Welcome to the first Edition of the Tool Smith.
We start simple. Before jumping to AI tech stack, let’s see if we are using basic tool functionalities much.
Now I’m not going to teach how to open an email and write an email here! Just how to organise them. Save 15-30 mins a day, if not more.
Today, we have Emails signups practically everywhere. Any new app, website, blog, business, required Email first. And we have all the emails at one place. It gets tricky sometimes to find the important ones, or sometimes we miss them altogether.
Now first let do a mental categorisation. What are the most important emails that you can ever receive?
1. Financial Emails (bank statements, transactions, credit card dues)
2. Personal Work (Job updates, side hustles, cold outreach responses)
3. Subscriptions (newsletters, OTT, blogs etc)
Now each one of them can be categorised into vendors and you can get 5-10 categories. But keep them less, keep the simple. The feature that I’m talking about is Labels.
How to create them?
The Create New Label option in the left bar is pretty self-explanatory. You create a label, add a colour and you have a label ready. But the trickier part is getting emails added into those.
For that we start with the filter icon besides the search button
Once you click on the filter icon, you get Criteria as to how you want to create a rule to send the corresponding emails into a label.
Once you add some filter (like for example I’ve categorised mails from Apple Marketing team into a filter, you select on Create Filter. Then you go to the rule section. This is the interesting part.
Now I add criterias:
I don’t want apple marketing emails to come to inbox. So Skip inbox.
Apply a Label, in this case Apple.
Never to send it to spam.
Add the filter to apply matching conversations (basically it selects the older emails to go into the label as well. Cleans Inbox)
Now how does it help me or improves my productivity?
No distraction : I don’t see Apple marketing emails in my inbox. Don’t waste time everybody surfing random Apple products
Decluttered feel : Inbox seems clean and I’m in more control of emails I read
Easy navigation when needed : When I wish to see some promo offers, I click on Apple label and read through the emails. or Delete them if I wish to as well.
All in all, I have more clarity on my inbox and more access of other specific emails. Helps especially with transactions and bills to collate at the end of the month. Just create a label of bank accounts, add bank related emails there and see the magic.
So there you go. A simple, easy solution to get organised. Some might call it a productivity hack as well! But it’s just getting organised. Hope this helps.
Keep an eye for the next one.
I’ll bring an AI tool that helps you create presentations!
Thanks
MJ
About Tool Smith
A Dedicated newsletter just to empower people with tools so that they become more effective at work and their daily life.