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Get This Organized and Under Control to Save Time Every Day

- April 4, 2012 | by April -

Do you ever have those days where you say to yourself, “What did you actually accomplish today?” and the answer is not much of anything.

I hate those days.

And, when I look back on them, I see a continuing theme. I spent time on “busy work” and I spent a lot of time on the computer not doing anything productive. One of those days might look something like this: Check email but don’t respond. Hop on Twitter for 20 minutes. Check Facebook. Play around on Pinterest for 30 minutes. Check email again. Start writing a blog post. Stop to check email and finally respond to those emails I put off that morning. Get back into writing that blog post….and on and on it goes.

Getting a handle on this is what I’m talking about in today’s video. Watch it to find out how you can save time and be more productive every day.

Now, it’s your turn. Let me know how you’ve dealt with email overload in the comments below. Share tips for organizing your email and keeping things simple, so you don’t waste half the day on checking and responding to email.

26 Comments · Filed Under: Productivity

Comments

  1. Kathleen Lange Klik says

    April 4, 2012 at 8:31 am

    Too funny, our husbands have something in common; I also have given my husband the title of “Creative Director”!

    Thanks for tip on organizing e-mail into folders-brilliant!

    Reply
    • April says

      April 4, 2012 at 8:32 am

      Hahahaha…that is funny!

      It definitely helps 🙂

      Reply
  2. Kim Palmer says

    April 4, 2012 at 8:32 am

    Yes! I completely relate to this. One thing that helps me is designating some “puttering around” time during my more sluggish periods, like after lunch, where I don’t feel guilty for browsing the internet in the name of research. Some non-productive/wandering time is useful I think, and if I know I’ll be doing later, I can focus more in the mornings to actually create stuff.

    Reply
    • April says

      April 4, 2012 at 8:34 am

      Love that tip Kim! I do the same thing throughout the day. I take small breaks in between productive time periods to give myself some fun internet time. And, scheduling email time also helps me a lot.

      Reply
  3. Licia Dantas says

    April 4, 2012 at 8:42 am

    I used to have my outlook box open all the time so I could check (not reply) emails faster. At the end of the day I usually was unhappy with my productivity and couldnt understand why time was going by so fast.

    It was only when I took Roadmap ecourse that I started to analyze my everyday activities and noticed how much time I wasted on email checking. Today I dedicate only 30 minutes, 4 times a day to check and reply emails during work hours. Since then, time has been just enough for everything I want to do.

    Another post I loved reading about similar topic was Mayi’s “Touch it once” post.

    Great post April! BTW love your necklace! 😉

    Reply
    • April says

      April 4, 2012 at 8:45 am

      This is awesome to hear Licia! I’m so glad limiting your email checking has upped your productivity.

      I loved that post of Mayi’s, too! Same type of idea. Check your email when you’re going to respond. It’s a small change that can make a big difference.

      Reply
  4. Michelle Ainslie says

    April 4, 2012 at 8:48 am

    Love this video 🙂 Especially the tip about responding immediately – I am such a huge procrastinator when it comes to admin.
    I also have folders for everything and I put my alerts off so that I don’t even know when an email has come in. Otherwise if I see the little red star on my email folder I just HAVE to go look – otherwise the suspense will kill me.

    Reply
    • April says

      April 4, 2012 at 8:50 am

      Oh man–I’m with ya! I had to set a rule for myself about checking and responding to email at the same time.

      That’s why I have to close out my email whenever I’m working on something on the computer. When I know I have a new email, I have to check it.

      Reply
  5. Mary Deighton says

    April 4, 2012 at 8:52 am

    Yay, folders are awesome! I still get overwhelmed though, because I am constantly checking emails and putting off on responding them. Then I get down on myself for being such a horrible friend, etc it goes on from there. But I have a rule that I try to get items out of my inbox as soon as possible, which means moving to the appropriate folder or taking action on the email. I’m still working on the taking action part!

    Reply
    • April says

      April 4, 2012 at 8:59 am

      Hey Mary! I think we’ve all felt that guilt that you’re talking about–I know I have, but I have to tell myself that checking and responding to email twice a day diligently allows me to respond to necessary emails and gives me the opportunity to do the work that I really need and want to be doing. I remind myself that I provide a lot more value by writing a blog post that will reach many people than going into detail in one email.

      Reply
  6. Cupcakes for Clara says

    April 4, 2012 at 9:38 am

    Fantastic advice! I have literally gone into my inbox as soon as I finished watching this & set up various folders to drop emails into. I need to get organised! Thanks April 🙂

    Reply
    • April says

      April 4, 2012 at 9:39 am

      Yay! I love hearing that!!!

