Email is the primary communication tool for businesses and teams worldwide. It’s estimated that every company has over 70 corporate interactions via email daily. Over time, this onslaught of emails piling up in your inbox can overwhelm your productivity. Check out the best practices of email management & tips to improve productivity.
According to statistics, employees spend an average of 13 hours a week reading and responding to emails. It’s one of the most time-consuming activities, taking almost 650 hours annually on an employee’s work schedule.
Given the figures, it is important to find the best ways to manage emails effectively. This article enumerates some of the best strategies to improve email management for both shared inboxes and individual employee emails and help enhance overall efficiency.
1. Convert Group Email Accounts Into A Shared Inbox
Most businesses have group email accounts that make it easier for customers or potential partners to get in touch with your brand. However, these group emails can be a hassle for employees.
Group email means a steady stream of incoming messages. Some messages may only be relevant to a few group members, but it still sends a notification to all group members. For instance, only three employees may only need to act on a specific email, but somehow five others have to read them, distracting them from their work.
Therefore, it is best to streamline emails arriving in these group inboxes. This helps reduce miscommunications and clarifies which email every team member needs to work on. You can do this by using an email collaboration tool.
For instance, HelpSpot allows for easier shared inbox management. You can easily assign tasks to anyone on the team without forwarding emails. It streamlines internal communication, which helps reduce email clutter using the best email management practices and tips to improve productivity.
2. Take Advantage Of Folders, Labels, And Categories
The terminology here can be tricky. If you are using Gmail, you’ll notice it uses the term ‘labels’ to organize emails. Meanwhile, other email providers use ‘folders’ or ‘categories.’ Whatever you call these email organization features, their purpose stays the same. It is to sort emails according to the content type and who’s responsible for them in terms of shared inboxes.
Take note that there’s no universal rule for creating labels or folders. Every person and inbox group is different and responds according to their personal preferences. It comes down to figuring out what works best for you and your team.
Prioritize, filter, sort, and group emails into categories and folders to create an organized inbox. The more refined your labels are, the easier it is to locate specific and essential emails at the time of need. You should also use sub-folders or parent categories for various clients, tasks, or projects for a superior organization.
3. Have an Email Schedule: Best Practices Of Email Management
Did you know that the average worker checks their email 11 times per hour? While email may seem less intrusive than phone calls, it still creates more stress for employees. They often worry about it all day without really addressing it, ultimately wasting time and reducing productivity.
In addition, some employees may prefer to leave their emails open all day long. This means alerts, notifications, and beeps can disrupt their focus and interrupt workflow using the best email management practices and tips to improve productivity.
To solve this issue, you can allocate a fixed daily schedule to deal with emails. Scheduling specific times just for email allows you to focus on one email at a time. It also helps you finish and eliminate them faster instead of multitasking.
4. Follow The Touch-It-Once Principle
The touch-it-once principle works more effectively than the previous strategy of having an email schedule. As its name suggests, touch-it-once means working on a specific email immediately. Instead of returning to the same email repeatedly, you open it once, do whatever action needs to be taken, close it and move to the next one.
Practicing this principle is particularly important when dealing with large volumes of emails every day, especially with shared inboxes. It reduces distractions due to the anxiety of unreplied emails and improves overall productivity.
5. Unsubscribe Best Practices Of Email Management
One of the most effective email management tips is unsubscribing from emails you no longer need.
Most employees subscribe to websites and newsletters relevant to their domain to stay updated with industry news and improve their skills. However, you may subscribe to numerous newsletters and end up cluttering your inbox.
Identifying the most critical subscriptions and unsubscribing from the irrelevant ones can help reduce the daily emails you receive, keeping your inbox organized and less chaotic.
Takeaway
Using the best practices for email management is critical for any business looking to maximize its employee’s overall productivity. Without proper email management, companies could waste money, increase employee burnout, and potentially lose clients.
Thus, consider implementing the strategies mentioned above to help you master the art of email management for a more streamlined workflow and increased productivity.
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