Who doesn’t love email? It’s easy, convenient and trackable. We all have our various systems for managing it. Mine is far from perfect but I’m usually able to make quick decisions about each message I receive. Some emails I file away. Others I transfer to a different folder or project. Some I tag for the future and some I answer on the spot. It’s all about quick decisions. My eternal aim is to have just a few messages(Under twenty) at any given time in my mailbox. That’s the goal anyways.

It works. The field of email management is one where I feel pretty confident. However, the interruptions that come with email are another story.

The Problem

Like most people who work for a living, I keep my email client open all day. I don’t use a visual notification to alert me when new emails show up, but I do have an audio alert set up. I chose the quietest, shortest and least obtrusive alert. It’s a nice, gentle ping. Kind of relaxing actually.

But on some days, I can shoot from 20 to 120 messages in no time at all. There’s also that attention-craving Blackberry buzzing about my desk, also letting me know there are treasures to be read. How do you say no?

I try not to stray off task, but I am guilty of peeking once in a while when something comes in. Again, it’s hard to say no. The pause I take to take a peek at these emails has certainly begun to take chunks out of productivity. For instance, once the pause happens it takes me a few minutes to get back into the groove of writing. A lot of backtracking needs to be done.

This week I decided to face this problem head on.

The Solution

For me, the solution could not be removal of email. I need it. I also can’t even decide to look at it just once a day. Certain emails are time sensitive and that could be a disaster. But I no longer can afford to be run by the ping-pinging of new emails. I needed to turn the tables.

I shut down my email client.

Wait, didn’t I just say I wasn’t’ going to do that? Hear me out. I have more than 12 email accounts coming into my email client. Most of these are not accounts I need to check multiple times a day or even every day.

Also, having those twenty or so emails I have to act on staring me in the face all day tends to get, um, distracting. After all, I am not able to act on a great many of them yet.

As part of my solution, I open my email client just a few times a day to let messages download and to make sure I’m not missing anything important.

I changed my BlackBerry notification settings.

Gone are the vibrations that alert me to new messages. The Blackberry is a silent movie now.

I started using webmail.

My primary webmail account only contains my top-priority email, the messages I need to see quickly. None of these messages are tagged, labeled, colored or anything like that. There is no filtering of any kind whatsoever. This makes it perfect for a quick sneak and peek. Plus, I can delete the junk before it downloads into my email client, making it more manageable later on.

I (am trying to) reset my brain.

This is the hardest part of all. Training your brain into realizing that email WILL be there whenever you are done with what you are doing. You really and truly are not missing anything by waiting an hour to check it. The super important stuff can stream into your webmail and all will be right with the world.

That’s pretty much it. Call it a “zen state.” Call it “email meditation.” Call it what you will. It’s working. I finally feel like email is working at my command and not the other way around. It may seem simple, but I think I’m winning this battle.

What’s Your Problem?

What are your most pressing email concerns and what do you do to fix them?

How many email accounts do you have? It’s getting to be a bit overwhelming, isn’t it? The good old days seem so long ago now. You know, back when we only had three email accounts: One for work, one for personal use and one for all of the trash.

Well, times have changed. For instance, I now have five primary email accounts, and dozens more that filter into those main five. I’ve lost count of all of the webmail accounts I’ve registered for. I used to consider webmail accounts “throwaway” accounts but anyone who is a regular user of  Google Docs, Analytics or AdWords will certainly object to that. They all require use of the web’s most popular webmail service, Gmail.

This, of course, is more pronounced when dealing with freelancers or small business owners. It’s common to develop micro-businesses selling software or services from a variety of websites. These all include one or several new email addresses. It can be a bit much. Also, I’m sure email overload is becoming a frustrating issue for mainstream users as well.

Applications like Microsoft Outlook or Mozilla Thunderbird can help keep things organized. There are some little things you can do also. For instance, all of my incoming emails are color-coded or forwarded to an appropriate folder. The same goes for spam, which is filtered several times. Also, it’s good to make a habit out of deleted pertinent email threads once a project or conversation has been completed. Just because you have all of that space, doesn’t mean you have to use it all.

However, even with my diligence, problems remain. Some webmail accounts must be checked manually and do not allow access to services such as Outlook. So, what to do then? The easy answer would be to scrap some of those accounts, but we all know it’s not that easy or straightforward. It’s often a necessity to send emails from these accounts, especially if you are a freelancer that dabbles in several fields. You need to seem professional, after all.

But how widespread a problem is this? Many webmail services offer email aggregation facilities but few offer the configuration options of offline clients such as Outlook or Thunderbird. There’s also a pretty valid concern regarding full email consolidation. It could make you more susceptible to online threats, be they privacy, security or finance related.

There may not be a perfect solution. It’s something that just has to be taken as it comes. Piece by piece with due diligence. Keep things organized, to the best of your ability, and just try not to think about it. For now, let’s see what you have to say. Are you experiencing email overload? What do you do about it? Any tips will be much appreciated.

