{"id":64,"date":"2010-09-17T09:00:52","date_gmt":"2010-09-17T14:00:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/southern-seo.com\/?p=64"},"modified":"2017-04-17T20:16:21","modified_gmt":"2017-04-18T01:16:21","slug":"time-management-reduce-email-clutter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/southern-seo.com\/?p=64","title":{"rendered":"Time Management: Reduce Email Clutter"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>If you&#39;re like most people, every month the list of to-dos, appointments and demands grows larger. There are times when life can be a little overwhelming. <strong><span style=\"color: blue;\">Are you ready to simplify your days so you can live life on your terms?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>\t<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" align=\"left\" alt=\"email clutter\" border=\"0\" height=\"224\" hspace=\"2\" src=\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/mail_clutter.jpg\" vspace=\"2\" width=\"300\" \/>A little technology can go a long way in getting your life in order while saving time and minimizing stress. But, technology that causes more stress isn&#39;t <em>really<\/em> helping you. E-mail has become a great source of stress for a lot of people, including yours truly. Where do you start?<\/p>\n<p>\t<strong><span style=\"color: blue;\">Go on an e-mail diet.<\/span><\/strong> Unsubscribe from EVERY electronic mailing and commercial list that you <strong>never read<\/strong>. For me, this cut down about 20% of my daily e-mail. This only takes a little time but will pay long-term dividends. Most e-mail lists offer a way to unsubscribe near the bottom of the e-mail. It&#39;s actually the law. If they don&#39;t and you can&#39;t seem to get off the list, then block the e-mail using your e-mail software&#39;s tools. For those on Facebook, you should stop all of the notifications from being sent to you. If you love Facebook, set a time each day to get on and catch up.<\/p>\n<p>\t<strong><span style=\"color: blue;\">DRAFT your e-mail.<\/span><\/strong> You&#39;ll be amazed at what a difference following this quick tip will do for your e-mail inbox. It&#39;s an acronym that stands for &quot;Discard,&quot; &quot;Refer,&quot; &quot;Act,&quot; &quot;File,&quot; or &quot;Table.&quot; Here&#39;s what they all mean&#8230;<br \/>\n\t&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>DISCARD:<\/strong> Trash it. If it will never be retrieved again, don&#39;t keep it. Remember that your e-mail folders are for storing information and resources, not a dead storage place. Just delete it.<\/li>\n<li><strong>RESPOND: <\/strong>If someone else can respond to the e-mail for you, or if someone else needs the information, pass it on or give it up! Don&#39;t get caught in a paper trail jail. Here&#39;s where some of you need to be aware of what you do to others by passing on trivial information. Most of us don&#39;t care about seeing the redneck lion (a dog shaved to look like a lion.) While I enjoy humor as much as anyone, this takes time and some folks don&#39;t appreciate it. Your friends will like you much more if you don&#39;t send them this kind of e-mail clutter. Try to keep this type of &quot;information&quot; limited to Facebook or some other type of social media site.<\/li>\n<li><strong>ACT:<\/strong> Act on it now. Don&#39;t procrastinate. Answer routine e-mail immediately. If not, the time needed to tackle your e-mail later on can snowball! This will created a new source of stress.<\/li>\n<li><strong>FILE:<\/strong> File it in subfolders. If you don&#39;t have these setup already, start with major categories and then get more detailed as warranted. You can have subfolders of subfolders but it&#39;s probably not wise to go much deeper than this. There are other tricks to help in finding that filed e-mail later.<\/li>\n<li><strong>TABLE:<\/strong> Table it. If you need it at some time in the near future, other than today, place it in a simple &quot;follow-up&quot; system for easy, quick access! Use this sparingly and set aside a time on your schedule to &quot;follow-up.&quot;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong><span style=\"color: blue;\">Set a Computer Curfew.<\/span><\/strong> Give yourself a &quot;computer curfew&quot; and plan to check your e-mail at only certain times of the day. By setting limits, e-mail will be less likely to take over your entire day. This goes double for Facebook time.<a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/ben_grey\/4380871348\/\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" align=\"right\" alt=\"You've Got Mail\" border=\"0\" height=\"159\" hspace=\"2\" src=\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/youve_got_mail.jpg\" vspace=\"2\" width=\"240\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong><u>Quotes:<\/u><\/strong> <br \/>\n\t<em><span style=\"color: blue;\">&quot;Productivity is determined not by work&#8230; but by EFFECTIVE actions disguised as work.&quot;<\/span><\/em> &#8212; Doug Firebaugh<\/p>\n<p>\t<em><span style=\"color: blue;\">&quot;You don&#39;t have to be great to get started, but you have to get started to be great.&quot;<\/span><\/em> &#8212;&nbsp; Les Brown<\/p>\n<p>\t<em><span style=\"color: blue;\">&quot;Don&#39;t wait. The time will never be just right.&quot;<\/span><\/em> &#8212; Napoleon Hill<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>If you&#39;re like most people, every month the list of to-dos, appointments and demands grows larger. There are times when life can be a little overwhelming. Are you ready to simplify your days so you can live life on your <span class=\"excerpt-dots\">&hellip;<\/span> <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"http:\/\/southern-seo.com\/?p=64\"><span class=\"more-msg\">Continue reading &rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[8,10,11,12],"class_list":["post-64","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-business","tag-goals","tag-success","tag-time-management"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/southern-seo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/southern-seo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/southern-seo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/southern-seo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/southern-seo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=64"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/southern-seo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":719,"href":"http:\/\/southern-seo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64\/revisions\/719"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/southern-seo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=64"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/southern-seo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=64"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/southern-seo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=64"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}