Your Guide To Achieving Inbox Zero
Struggling with productivity? Endless emails getting you down? You need to clear out your inbox.
While this might seem like a daunting task, getting your email management under control is one of the best ways to improve your productivity and efficiency levels. We all spend so much time sifting through an overflowing inbox, wasting our day filtering out the irrelevant messages just to get to the emails that matter. We’re all looking for the secret to email management, so how can you get your inbox in order?
Inbox zero tools are designed to clean out your inbox, and your mind, to ensure that you’re focusing on the work that matters. But what is inbox zero, and how does it benefit your email management?
Find out how to get your inbox to zero in a few simple steps below.
What is inbox zero?
Inbox zero is an approach to email management and striving towards an empty email inbox – or as empty as it can be. The initial aim is to get your inbox down to zero, and from then onwards avoid wasting time and brain power spent trawling through emails – if you don’t need to be looking at your emails, then you shouldn’t be. The concept was developed by productivity expert Merlin Mann, who described it as: “It’s not how many messages are in your inbox – it’s how much of your own brain is in that inbox.”.
With inbox zero tools, it’s not about moving irrelevant emails out of the way, but instead making sure that they never make it into your inbox in the first place.
How to get your inbox to zero: email management tips
Here are a few email management tips to help you achieve an empty email inbox, and clear your brain of unnecessary clutter – including some advice from Merlin Mann:
- Close your email app – if you leave it open you’ll only be tempted by the notifications. That way, you’ll spend more time on work that matters.
- Set regular times to check through your emails, rather than opening the app every few minutes.
- Delete or archive any new emails as you can, to avoid unnecessary clutter.
- If an email can be responded to in a couple of minutes or less, respond to it right away – don’t let the little tasks build up (a rule created by David Allen in “Getting Things Done”).
- Is there someone else who’s better suited to answering it? Forward it on and file it away.
- If it takes more than a couple of minutes to answer, or doesn’t require an immediate response, create a new folder for emails that need a response to separate them from your inbox.
- Make sure you set some time aside each day to respond to these emails to gradually work your way through them.
- Use email management software to manage priorities and automatically file emails away that aren’t relevant to you – keeping your folders organised and well managed.
Email management software from Virtual Cabinet
Do you want to get your inbox down to zero, without all the admin time? At Virtual Cabinet, we are dedicated to helping you streamline your business and workflows – improving overall productivity and staff output.
Our automatic filing system works for both documents and email – making your life easy with unique rules that are tailored to suit your business needs. With conversation capture you can use rules to index the first email in a conversation with your client, which then automatically file any emails and attachments within that conversation. And with bespoke email address and subject rules, you can automatically capture messages based on the addresses in your CRM system and information within the subject line – that way, you spend less time on email admin and more time on important tasks. Save your brain power and let your email management software do the work for you.
The secret to productivity?
Achieving inbox zero is just the beginning – with the GetBusy task management tool, you’re one step closer to missing less, forgetting less, chasing up less and getting more done with clarity. Bring order and organisation to your growing and evolving work environment with the Virtual Cabinet task management tool.
Book your free demo today and receive advice from a product and industry expert – helping you achieve inbox zero, efficient communication and streamlined task management.