By now you know Gmail's fundamentals. It's been around since 2004 and is the dominant email platform in the West. But the chances are you could be using it more efficiently. Your Gmail game should be better than it is. To help you navigate the complex world of email etiquette, we've gone deep on ways to make your inbox more streamlined.
Inbox zero
Before we even get to Gmail there's something you should consider: inbox zero. You're either inbox zero, or you're not. If you want to commit to it then you have to change your mindset and how you handle emails.
The idea behind inbox zero is that you should never have emails sitting in your inbox. Instead the inbox acts as an in-tray. You consider what needs to be done with the email and then act upon it. If the email can be answered quickly, bash out a response there and then. If it's something that take some more consideration it gets added to a to-do list and the email itself gets moved into a folder.
The point is that emails should never be accumulating in your inbox for too long. It's best to keep the main Gmail view of messages empty. There are plenty of other ways to handle your email but inbox zero is an efficient and fairly simple way to do so. It takes a little bit of preparation to get up and running – such as deleting the 17,000 outstanding messages in your inbox – but once it's underway then its true power can be realised.
Filter as much as possible
Filters are your way to make Gmail actually useful. In short: filters are sets of automated rules you can apply to emails you've been sent. Filters can highlight messages from your boss, apply labels to conversations about a specific subject and make email completely bypass your inbox.
Filters can be found in Gmail's settings. First you need to define what is getting filtered – options include, by sending, subject, whether attachments are included, or emails that contain specific words. For example all emails to or from example@wired.co.uk can be filtered.
Once you have decided what to filter, you need to pick what the action will be. It's here where Gmail gets powerful. You can tell Google to automatically mark those emails as important, apply a label to them, add a star, delete them or myriad other options.
Filters can created without visiting Gmail's settings. Once you have an email opened, clicking on the down arrow in the search bar will automatically set that as a filter. You can then select the action required. It's also possible to create filters by selecting the three dots option at the top of a message and pressing the 'filter messages like these' option.
Get organised
Gmail's labels are the best way to organise your inbox. The colourful little icons work as tags and allow you to group emails on the same subject in one place. Applying a label to an email chain will place it alongside all other messages with the same label. This makes it possible to easily view related messages in one place.
Labels can be colour co-ordinated and removed via Gmail's left-hand side menu. By hovering over a label and clicking the three dots that appear it is possible to make labels appear in the message list and make them visible or invisible in the labels list.
On top of labels, Gmail's settings give you a ton of personalisation options. Change the number of conversations shown on a page to 50 or 100 and you'll see plenty of emails in one place; turn on auto reply all as a default behaviour; turn-up the time to cancel sending messages to 30 seconds; and whizz through your inbox by enabling auto-advance, which instantaneously opens the next message once you archive or delete the one you are reading.
Schedule and snooze
Two of Gmail's most recent additions make emailing more pleasant. The first is scheduled send. It does what the name suggests and lets you send messages at a later time and date. Clicking the down arrow next to Gmail's send button allows you to pick a time and date when a message should be delivered.
You no longer have to send messages to colleagues in a different timezone in the middle of the night, or if you're instantly responding to a received message adding a delay can show that you weren't overly enthusiastic about its contents.
In similar circumstances the snooze button allows emails to be moved out of your inbox until a later time and date. Clicking the clock icon within Gmail gives the option of delaying a message until a time when you are ready to look at it. The snooze button helps you keep inbox zero.
Get some extensions
If you're using Gmail at work then there's a good chance it will be through G-Suite, Google's software offering for businesses. As well as a host of Chrome Extensions, G-Suite also offers apps that can integrate with Gmail.
This lets you add compatibility with third-party services you may already be using. You can add Trello integration to connect cards and boards to your email; Dropbox to introduce your files to Gmail, and Zoom to bring video conferencing into your inbox.
Get on top of shortcuts
Keyboard shortcuts will save you more time in Gmail than possibly any other piece of advice. Email is fundamentally keyboard based and if you can get around your inbox without reaching for the mouse then life becomes that little bit easier.
To start with, a press of C within the inbox view will open a new message for you to compose. E archives messages, B opens the snooze menu, Ctrl+K will add a link, and / will open the search menu. Elsewhere, a press of R starts a reply to a message, N goes to the next message in an open conversation and V will open the Move To menu allowing a message to be placed under one of your previously created labels.
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
