I’ve come up with a couple of tips I hope will help you get a handle on some time-management problems when dealing with email.
First I use folders to sort my mail into very small areas. I have a business one where I place sub-folders to throw in payments, orders, and so on for each business. I have folders for people I do a lot of correspondence with. I have them for family members. And so on.
But I had a brainstorm the other day, and started one for personal emails to answer, and one for marketing ideas. Now I see at a glance how many I need to answer that are personal, and how many I should go through for marketing. I even send myself marketing ideas (usually links) when I find them.
The system has helped with my usual overwhelmed feeling when I look at my inbox. And the marketing idea is great because when I sit down and decide to work on marketing, I can go to that folder and find ideas to carry out. Examples include using Notes in Facebook to put up my most current blog post, update my bios at Amazon, Goodreads, Twitter, etc. I try to work on one a day. (Think about it—that would be 365 marketing attempts a year!)
Let me know in the comments if you have any special email tricks
I have three email addresses: one for social media stuff, one for what I call “commercial stuff” (you know, when you order something, or sign up for special offers? My online billpay goes in that one too), and one for Writing Business. I use X-notifier (a Firefox add-on), which lets me know fairly instantaneously if I have new mail, and which box it’s in, and therefore what priority I should give it..
I have never seen the advantage of having more than one or two email addresses. I let Outlook sort my mail into the categories I need when it arrives. But to each his own!