Organize & Filter Your Inbox to Get 4 Days of Your Life Back
Yes, we know — a newsletter telling you to clean up your inbox via your inbox. The irony isn't lost on us. Moving on.
Spend an Hour to Save Four Days: If you're anything like us, you get hundreds of emails a day. Shaving off just 15 minutes of daily inbox wrangling adds up to an entire workweek saved every year.
All it takes is one hour of setup to reclaim your time with benefits that compound for weeks (or months).
Start With Your Filters: The most impactful tip we can give you is to maximize your use of filters for inbound email. This isn't just to clean out junk or to auto-open things; this will also help you get through the emails you do want to read much faster!
Each email provider will have a slightly different way to setup your filters. Google, YouTube, or ChatGPT can give you some guidance on the details but we recommend the categories below
Our Top Filter Setups:
By Sender - There are emails that you always read from specific senders, and there are ones you never read, but still want them for reference. Sorting by the sender of these emails allows you to either mass "mark as read" or to jump straight to the ones you know need attention.
By Subject - This is useful when you get a few different emails from the same sender but again, want to skip over some.
Meetings - If a large chunk of your day is spent logging in and out of video calls, this is a Game-Changer. Filter your meeting notifications by type (invite, accepted, declined, etc.) and free up your inbox!
Notifications - You want to be able to visually scan these quickly, maybe it's comments from another application, order shipment alerts, or something else you want a record of. Putting these in one folder turns the whack-a-mole approach to a QUICK check and move on.
Mark as Read: Once filtered, take it a step further and auto-mark-as-read the stuff you never read but still need to keep. (Accepted meetings, system alerts, comments.) Just... don't lump in FlexVerk Friday to that list.
1-Touch Rule: If you open it, act on it. Reply, archive, snooze, delete, forward, pretty much anything besides letting it sit. Aging emails only add to decision fatigue.
Bonus Tip: Schedule your inbox time like a meeting, block some time once or a few times a day and your inbox will stay in control while your brain stays focused in between.
Remote Rhythm
from
Everything is a Funnel
Whether you're optimizing a marketing campaign, generating new product ideas, or considering a new car purchase, everything can be viewed as a funnel. Every process filters inputs through a series of stages that lead to an outcome. And the best part? You can forecast and optimize each step.
Not Just For Marketing and eCommerce:
Funnels are just a structured process. They take raw input, move it through key stages, and produce an outcome. Once you start viewing problems this way, you’ll think more clearly, act more intentionally, and focus on what truly drives results.
Wide OR Narrow?: Start by asking, are you trying to maximize or minimize a result? For a marketing funnel, you will try to bring as many customers to a purchase as possible. For dead plants in your flower garden, you'll work to minimize that result. Clarifying this sets the direction for every step that follows.
What's Controllable?: Once you know your objective, identify what actions influence each stage of the funnel. Can you search more websites to find suitable cars to test drive? Can you reduce client confusion with more proactive updates? Breaking down your process stage by stage will pinpoint what's controllable. This is where your leverage lies.
Time to Experiment!: If you know what you can control, now it's time to test your inputs. Change one variable at a time and then see if your stages and outcome get smaller or larger depending on the direction you're trying to move them. If nothing changes... then you haven't figured out the right controllable. Go back a step and try again. Once you see movement, you're no longer reacting; you're driving change. If you can do this consistently across your funnel, almost any problem becomes solvable.
