit send!
7. Run AutoArchive regularly. If your email software
comes with an autoarchiving feature you need to run this
regularly - at least once a month - so that your email
folder doesn't become too large. And let's face it, do you
really need to keep emails that are more than six months
old?
If you follow these 7 tips above, you will find you are
spending less time worrying about and checking your emails,
and more time on being productive! That has got to be
better for your bottom line.
----------------------------------------------------
Office Organization Expert, Tracey Lawton, teaches
professional speakers, coaches, and authors how to operate
an efficient, organized, and profitable business. Learn
how to create an efficient and organized office in 7 EASY
steps, and receive free how-to articles at
http://www.OfficeOrganizationSuccess.com
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