Brits embarking on their annual January detox of healthy food and exercise are being urged to take their regime a step further this year. A recent report from Yahoo!, found that over half of email users admitted to feeling more tired and sluggish due to the sheer volume of emails they receive on a daily basis.
So to help combat this, experts at Yahoo! Mail have offered ten top tips on how to sort bulging inboxes and suggest simple ways to detox inboxes for happier, healthier email users.
Top Tips to help Detox your Inbox
1. Dump the junk - Keep spam out and make sure that youve set your spam filters to cut back on unwanted emails that could come into your inbox2. Keep a mean lean inbox - Simply create folders for specific emails and use filters to automatically sort them for you.
3. Refresh your address book - Dont let your address book go stale, revise your address book and get rid of contacts you no longer need including duplicates. Make sure youve got your diary and mobile contacts are in one place so nothings going to get lost.
4. Go on an efficiency drive - If you send emails to a group of contacts in your address book, set up a contact list for them. This will make it easier to compose emails and you wont forget anyone.
5. Give your inbox a check up - Its worth checking General Preferences to make sure they are set as you want them to be.
6. Keep your finger on the pulse - Stay up to the minute with latest news from your favourite sites by setting up RSS feeds.
7. All new organised you - Use a calendar function within your inbox to help get the New Year off to a stress-free organised start. You can organise your plans and help keep those New Year resolutions such as going to the gym.
8. Get to know your inner inbox - Do you really know your inbox? Learn all of the shortcuts - Emailing could be made much simpler and faster if you know key functions within your email.
9. Flag it dont blag it - Make sure you dont forget about those important emails - why not flag them? You can quickly return to urgent items and deal with them efficiently and on time.
10. Sign up to a web based email address, that way you can access information anywhere at anytime from your PC. Visit: www.yahoo.co.uk/mail for more details on how to create your own web based email address.
Have you ever missed an important meeting or turned up at the wrong venue? Then you should continue your 07 with a new email regime its a great time to tackle that bloated inbox. Recent findings from Yahoo! Mail showed:
* 25% of Britons delete email messages before reading them because they are so pushed for time. * Nearly 30% of respondents also admit to missing either: meetings; social gatherings or major family announcements because theyve failed to read an email or reply to an email invitation.
The new year is a great time to get inboxes in shape and making simple changes to the way you approach your inbox could make a difference. Check out our top tips below and play our email quiz at http://mail.yahoo.net/uk/detox
Isabelle Wies, Yahoo! Mail Senior Product Manager comments "Taking small steps to make your day-to-day life a bit easier can go a long way with helping your January detox. Taking a few minutes out of your busy day to manage your inbox more effectively could help."
"Weve included new features within Yahoo! Mail such as drag and drop, tabbed navigation and keyboard shortcuts to allow our users to be quicker and smarter about their approach. After all, a healthy well ordered inbox means happier users."