      Reply
  7. Bridgett says

    April 4, 2012 at 10:30 am

    Those are some great tips, thanks for sharing! I’m guilty of puttering around my email and never acting on anything.

    Reply
    • April says

      April 4, 2012 at 2:52 pm

      Yay! I’m glad you think so Bridgett! Stop that puttering 😉

      Reply
  8. Erin says

    April 4, 2012 at 10:49 am

    I believe I requested a post on email organization recently, so thanks for listening! I spent a few afternoons going through the hundreds of emails in my inbox and putting them in folders. Man, that felt good when that was done. I also reorganized my gmail layout so only new important emails go first, starred emails go second and everything else goes third. That really helps me to prioritize. Now I just have to get in the habit of turning it off! Haha!

    Reply
    • April says

      April 4, 2012 at 2:53 pm

      Yes, I think it was you Erin! I couldn’t find who asked for it.

      Thanks for sharing your tips! And, yes, turn that email off! It makes such a big difference to productivity–I promise.

      Reply
  9. Amy says

    April 4, 2012 at 11:58 am

    Thanks for the great tips April! I am definitely guilty of checking my email and then not responding right away which leads me to go back to my email over and over again. Starting today-I’m going to work on breaking that cycle!

    Reply
    • April says

      April 4, 2012 at 2:53 pm

      Woohoo for breaking cycles! Once you get into this new habit, it won’t be hard to keep up. But, like any new habits, it’s usually hard the first month.

      Reply
  10. Carrie says

    April 4, 2012 at 2:50 pm

    My boyfriend is my creative director too! He designed my new business cards and helped me with my booth set up for the first show I did this past Saturday! =D

    I’m still fine-tuning the way I work with my emails. I have 2 email addresses – 1 personal, the other business. I first look at the list of new emails and delete what I can from looking at the sender & title (spam filters don’t filter out everything). The thing that I try to do now is check email when I have the TIME to respond! I used to check email all the time, but found out that I wasn’t being very productive/efficient. I would quickly read through them and would then have to go back to them later on when I had the time to respond. That process takes up extra time AND I would end up “losing” some emails – forgetting to mark them back as “unread”, or they’d get lost at the bottom of the list.

    Also, checking emails when I’m “awake” helps – I used to check email first thing when I woke up, but realized that it wasn’t a good time for me to think straight yet and respond. ;P

    As for things that I want to get to later on, I open up windows for them and go through them throughout the day. My sewing machine is in front of my monitor, so I can actually go through videos and podcasts while I’m working. =D

    Thanks for the reminders and tips as always! =D

    Reply
    • April says

      April 4, 2012 at 2:56 pm

      Yay for creative, awesome men who help us creative entrepreneurs!

      Oh, that’s pretty neat that you open up videos and podcasts and listen to them as you sew. I used to do a lot of listening to podcasts and videos when I was packaging items and making jewelry–but now, most of my business is online, so I have to close everything out to concentrate.

      Thanks for sharing your tips!

      Reply
  11. Amy says

    April 4, 2012 at 3:46 pm

    great post – thank you a million times April – I definitely needed the reminder about the time-suck of checking email – one thing that gets me every time is that my phone dings when I get an email – so I get all excited and drop everything when I hear a ding (seriously – I am like a trained lab rat when I hear that dinger ding – haha) so I need to stop that habit now …..so I need to sit down and get into my phone settings and turn that setting OFF right now and get more work done…..

    Reply
    • April says

      April 5, 2012 at 7:33 am

      You’re sooooooo welcome! My phone has a little red light that flashes when I have a new email. That’s why I don’t keep my phone in my office area, but I can still hear it when it rings.

      Reply
  12. Jeannie says

    April 5, 2012 at 9:10 am

    LOVE the colors in the background!

    I started using folders within my email a while back & found them to be very helpful, except I still struggle with my Read Me folder. That poor file seems to stay overloaded. That, however, is a procrastination problem on my part, not a problem with the system. And since I hate to publicly admit that I’m a horrible procrastinator, I think I’ll go clear out that Read Me file right now. Thanks for the motivation!

    Reply
    • April says

      April 5, 2012 at 12:09 pm

      You’re too funny Jeannie! Get that file cleared out! 🙂

      Reply
  13. Nicole says

    April 9, 2012 at 1:54 am

    this video is hilarious! I love it Jeannie. but it is really helpful. I learn how to organized so it will save time.

    Reply
  14. cathy says

    April 10, 2012 at 5:43 am

    Fantastic video.Its informative and useful thanks for posting it.

    Reply

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