Guest Blog: Handling Email

by Rachelle Adams

I read a tip recently from Beth Beutler in her book, 52 Ways to Be More Organized:

“Unsubscribe to email distributions you do not need/do not read regularly.”

I thought about the nearly 5,000 emails in my inbox. The majority of those were from email subscriptions, were unread, and were preventing me from seeing important emails that needed responses.

When I arrived home from school the other day, I felt prompted to tackle my inbox. I spent the next two hours unsubscribing to email distributions, deleting emails, and apologizing for not replying to a few important emails I had overlooked.

My inbox went from nearly 5,000 emails down to TWO emails. That felt great! Since then, I have not had nearly as many emails flooding my inbox each day, and I've been able to manage my inbox and reply to important emails in a more timely manner.

A few thoughts from my experience:

Depending on the email service you use, try to group your emails by sender. This will allow you to review your emails quickly, unsubscribing as necessary and deleting much more quickly (you can delete all of the emails from one sender at a time).

Be honest with yourself. Do you skip emails from a certain sender (such as an online clothing company) more often than you actually read them? If so, consider unsubscribing. You'll save time by not having to skip them, and your important emails won't be lost among the unimportant ones.

Several of the sites that were sending me emails said it could take up to 10 days to process my request to unsubscribe. I plan to review my inbox again in a couple of weeks to determine if I need to follow up on previous requests or unsubscribe to any other emails.

My husband uses his inbox well, and I'm attempting to follow his lead! The only emails in my inbox right now require follow-up. Everything else has been archived (I use Gmail and choose not to use folders, because the search function works well).

This really was worth the two hours I spent on this task, and it may not take you nearly as long as it took me, depending on how many subscriptions you receive.

Beth, thank you again for the tip, and thank you for the chance to guest blog!

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