2010 is upon us. Get ready for another round of changes of both the monumental and incremental variety. Our friends as Last Exit have compiled a list of digital marketing trends for the new year. Some will seem obvious, others not so much.  Read on to discover how the new year will play out:

1. Facebook continues it ’s eventual replacement of personal e-mail – This is already happening, thanks to the massive pre-existing userbase of Facebook and a few key conveniences that sites like Gmail and Yahoo can’t offer. For one, you don’t have to remember any e-mail addresses. Just ring up your friends name and it’s message time. It even has a chat functionality built in. But don’t worry, Facebook still hasn’t made a dent into business e-mail. Maybe in 2011.

2.The Cloud Helps Open-Source Software Make Proper Money – Open-source software projects that were typically a tiny niche market are  now available to the masses. In this example, Beanstalk, a fully hosted, version-controlled code repository that uses the Subversion open-source project has created a subscription based service that – for a small fee – removes the hassle of setting up Subversions and maintaining those pesky servers.Cloud computing infrastructures is the only way to make this kind of business model profitable.  Companies like Beanstalk don’t have to upfront capital outlay for servers. With the right skills any open-source project can be commercialized this way. Bring it on.

3.Mobile commerce finally comes into it’s own -  Mobile commerce was something of a joke until the iPhone app store took the world by storm in the past year or so. This trend will continue as the new Google Nexus phone enters the fray and other companies finally play catch-up with Apple’s business models. Expect your all-in-one smart phones to be able to do all sorts of new things, for a fee, by this time next year.

4. Fewer registrations, less annoyances - How tired are we of remembering password after password after password? We are lazy, dammit! Well, companies are listening. This has already begun to happen. Notice once you sign into your Gmail account, you can pretty much do anything within the Google network. More companies will partner up to make this a reality amongst different websites. You should probably change your password from “hello” already, though. It’s 2010.

5. DIY culture comes into it’s own – Call it DIY culture, Web 2.1, or whatever you want. It’s here to stay. Sites like Cafe Press, Etsy, and even old stalwarts like eBay allow people to run their own businesses from the comforts of their own home. Etsy in particular has turned into a huge success story, allowing people to produce and sell their own art for whatever price they choose. And, of course, Etsy gets a cut. Not a bad deal for them.

6.Crowd Sourcing – Across many industries and organizations, crowd sourcing will become a growing tool as part of various outsourcing strategies. Organizations will mobilize the passionate special-interest groups to not only carry a message but also to lead and take part in activities on their behalf. From political canvassing to software development, from people journalism to environmental activism, expect to see huge growth in crowdsourcing models provoked and led, in large part, by digital social media strategies.

7.Flash overtakes the universe – Every year likes to predict the death of flash, simpler is better after all. That’s a load of podunk, though. Flash is not only here to stay, but it will be wrapping it’s sinewy tentacles into every aspect of the Internet experience this year.  Thanks in part to Adobe’s rich media tool. Also, several tricks, authoring tools and server side scripting workarounds have meant that Flash-built websites no longer serve up single, impenetrable pages. They offer deep, searchable, indexable sites that will allow acute, detailed traffic and behavioral analytics and search engine optimization. Which is good for all of us.

Well that’s it for now. Let’s meet back here at the end of year and see how wrong we were. Isn’t that part of the fun?

In this day and age, personal email should come in three flavors.  Free webmail, your own domain’s email, or hosted exchange.  If you do not fall into one of those groups, and pay for email access for no reason, let me point you in the right direction.  Here are the hilights if probably the 6 most useful free webmail companies.  Now if you are a devoted Outlook fan, most of these services allow IMAP or POP3.  GMail even offered free push style faux exchange email.  This is a break through since its the first main stream free competitor to the venerable hosted exchange solution.

Gawab:

Gawab is an Egypt based company with an AJAX based inbox.  Services include 10GB storage, 50MB attachments, IMAP, POP3, some International SMS, and delivery confirmation.  Fun fact: Gawab is the phonetic spelling of the Arabic word for “letter.”

Gmail:

Gmail is the email service from our domestic internet giant Google.  This service is my personal favorite for many reasons.  Service includes 7.5GB storage, 25MB attachments, IMAP, POP, POP+TLS, Microsoft Exchange(hooray!), account aggregation, plugins, and Google Talk.   This is my favorite because of the SPAM control and the simple down to business design (oh and exchange support!).

GMX:

GMX is a european import that is a great success overseas.  Services include 5GB storage, 50MB attachments, IMAP, POP3, mobile access, and account aggregation (up to 10 accounts).  The Mail Collector is a nice aggregation tool.

Inbox:

Inbox.com is a straight forward webmail provider.  Services include 5GB storage, POP3, SMTP, photo galleries, and 90 day inactivity protection.

Mail.com:

Mail.com is a unique webmail provider in the sense that they offer multiple domains in which to attach your email address.  Choose from including things like mail.com, email.com, techie.com, lawyer.com, and others.  Services include 3GB storage, and 60 day inactivity protection.

Yahoo! Mail:

Yahoo! was a pioneer in the free webmail world.  GMail has taken a little shine off their armor.  Services include unlimited GB storage, 25MB attachments, YIM chat, POP3, and plugins.  You have to pay to remove ads and use forwarding.  Personally I know a good amount former Yahoo! mail folks that made the move to GMail…. (may have influenced that).