Email is my primary source of communication with existing and potential clients. So it is important to me to keep my inbox as organized and minimal as possible.
I’ve deleted all the unnecessary emails in the past and unsubscribed from many websites, but my inbox still gets cluttered very quickly. That’s why I committed to getting my inbox down to zero emails by the end of each day.
In this post, I’m going to share, from my own experience, how you can keep your inbox free from emails so you will have peace of mind.
Step 1: Archive all your emails in your inbox
Just select all the emails and click on ‘Archive.’ This way you get instant relief from all clutter and you can focus on processing new emails. I like this option because it reminds me how I want to see my inbox at the end of the day and how it makes me feel less stressed.
Step 2: Process all new emails immediately
Processing is the key step. Go to your archive and check the new emails. You must process all new emails as soon as possible after reading them. I use flags to categorize all the new emails.
I have three main flag tag named Taxes, To-Do, and Read.
- Taxes: I keep important emails that I might reference in future in this category.
- To-Do: This category includes all the emails that I need to act on. It is mostly work related but also include other types of emails that I need to act on such as returning an item. I also keep the emails that I need to reply in this box but I always try to reply my emails quickly.
- Read: I like to read blogs and websites that I find value in it. I keep the ones I like or the ones I haven’t read yet in this folder.
Step 3: Go through your emails once a week.
If you haven’t go through your emails yet, I would recommend you to delete any email that you know you’re never going to need again and unsubscribe from all the memberships that you think unnecessary. There are various websites that help you to detect your subscriptions and unsubscribe from all of them at once.
If you have already gone through your emails and tried out the inbox zero method, I would recommend you to go through your emails once a week and delete any item that is not needed anymore. This will help you to keep your categories clean as well.
I follow these steps almost every day and I love the feeling I get when my inbox is empty. It helps me to stay more organized and focused on important work. Here is my inbox after applying the above steps. I think it looks pretty clean, doesn’t it?
Thank you for reading and I hope this article was helpful for you. If you want to ask questions or share your thoughts, feel free to write in the comments section below
