10 ways to ease e-mail overload
By Jenny C. McCune • Bankrate.com

If you feel overwhelmed by e-mail, you're not alone.

Around 4.1 trillion e-mail messages are expected to be sent this year by North American businesses, according to computer market researcher International Data Corp. Add to that the millions more in personal communiqués, unwanted spam messages and automatically delivered missives spawned by computer viruses, and almost every electronic box is overflowing.

In addition to being annoying, all this e-mail is counterproductive. Most people still get the bulk of their e-mail at work, where the average office employee spends 49 minutes a day managing it, says Nancy Flynn, executive director of the Columbus, Ohio-based ePolicy Institute. Top managers can devote up to four hours or more on reading and responding to electronic messages.

Ultimately, managing e-mail takes the focus off of other, sometimes more important, tasks.

"I think that e-mail can be a distraction, particularly if you have one of those programs that says 'You've got mail' or a bell goes off," says Terri Levine, president of Comprehensive Coaching U in North Wales, Pa. "We lose our focus and get caught up in reading and responding."

It's easy to suffer from e-mail overload. But there are ways to stem the electronic tide. Here is how Flynn, Levine and others say you can tame the e-mail monster.

Sort and sift.
E-mail is just like any other information you get, just served up in electronic form. Handle it as you would other correspondence. Start by sifting and sorting your e-mail. It saves time and will make you more efficient.

Prioritize and organize.
As you go through your electronic epistles, speed the task by prioritizing your reading and responding. An organizational system is a must.

For example, set up different folders to accommodate each category, much the way you do with written correspondence at work or personal paperwork at home. Levine recommends an "action" folder and a "to read" folder. Or try color-coding e-mail messages using the label feature that comes with most e-mail programs. Just come up with some system to make order from chaos.

Don't dawdle. Decide!
Sort your e-mail quickly and thoroughly. Don't go through half of the mail in your inbox and then leave the rest for another time. Make a decision then and there on how to deal with the message and follow through. Read it, file it or hit the delete key.

"People who read an e-mail and leave it in their inbox end up accumulating e-mail." Levine says. "I've seen 10, 20, 100 messages in some of my clients' inboxes." The problem with letting the stuff pile up is that you lose track of messages and you lose heart in battling the ever-growing e-mail monster.

And don't be afraid to delete. "If it's important enough," says Levine, "you can always get it again."

Learn to scan.
In a sense, put yourself through your own e-mail speed-reading course. Delete messages before reading when the subject head indicates that it's spam. Toss without reading e-mail from strangers or those sent with odd addresses. And with the plethora of computer viruses circulating the Internet, if it has an attachment you're not expecting, kill it immediately.

For those messages you deem important, read through them quickly to decide on your next action (filing it, replying, etc.). Don't reply to copies and blind carbon copies unless your commentary is required.

Filter your e-mail.
If you don't want to sort your e-mail, have your computer do it for you. Most e-mail programs and Internet service providers offer filters that can screen out unwanted messages. Independent software is available to help stop spam before it arrives in your box.

There's also outside help in policing who is mailing to you. The Spam Laws Web site lists legislation related to unwanted e-mail in easy-to-understand language. At the federal level, you can forward your unsolicited commercial e-mail to uce@ftc.gov, the Federal Trade Commission's special spam mailbox, which receives an average of 15,000 new pieces every day. The FTC has collected more than 10 million spam messages since 1998 and uses the data to supplement law enforcement and consumer and business education efforts.

Schedule your reading.
Limit yourself to two mail checks a day, especially if you're accessing your e-mail on the job. Office workers often use reading e-mail as a break. That's fine if your time isn't at a premium. But frequently, the quick trip to the e-mail box turns into a time-consuming detour. Limiting the time you check e-mail will free you to tackle other more important duties.

Cancel free newsletters.
Sure, they sound great. Some even offer valuable information. But if you find yourself not reading them or worrying about the time it takes to plow through them, unsubscribe.

Keep it short.
Enlist your business colleagues and friends in your effort to ease extraneous e-mail. Ask them not to copy you on electronic correspondence unless you absolutely, positively have to know, advises Levine. Flynn suggests that you also ask them to follow the three-sentence rule: Only send messages that are three sentences in length. If they send a longer one, ask them to put the most important points within the first three sentences. Return the favor, says Flynn, and abide by the three-sentence rule when writing your own e-mails.

Stick to the subject.
Sometimes you don't have to use any sentences to communicate via e-mail. Simply put your inquiry or response in the subject line and, taking a cue from message board shorthand, append the letters NM, indicating there's no message to be found by opening the e-mail.

For example, ask in the subject area, "Is the meeting at 3 p.m. still on? NM." Encourage your e-mail colleagues to respond in kind: "Yes. See you at 3 in the conference room. NM." This way, you basically turn your e-mail into a quasi-instant-messaging system.

Stay in control.
"The biggest tip that I gave give an e-mail receiver is that you need to bear in mind that you retain control of your e-mail box," says Flynn, author of The ePolicy Handbook and Writing Effective E-Mail. "You don't have to open every message, and you don't have to respond immediately to every e-mail."

Wally Bock, a technology speaker and columnist, suggests you consider adapting the Napoleon technique to your e-mail. "Napoleon didn't read his mail right away," Bock says. "Instead, he looked at it after it had been there for a couple of weeks. He reasoned that anything important would be brought to his attention quickly by another means. Let your mail sit sometimes."

"Finally, don't worry so much," Bock says. "Most of the time, missing an e-mail or not responding to it right away isn't going to cause any serious damage. Relax!"

Jenny C. McCune is a contributing editor based in Montana.

-- Updated: Dec. 18, 2002