How to Organize Home E-Mail

by Mary Ann Romans | More from this Blogger

06 Apr 2009 10:14 AM

Being organized can make your life a lot easier and your home more pleasant to live in. Having a chaotic e-mail system can put a lot of stress on your and waste hours weeding through things. It can also cause issues if you do electronic banking or miss important notices and appointments. Here are some tips on how to keep all of your e-mail organized.

You should treat e-mail the same way you would traditional mail. All e-mail should fall into one of three categories: Delete, To Do, Archive.

First start with setting up folders to reflect the above categories. Your mail software or website should already come with a trash of delete file. Set up a To Do file and an Archive file.

You can set up sub folders under your archive file or divide your archive file into different folders for storage. These are e-mail that you want to store for reference. Some common archive folders might be: Online Purchases, Contacts, Work Reference, Household information.

You may want to set up subfolders under your To Do file, such as Bills, Friends, Commitments.

Take advantage of "rules" to delete junk mail automatically or mark e-mail to automatically be filed in a certain folder, depending on subject line or send. This way, your friend Daphne's e-mail always winds up in the "Friends" folder.

Allow a regular time to deal with your e-mail. Aim for twice a day. Checking e-mail several times an hour and responding immediately can be distracting. Having a regular time to go through your To Do folder and knock things off of your list can be much more productive.

Take advantage of color coding or priority settings available through your e-mail service. A message from your boss or your child's school might always come in red, for example, so it doesn't get lost in the shuffle.

Mary Ann Romans writes about everything related to saving money in the Frugal Blog, creating a home in the Home Blog and caring for little ones in the Baby Blog. You can read more of her articles by clicking here.

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Learn more about Mary Ann Romans

Mary Ann Romans is a freelance writer, wife and mother of three children. She lives in Pennsylvania with her husband, the kids and a 16-pound cat.

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