January 1st, 2018. My inbox was out of control. THOUSANDS of emails. Ads, order confirmations, shipping notifications, probably some real emails in there too that I never replied to (sorry!). It was beyond the point of no return. I wanted to be an inbox zero person, but there was just no way I could ever go through the madness that was my inbox to get there. And it's not like I could just delete all the emails. There's some important stuff buried deep inside there. But I did it, y'all. I became an inbox zero person. Well, more like inbox 30-40 (business and personal combined), but I'm pretty dang happy with that.
Here's how I did it and how you can do it, too!
1. Commit. You have to be ready. But trust me, it's not that hard!
2. Select ALL your emails and move them to a pre-whatever the year is folder. This may take a little time to get them all selected. But it will get them out of your inbox. The good news is that it also keeps them from being deleted so you can still search for them.
3. Make folders. Think of any emails you may want to keep handy and make a folder for them. Examples may include sales and purchases (if you have a business), folders for each of your kids (I always keep things like camp registrations for Gabe, at least until the camp has passed), home (I have one for the home we're currently leasing and for the home we own so it's easy for me to access leases and maintenance information). You may think of more as the year goes on, but go ahead and set up the folders for the ones you know you'll need.
4. Sort the emails. It doesn't work if you don't do the work. You can do it daily, weekly, when it needs it, whatever. Just do it. Take a few minutes and delete emails you don't need and move the ones you need to keep. It's actually pretty amazing how simple it is. It makes me wonder how my inbox ever got into the thousands in the first place!
So what's the deal with the 30-40 emails that I mentioned are almost always in there? I keep order confirmations and shipping notifications in my inbox until items are received WHEN I DON'T HAVE AN ACCOUNT with the company I ordered from. If I have an account, I can access all that information there so I usually delete the emails. I normally have a few emails that also need some sort of action. This week, baseball camp registration for Gabe, wholesale inquiries that I need to reply to, and a giveaway I'm working on. I also usually have a few work emails that need to be sorted. Every sale I make results in 2-3 emails automatic emails in my inbox and those add up quickly!
So how does your inbox look? Can't sleep unless you zero it out? Thousands of emails don't bother you? Let me know if you decide to go zero for 2019!
