Reader Project: Clear Your Mail Inbox

mailiconI decided it was time for a reader project, so we can get our email inboxes sorted for the Christmas holidays. The last thing anyone wants over Christmas is to be stressing over their email overflow.

As a team we are going to help each other out to clean out our inboxes and get our Mail application sorted and cleaned. Over the course of this week I will be posting tips and tricks on how to manage your Mail application, your workflow, and more.

Your job is by the end of the week to be happy with the state of your Mail application, and have it set up so you can be much more organized. The first step is to start by taking a snapshot of the current state of Mail, upload it to Flickr or other sharing site, and post a link in the comments so we can see your mess.

The before you get started, read this extremely popular article I write a few months back on “6 Ways To Organize Your Mail Application”

Watch out for many tips and tricks coming this week, let’s get our inboxes sorted!

Want to help me announce this project? Then copy and paste the following text to your own blog to help spread the word and extend our knowledge around the blogosphere.

“Want to get your Mail inbox sorted and organized before the holiday season? Then head over to GlennWolsey.com where he is running a Reader Project to clean out your Mail inbox and get organized. He will be posting tips and tricks over the course of the next week to help you on your way. To get started, hit up this introduction blog post, and then read this initial post full of tips and tricks.

Comments

  1. #1

    Richard Neal

    I just delete everything in Mail every month. Gmail just archives it when it downloads, and whenever I need something old, it’s just two clicks away.

  2. #2

    Josh → maconlyreview.wordpress.com

    I’ve put mine up on my blog post. Really great idea Glenn.

  3. #3

    yannic → yannicwalter.de

    No mess here.

  4. #4

    Josh → maconlyreview.wordpress.com

    Direct link to my photo. Yannic, do you delete all emails after so long then? Or are you a web-based email guy

  5. #5

    yannic → yannicwalter.de

    No I file them in their respective folder shortly after reading them.

  6. #6

    Sam → www.gosammy.com

    Here’s my screenshot. I’ll put an aside link to this on my blog as well.

    I was able to organize my mail much better after reading the “6 Ways To Organize Your Mail Applicationâ€? article, but my inbox still tends to pile up because of work emails which would disappear from webmail if I moved them into a folder. I’ll need to find a solution to that.

  7. #7

    Clear Your Mail Inbox at goSammy → www.gosammy.com/2006/12/04/clear-your-mail-inbox

    [...] Clear Your Mail Inbox Want to get your Mail inbox sorted and organized before the holiday season? Then head over to GlennWolsey.com where he is running a Reader Project to clean out your Mail inbox and get organized. He will be posting tips and tricks over the course of the next week to help you on your way. To get started, hit up this introduction blog post, and then read this initial post full of tips and tricks. [...]

  8. #8

    wph

    Mine’s fine now. Not a single messae in the in box.

    Am I orderly, or do I just have no friends?

  9. #9

    Taylor → www.taylorsblog.com

    HAHA! I’m with wph, sorta. My email inbox is always cleared at the end of the day. That is why the “delete all” button comes in handy. :-P. I have saved email in an orderly folder! Good idea.

    Check out my post:

    http://www.taylorsblog.com

  10. #10

    Smaran → smarandayal.com

    I have this excellent rule in Mail that archives e-mails older than 1 month. I set this up because my inbox was starting to take too long to load. If anyone wants to know the specifics of my rule, let me know. As for a screenshot, I’ll pass. My mailbox is off-limits to the world. All those love letters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . NOT! (Borat style)

    @ Yannic: Eww, uno-crap :-P

    @ Sam: That’s a … different … theme you’ve got going. Hmmm. Definitely not something I would use.

    Glenn wrote:
    “The before you get started, read this extremely popular article I write a few months back on “6 Ways To Organize Your Mail Applicationâ€?”

    This extremely popular article you wrote a few months back? I’m starting to wonder who the Indian is, you or me. :-P

  11. #11

    Codie Westphall → www.8flow.com

    oh man im a like an hour too late iv just spent a bit of time cleaning up my inbox, archiving important stuff and delteting/bouncing bullshit crap like BUY VIAGRA NOW YOU NEED IT wtf im 15 i dont need viagra

  12. #12

    Michael → michaelyurechko.com

    @ Smaran.

    Stop bashing UNO. First on flickr, now on Glenn’s blog.

    Wow, I hate having emails in my inbox. I delete/bounce all junk mail, and I archive anything that I’ll need later.

    At the moment I have no mail in my inbox, 2 smart folders (Today and Yesterday) as well as 2 other folders named “Follow Up” and “Archive”.

    Then I have a couple more folders inside each to split up work/personal. I deal with my inbox in the morning, after school, and night. Always clearing it.

  13. #13

    Smaran → smarandayal.com

    I’ll bash UNO all I want, Michael. It’s lame and it ruins the OS X interface. It lacks depth and I pray to the Gods of Cobol (BGS rules!) that Apple doesn’t implement such a thing in Leopard.

    I’ve tried bouncing e-mails, it doesn’t work! I get more spam from those senders. Bouncing e-mails is like confirming that you got them. When an e-mail actually bounces, it send a different message, but when you manually bounce it, it goes back through your SMTP server, just like if you would send a reply.

  14. #14

    Josh → maconlyreview.wordpress.com

    @ Smaran

    I’d like to know what the specifics of the rule is. I’ve only got 2000 emails in my Mail inbox so I’m not seeing any slowdown at all, but it would be nice to organise things a bit better. I suppose that’s what we’re waiting for with Glenns tips though!

  15. #15

    Smaran → smarandayal.com

    Okay, here’s the rule:

    “If date received is older than 30 days, move message to folder Archive.”

    That way your inbox will load up super fast forever. And when you need to find an old e-mail, just use the search bar and it’ll search all folders by default.

    I had a few years of e-mail, so my inbox would take 3-5 seconds to load up each time. Quite painful.

  16. #16

    Chris Thomson → christhomsonblog.com

    Okay, here’s the rule:

    “If date received is older than 30 days, move message to folder Archive.”

    That way your inbox will load up super fast forever. And when you need to find an old e-mail, just use the search bar and it’ll search all folders by default.

    I had a few years of e-mail, so my inbox would take 3-5 seconds to load up each time. Quite painful.

    Thanks! This is very helpful!! Having ~3000 messages I don’t need and ~1000 Bacn messages, I need an archive folder badly. Thanks for the helpful rule Smaran :D

  17. #17

    Nasru → www.hghenergizer.net

    I have found few blogs having good content. And I think you are doing a very good work buddy. Keep up your work. This post was really a nice piece of your work.

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