How to Get your Email Under Control Again

EMAIL QUOTE FROM A GENTLE READER:

Again, just checking mail. Been busy but sorry I missed so much. I'm changing my address for email, 350 emails in my box!!! I have no time but to delete, but I go through one by one, given the time.

How to Get your Email Under Control Again by Dear Miss Mermaid

There are many legitimate reasons to have multiple email addresses, and this presorts your email so you know which accounts have the stuff you want to read and which accounts you can just hit the delete all when you open them.

My list of six email accounts are sorted something like this:

Trusted friends and relatives

Business

Junk & Other Website Requirements

Bulletin Board, Chat Room, Networking Sites

Blog

Mail Order Confirmations

Many sites want your email address before you can use the free site. In reality, many are simply asking you for your email so they can automatically subscribe you to their newsletters, and many unscrupulous sites sell and give away your address, and soon you have hundreds if not thousands of emails you never wanted.

Before I sign up on a website, I open up my junk email, delete everything, then sign up for the website, I wait for the email confirmation or whatever I have to do to gain entry to the site. Now these folks don't have my REAL email address, they only have my junk email address.

Elsewhere, I make a note of log-in names and password if need be, if I plan to visit the site again.

Changing your REAL email address is a true pain in the elbow and you invariably lose contact with folks you would actually like to hear from. So have several email addresses for various uses and your email will become presorted and controllable.

Many websites insist you sign up with your email name to access their site. This can be rather frustrating, but always use your "Junk email" name. Then you can retrieve whatever password or link they send you to enable you to access the site. Any more junk they choose to send you ends up there and not in your REAL email address. Use your real email address for trusted friends and relatives.

Now, open up your real mail and sort it quickly before you start reading anything. YOu may still have to use "report spam" and email those pecky folks that forward everything under the sun to you.

Use your "report spam" button for the spammers on all accounts, when you have time. This helps the rest of the world and spam sorting programs figure out who is sending all this unwated spam.

Delete the "forwards" unless you were expecting a "forward"

Email the people who forward stuff, you never read, and ask them to please remove you from their forward list. Some people use your email address found on "forwards" to send you even more junk. It can quickly spiral out of control. If the person refuses to stop sending you forwards, then write and tell them you have changed your email address ad give them your junk email address. Block their address from your real email, if they never send you personal or useful emails anyhow.

Having my email presorted, has worked wonders. I know where to find my business email, here again, only used for business. If folks start filling it up with forwards, I send them a nice note, and if that doesn't stop the forwards and crap, then I block their email. True business professionals, will not abuse your business email. For the most part, my business email is easy to navigate. Ditto for my real email for trusted friends and relatives, folks that actually write me a personal note and that I want to correspond with.

I love opening my junk email, laughing out loud at the 2116 emails from the past few days, selecting all and reporting spam or deleting them.

By having several email accounts, for specific reason, I am able to plow through my important emails rather quickly.

I am a picky consumer, and do not randomly shop for junk. Sometimes I resort to mail-order to get the just-perfect thing I desire. I might be picky about size or color or something. Much of my life I have lived in space challenged places where I had no room for junk anyhow, so my few purchases had to be well chosen for durbility, size, aethtics and so on. Living on a boat, owning something, meant having a place to store it safely too, so I am often picky about measurements, weight and so on.

I have a specail email account just for my mail orders, so I can recive invoices, confirmations or correspond about the product if there is a problem. Most reputable businesses let you opt-out of the newsletters and sale papers and so on. If they come to abuse my account to heavily, it's easy to close it our and open up a new email account. Next time I mail-order, I can give them the new email address.