💌 My Email Toolkit
How to manage 1000 incoming weekly messages
To keep up with 1000+ weekly email messages, I rely on a simple email workflow and a few tools. Here are the primary tools and tactics I recommend for inbox efficiency.
1. Adopt an email strategy.
Delete, Defer or Do
Devote 30 minutes to an email sprint 3 times a day. After vacation, I do a 3-hour deep dive. Each time I open a message, I choose between five actions:
DELETE or archive if no action is needed
DEFER to a later date
DELEGATE to someone else
DEPOSIT info into my digital notebook
DO something, like accept an invite.
2. Explore new email tools
Shortwave is an excellent new service for organizing and acting on email. It has the most useful AI email capabilities of any service I’ve tried. Use it to find past messages with a chat interface and to draw on past email replies when responding to new emails.
Learn more: Check out their writeups on 7 ways to use Shortwave AI for email and a smart method for email efficiency.
Platforms: You can use Shortwave with your existing Gmail address on desktop, Android and iOS. It doesn’t yet work with Outlook or iCloud email.
Pricing: Shortwave is free for basic use, including AI features and 90 days of searchable email history; $7/month billed annually for full features, including more extensive AI email search.
Superhuman has also added numerous AI email features. I don’t use AI to compose email, but it can be helpful for summaries and for locating messages.
Why Superhuman? It’s my daily email tool because it lets me move through messages more efficiently than Gmail.
My favorite features: quick-loading messages and keyboard shortcuts let me act on email quickly. I also like being able to schedule messages to be sent later.
Magic follow-ups: Superhuman also lets me mark an outgoing message to be resurfaced automatically in my inbox if the recipient hasn’t replied within a few weeks.
Why this is useful: I don’t have to file messages in a “waiting for” folder, because they’ll automatically return to my inbox if I don’t get a reply. That means less scrambling to remember to follow-up.
Pricing: As an educator, I pay $10/month, a steep discount on the usual $30/month price. Because I spend so many hours a month on email, I consider it worthwhile to pay for the most efficient tools.
Summer 2024 additions
Letterly is a useful new AI tool I use to dictate long message drafts. I say whatever I have in mind and the app does a superb job of transcribing and transforming my words into a coherent email.
Caveat: Using AI to transform dictated audio is distinct from having AI write messages for you, which can easily go awry. I also use Oasis for AI dictation — it remains one of my favorite AI apps, but I like Letterly’s new templates.
InMoat is another new service I’m experimenting with to clean out a backlog of old email. The Deep Clean feature filters out old calendar invites, receipts, and other outdated notes in categories you select. Its blog has a great guide to email productivity.
3. Set an email schedule
Do: Spread out your scheduled email sprints. Pick a time early in the day, midday and late in the day for 30-minute email bursts.
Don’t: Respond to email alerts. That behavior — like a squirrel 🐿️reacting to a nut — blocks deeper focus. Rationale: Scheduling email intervals frees up mental space for deep work.
How: Silence notifications or try a tool like Inbox Pause, recently improved. Learn More: Cal Newport’s helpful books on deep work and email overload are full of useful insights on how and why to pare back time spent on email.
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4. Master keyboard shortcuts
Using your mouse to select from menus slows down each message by a few seconds. Using keyboard shortcuts on 1,000+ messages a week can save you an hour a week.
Gmail shortcuts:
The big 4 = C for compose, R for reply, A for reply all and F for forward.
The next 4: E for archive, L for label, V for label + move, S for star.
To see the rest of the shortcuts, press [SHIFT] + [?] within Gmail
Outlook has similar shortcuts, as does Apple Mail and most other services.
5. Revisit classic email tools
Boomerang = handle email whenever you want
Tools complement tactics. To cope with email, sometimes you have to postpone messages until you’re ready to act. Boomerang helps by adding a button to your inbox. When reading an email, you can designate a future time to have that message returned (“boomeranged”) back into your inbox.
Boomerang can also deliver a message to your recipient at a future time. Pick the optimal time, which isn’t always right now. ⏰
It's free for basic use, with premium plans for pro features. Works with Gmail and Outlook on iOS and Android.
I interviewed co-founder and CEO Aye Moah about email craziness and how she’s managed to build a successful venture helping people cope.👇 📺
MixMax = augmented email
Mixmax is another useful Gmail add-on. Before I switched to Superhuman to read and respond to my Gmail more quickly, I used Mixmax regularly. Mixmax has lots of free features. You don’t need a paid plan unless you want to use it for sales tracking or to send a sequence of emails to a large group.
Helpful free features include: scheduling message delivery, templates, polls & surveys that work right inside email messages, and quick meeting scheduling.
👇📺 Below is a short video I once made to showcase useful Mixmax features.
FutureMe
Send a message to your future self or to someone else you love.
Send yourself, your child, or a partner a note they'll receive when they reach a particular birthday or milestone.
Notes are private by default, sent only to the email addresses you input.
Some people share public letters. Some even have epilogues.
FutureMe is free, but there’s a new version for businesses too. There’s a mobile app for iOS and Android.
I love Superhuman, would never go without it. Ranks up there with Vimcal for calendar, Koyfin for stock research, and yellow legal pad for to-do list
Great writeup on email tools! This should be the go-to reference for all starters.