11 Tips to Master Those Email Ninja Skills

Welcome to Part III of my series, Email For The Small Business Owner, where I’ll be outlining specific tips and tricks to help you get a handle on email to keep focused on what’s important.

Missing an opportunity. Being late to the party. Not meeting that critical contact. Waiting on a client’s response. Waiting on an employee’s response. Waiting on the latest quote from a supplier. These are only some of the things that keep a small business owner up at night.

It’s no wonder you are a slave to the technology that’s supposed to make your life easier. There’s an infinite number of ways for people to get in touch with you: phone, cell phone, email, mail, text-message, instant message, Facebook, Twitter. On top of all these infinite number of distractions you are supposed to run a business too?

I’ll share the following 11 tips to help you get a handle on email and, hopefully, regain your inbox and (some of) your sanity.

1. Delegate

If you have an assistant (and I know most small business owners don’t) then grant them access to your email to help keep it organized. If you need an assistant, virtual assistants are increasingly popular and may provide the small business owner the ROI (Return On Investment) to justify the marginal expense.

2. Check Email At Timed Intervals

It’s important to check email; to keep connected. You have more important things to tend to in a day unless you’re in the business of reading email. When email becomes a distraction it hurts your bottom line. Instead, schedule times throughout the day that you check and process email. Maybe, every 30-60 minutes you open up your inbox for 2 minutes. Process emails quickly by adding the following email folders/labels: @ToRead, @ToReply, @ToDo, @ToFile. Add each email to a folder and get it out of your inbox.

In order to make this work, don’t read anything more then the subject. Otherwise, you’ll be sucked in to reading the entire email. Or replying. Or making a phone call…

3. Schedule Time to Read and Respond to Email

Stopping to read and reply to every email prevents you from keeping your business moving. Instead schedule regular times (2-4 times a day) to stop and read emails that need reading and reply to emails that need replying. If the email triggers a to-do item, then add it to your to-do list. (Personally, I’m a big fan of RememberTheMilk.com).

Don’t spend more then 30 minutes reading and replying to email. There are rare cases when a long, well thought out email is warranted. 99.99% of the email we read and reply to don’t fall into that category.

4. Turn Off Alerts

Turn off alerts in order to keep you from being tempted to look at every email as it comes in. These constant distracts inhibit your ability to concentrate on the task at hand. Alarms that need turning off include:

• The popup on your computer.
• The “ding” on your cell phone.
• The vibration of your cell phone.
• The blinking light on your phone.
• The SMS message alerts.

Turn off all alerts. If it’s a critical emergency people will get a hold of you beyond email. The only thing your phone should be alerting you to is incoming phone calls.

I have a visual notification bar on my Android phone to display alerts and such. But I have to actively look for them. The phone does not interrupt me with sound or vibration to alert me of a new messages.

5. Restrict Email to 5 Sentences or Less

Limit your email to 5 sentences or less. Make your subject clear and obvious, summarizing the entire email. This is a tough one but doeable 95% of the time. Stop wasting everyone’s time (and money) with lengthy emails and focus on igniting action with email.

6. Use Rules and Filters to Auto-process Email

Mail clients come with Rules or Filters which process email for you. This is handy for newsletters and emails from specific people. Not to mention types of emails. Look for patterns in the messages you receive and set up filters accordingly. For example, I have one that filters when the subject contains “Order OR Receipt OR Confirmation,” applies a label of “Receipt” and marks it as Read. I then verify the filter worked when I process email and Archive it after I’ve seen it.

7. Unsubscribe From Email Lists

We all knowingly, or unknowingly subscribe to email lists and newsletters. Worse, I’ve subscribed to the same newsletter with multiple email accounts. If you don’t read them or get any value from the lists and newsletters, then unsubscribe. Save yourself from having it clutter up your inbox.

8. Website FAQ’s to Answer Common Questions

Answering the same email again and again from customers and employees? Use a website to post FAQ’s (Frequently Asked Questions) and cut down your unnecessary emails. When a customer asks the question in email, give a brief answer with a link to the FAQ page for more detail. Do it repeatedly and they’ll learn to look there first and ask you follow up questions.

9. Delete

That joke, while mildly amusing, is not worth your bottom line. Delete anything you can, especially that which is not related to your business. How important is that coupon that expired 6 months ago? You get no value from keeping it, but still wastes your time having to skim past it looking for important emails.

10. My Favorite: Archive

A lot of entrepreneurs and small business owners I’ve met are pack rats in one way or another. Whether it’s spare parts, receipts, articles or email there’s something about hoarding resources that’s part of the small business way of life. And with most email accounts you have enough space to save everything. As my dad would say: “Then you’ve got the thing there in case you need it.” But saving email is not the same as having it live in your inbox. Apply a label if you can then archive it.

11. Utilize Search

Most email clients (especially gmail) have great search features. Learn to utilize search. Just be sure with clients like Outlook that you know where you’re searching. By default Outlook will search in the currently folder only. But you can open it up to search the entire mailbox.

There you have my top 11 tips on how to get your inbox under control. If you can learn to implement these rules you’ll free up more time to get work done and email will become less of a distraction and burden.