Organizing email: How to clean house without breaking a sweat

That’s a whopping one-third of the work week.

Luckily, when it comes to your inbox, cleaning house can be a lot easier—and it doesn’t require any elbow grease or expensive housekeeping.

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How to organize email without breaking a sweat

Cleaning up your inbox is as easy as getting down and dirty with some often-overlooked email tools that are right at your fingertips. Here are just a few simple tips and tricks for managing, organizing and cleaning up that email:

1. File away the clutter.

If you have a messy workspace, you file stuff away. Same goes for a messy inbox. That’s where folders come in handy. And while everybody knows about them, not everyone uses them to their fullest potential. Be warned, however, the initial process of creating folders is not fun, but once you’ve done it, life will get a lot easier. Everyone’s system will be different. Some will organize folders by client or project name. Others will do it by priority level. If you’re managing a household, you may have one folder for bills and another for kid-related events. Students may organize by class, project or due date. Once you figure out what works for you, be sure to put each email into its proper place as it arrives.

2. Take out the trash.

While email technology has gotten a lot better at recognizing junk email and filing it away as spam, some still gets through. That’s where a simple setting change can make a big difference. Most email providers let you choose some type of junk email options, like the ability to block individual senders, domains or even certain countries from getting into your inbox. One easy way to do it is to right click on the junk mail and block it, or mark it as spam. You can also set different levels of spam filtering based on personal preference: low, medium or high.

3. Save the strings for laundry day.

So, you deleted that huge string of emails and now you’re left with one long email to scroll through. Many email providers let you simplify those email strings by instead displaying them as conversations. It makes them a lot easier to read since they’re now condensed into one simplified view. Depending on your email provider, you can usually activate this feature under View or Settings.

4. Make a chore list.

Lists help keep everything top-of-mind so things get done in a timely manner. Same goes for cleaning up your inbox. Instead of saving emails, notes, calendar events and other items in your email—you can save them as files on your desktop. This keeps your to-do list front-and-center, while also keeping your inbox tidy and clutter-free. With Outlook, you can easily drag the item from Outlook right on to your desktop—with other types of email, you should be able to right click, select File then Save As to your desktop.

5. Dust off some tried-and-true tools.

There’s nothing worse than coming home from vacation to a dirty house. The same rings true for a messy, overflowing inbox. One obvious way to cut down on the clutter is by setting up an automated out-of-office reply or by posting your time-off on a shared calendar. That way, everyone knows not to bother emailing you (in theory). Of course, depending on your situation, you may end up with lots of email anyway. That’s where your email’s clean-up function can come in handy. This removes all the duplicated email replies, and gives you one, simple thread instead of several individual emails.

6. Hang the “keep out” sign.

Chances are, your house has certain sanctuaries that are off limits (like your home office, man/mom cave, bedroom, etc.). These areas offer a bit of a refuge from everyday life, so you strive to maintain them as stress-free zones. The same should go for your email. Getting constant pop-up email notifications to your desktop when you’re trying to concentrate or work on something else is a major distraction. Luckily, you can adjust your desktop alert settings by creating custom rules that only allow certain messages to come through. For example, you can choose to only allow certain contacts, domains, etc. to get through. While this feature won’t keep your inbox clutter free, it gives you extra time to “clean house” in other important areas without being disturbed.

7. Delegate duties.

You have an email ready to go but you don’t want to send it right away. Maybe you wrote it at midnight and don’t want it to arrive after hours. Perhaps you’re negotiating a sale and don’t want to appear overly eager. Most email providers give you the option to compose your message now and send it later using a delay delivery option. You choose when it goes out—and then it’s out of sight, out of mind. This helps you clean up your email to-do list and get on with your day or evening.

Now that you know a little more about the email tools available, don’t be afraid to try them out. Once you do, you’ll find that cleaning house is a lot easier than you might think… no mops, vacuums or feather dusters required.