Five Mail Features that your Business Needs to Improve Time Management

On average, people check their emails every 15 minutes. Additionally, employees can spend 3.1 hours a day reading and responding to emails. That’s why it’s important to implement methods that speed up the process to improve time management. 

Most employees don’t know the benefits of a company’s email features. They continue to use old methods that can get in the way of business productivity. To optimize time management in your departments, we’ve listed five mail features your team needs to boost workflow. 

1. Search Feature to Find Information Faster

The average employee can receive up to 121 emails per day. So it can be difficult to find information when you’re looking for documents or a recipient. In this case, you can use the search in email feature. 

With this feature, you can find a specific message in a long thread. Search the email using keywords, the name of a contact, or the label of an attachment. Furthermore, you want an email system that allows you to filter your messages by contacts, files, or tags.  

Using the search feature allows you to bring up any messages related to your search. You can then effortlessly retrieve any information you need for clients, managers, or partners. 

2. Create Email Templates 

Do you respond to clients or colleagues using the same wording and format? Why type out a completely new email if the information is the same? You can save hours during your work days by creating pre-written emails and saving them as a template. 

When creating your template, you can include links, images, and signatures. Templates ensure that your emails follow company branding guidelines. You can attach a company banner with a logo and contact details, so recipients know who the sender is. 

You can then attach documents and personalize the email by adding the recipient’s name at the beginning of the email. The benefit of email templates is that it reduces errors in your messages. It also improves communication and elevates the client experience. 

3. Set Up Signatures 

You can waste valuable time adding your name and contact details at the end of every email. It wastes even more time if you have to include banners or images in the email. A signature should be included in all the messages you send, no matter who the recipient is. You can save time by setting up signatures so that they automatically appear at the bottom of every mail. 

Your signature should include your name, contact details, and your position in the company. Here is an example for you. 

Best Regards, 

Joe Doe 

Quality Control and Operations Manager 

Tel: 011-285-7890
Cell: 072-542-1111

You can also include visuals in your signature, like a professional image of the company and any disclaimers you’d like to include regarding products and services. 

4. Utilize Bulk Actions 

Another feature that can save valuable hours during your work day is bulk email actions. You can select a batch of emails and mark them as read or unread or move them to your trash folder. 

What’s more, you can select multiple messages and place them in categorized folders that are color coded. For example, if you have marketing emails, you can place them in your advertising folder. If you have accounting messages for specific clients, you can categorize them by company name.

You can also apply tags to a group of emails you’ve selected. Most email clients don’t have a limit to how many messages you can select. So you can move, delete or categorize hundreds of emails at a time.  

The bulk action feature saves you from moving one email at a time which can get frustrating and it can slow down productivity. Make sure you spend time cleaning up your mailbox 10 minutes before you leave the office every day so that your emails are always organized. 

5. Take Advantage of Keyboard Shortcuts 

You can manage your time effectively if you know what your email client’s keyboard shortcuts are. Every system will have different shortcuts, but it’s important to know what they are so you don’t have to navigate through menus to complete a task. 

With your keyboard shortcuts, you can perform the following activities on an emailing client: 

• Open a message
• Mark a message as read in your mailbox
• Mark a message as unread in your mailbox
• Forward a message 
• Reply to an email 
• Reply to all recipients within a thread 
• Send a new message 
• Open up a calendar
• Create a new meeting request 
• Go to a specific task 

You can perform these tasks by simply pressing a key associated with the activity on your laptop or desktop keyboard. For example, if you press R on your keyboard, you can automatically open a new page to respond to a message. Your email client will need to be open for these keyboard functions to work. 

Overall you can save a couple of minutes every day if you know how to access features using certain key functions. 

Final Thoughts 

If you want to spend less time on your emails and more energy on other important tasks, use the tips in this article to improve business productivity and time management.