Ways to use Outlook Rules and/or Gmail Filters to Process Email More Efficiently

Many people are familiar with email Outlook Rules and/or Google Filters – similar tools that apply rules to emails you receive to automatically do something with the email, like move it to a different folder, mark it in some way so it pops in your inbox, etc.

I’ve used them for a while, but I knew there were more ways to use them than I was. So, I asked the women in my community on Instagram, and it reaffirmed (not that I needed it) how smart and creative the women there are. Here’s how they use them!

Note 1: Most suggestions were work-related and regarding using Outlook, but even if you’re in GSuite, they might inspire a similar approach!

Note 2: a few people mentioned the “Sweep” function in Outlook 365. “Better filters than Rules and easier to set up.” That said, the end result with Sweep is that the email is deleted, so it’s perhaps a more nimble tool – but only for email you want to delete.

Turning to Rules/Filters, I divided the suggestions up into three categories:

• Ways to deal with LESS important email (part of efficient email processing is preventing the irrelevant stuff from cluttering up the relevant); 
• Ways to deal with MORE important email; and
• Personal email tips.

Handling less important emails (especially at work; some capabilities may only be found in Outlook Rules)

• Redirecting less relevant emails to a folder and bypassing your inbox entirely:
  • Having all industry news, webinars, listservs, and newsletters automatically direct into one folder, bypassing your inbox
    • Note: Calendar time, e.g., once a month or quarter to review the folder and, if you want, delete whatever you don’t need. Otherwise, given the emails aren’t hitting your inbox at all, you might forget about them. 
  • Notifications from, e.g., a project management tool or other software could also be redirected into a folder if you check the project management tool/software frequently enough that you don’t need the notifications (this assumes you can’t change the settings in the tool/software.)
  • Organization-wide emails go directly into one folder (or at least pre-labeled for easy filing).
    • For certain ones (like conflict-check emails in my attorney days), I had these bypass my inbox entirely and scheduled time twice a week to skim through them.
  • Any emails telling you someone else accepted your invite could bypass your inbox so that only those who decline or mark it as tentative are flagged for you
• Allowing less relevant email into the inbox, but somehow marking that it’s less important:
  • For anything you’re cc-ed on, changing it to a certain color and italicized to flag for you that it’s not a to-do for you. 
• Redirecting “Heartsink Emails,” i.e., email that’s emotionally jarring:
  • From a very smart physician: “I currently only have one rule in my outlook, but it’s one that has made a huge difference. Every month we get an email with our ratings and comments. It doesn’t actually mean anything because there’s nothing I can do about it, and, while it’s always nice to read good things, seeing the email there in my inbox always instilled a sense of dread because of the potential for unfavorable comments. I realized this was bad for me after the first couple of months, so I made a rule that it automatically goes in the trash folder. This way, sometime each month when it occurs to me and I’m mentally prepared for it, I’ll take a look at it. If it doesn’t occur to me, it’s also just fine. I have since done this for other similar what I call ‘heartsink emails’ – it’s amazing!”

Highlighting more important emails (especially at work; some capabilities may only be found in Outlook Rules)

• Flagging Email from Particular People (Bosses, Clients, etc.)
  • Apply a color coding automatically
  • Have font change: Larger font, bold or italics
  • Tagged/categorized a certain way automatically
• Flagging email with specific action items: If you get notifications from a software (e.g., project management tool or other software) that you do use to flag action items for you, you could mark those by color, size, etc.
• If you have a few main clients, you could have them automatically flagged in a particular color to help orient your brain
• You can also change the view of your inbox to have some of these emails pin or show up a the top

Personal Email ideas

In addition to doing similar things to the above:

• Have labels applied automatically where you can to make archiving faster later – e.g., emails from school labeled a certain way.
• Amazon label & filter: Everything from them goes into a separate folder
• A rule that contains certain campaign-related words to send all campaign funding emails to the trash!

Have any other ideas?

Feel free to share in the comments!