So you set up email address in Gmail and are now thinking, but what about all the email addresses I had in my address book - do I have to type these into Gmail? No! Thankfully Gmail makes it very easy to import your contacts from Outlook, Hotmail, Yahoo!, orkut, and other services into your new Google Mail account.
STEP 1
Create a CSV file of your contacts. CSV stand for comma separated values and the format of the data in the file - it is separated by commas!
I will use the example of Outlook to show how to create this a CSV file:
Click on File, then Import and Export.
This will start the Import and Export Wizard. Click on Export to a file. Next.
Select Comma Separated Values (Windows). Next.
Highlight Contacts. Next
Click on browse to select the location and the name of the CSV file. OK. Next. Finish.
STEP 2
Log into your Gmail account and then follow these steps:
Click Contacts on the left side of any Google Mail page.
Click Import in the bottom left corner.
Click Browse to locate the CSV file that you want to upload.
Select the file and click Import.
You can then click on Contacts and will be able to view your recently imported contacts, along with any contacts that you have created in your Gmail account already.
Before I set up email address with Gmail, I really struggled containing my inbox. I would have week/month old emails sitting in my inbox waiting for me to action them.
There was a great inefficiency in the way that I was handling my emails. When I was in my inbox and I could see the emails sitting there, I found that I was often reading them multiple times, deliberating on what to do with them and generally getting sidetracked by non urgent emails.
I went away last week and decided to have an online holiday as well. I did not check my email for six days! When I had been using Outlook, such behaviour would have seen me most likely exceed my mail box storage and a massively overflowing inbox.
Using Gmail effectively though means that my return scenario was very different for the following reasons:
STORAGE
Gmail allows you over 7000MB (and continually growing), so the chances of me exceeding this storage limit are almost impossible.
SKIPPING THE INBOX
I receive email from so many sources on a regular basis that I do like to read, but they do not need my immediate attention. The types of emails that fall into this category are statistic reports, monthly newsletters, subscriptions to my own blogs, etc.
By setting up filters within the settings function of Gmail, I can choose to apply a label to the email and have it skip the inbox completely and be archived under this label. This is a fantastic way to reduce distractions that can arrive in your inbox.
LABELS
As most people do, I receive regular emails from particular friends or groups that I am working with. In the filters section I can apply a filter to a particular email address, so that it labels the email with that name.
For example I have set up a website for the occasional care centre that my youngest child goes to. Every time I receive an email from my contact person at the centre, it is automatically lablelled “Occassional Care”. Once I have actioned the email, I then simply click on archive button to remove it from my inbox and keep it filed appropriately under “Occassional Care” if I need to recall it later.
SPAM
Dealing with spam can be a big time waster. The spam filters are so smart on Gmail. Over a week in Outlook, I would receive at least 30 - 40 spam emails in my inbox. In my six day absence, there was no spam in my inbox and only eight in my spam folder.
CONVERSATIONS
Gmail groups all replies with their original message, creating a single conversation or thread. Replies to replies (and replies to those replies) are displayed in one place and in order. So when you have been away for multiple days like I had, it made it so much easier to follow the “conversation” of some of my emails. It also reduces the total volume of emails that you see initially in your inbox.
These factors, combined with a more disciplined approach by myself, meant that it took less than an hour to action and tame by inbox back to zero again.
So if you are having trouble managing your inbox and have not yet set up email address with Gmail, I can highly recommend doing so as the first step to effectively managing your inbox to zero.
Common Craft, whose videos I have used previously on this blog, were hired by the team at Google to make a short video on their Google Reader. The video runs for just over a minute and as is Common Craft’s unique style, is in plain english and very easy to understand.
My step by step instructions on adding blogs to Google Reader includes screen shots if you are looking for more information on how to use Google Reader.
When I first set up email address with Gmail, initially I couldn’t find where my Address Book was. Having been operating email from only Outlook for years, I had become programmed to look for particular terms and had become used to the way the Address Book function operated in Outlook.
CONTACTS
The first difference is that in Gmail, Contacts is where you will find all your email addresses. Contacts can be found on the left hand side on any page once you have logged into Gmail, just above the Chat box.
It is worth having a look at some of the nifty functions in Gmail Contacts:
When entering addresses in the appropriate fields, you need only type the first letter of the name of your contact, using predictive text Gmail then brings up the contacts that match your input. Simply click on the right one and add more addresses the same way if you need to.
It is very easy to create groups in contacts, for people that you email regularly together. For example I have a Family contact group, so when I want to send a message to all of the members of my family, I only have to put one name in the “To” box.
Email addresses are automatically added to your Contacts list each time you use the Reply or Forward functions to send messages to addresses not previously stored in your Contacts list.
Each time you unmark a message as Spam, your Contacts list is automatically updated so that future messages from that sender are received in your inbox.
When you are in your Contacts, you can click on a particular person and not only do their details come up, but with one more click, you can see all your recent email coversations with them. It will even let you know if you have any messages from them in “Trash” and you can recover them if needed.
You can import your contacts from Outlook, Hotmail, Yahoo!, orkut, and other services into Gmail. Gmail requires this to be in CSV format and most email services will export contacts in this way.
Now that I have adjusted to my new surroundings in Contact Manager, I am really enjoying the simple interface and efficiency that this feature of Gmail offers.
