Drowning in email? Try this simple trick

And every day the paperboy brings more ...

If you are like me, you probably get way too many emails each day.

Some of them – from co-workers, customers, prospects, your spouse – absolutely need to be reviewed. Ok … maybe “absolutely” is the wrong word for some co-workers, customers and prospects, but you get the idea.

A lot of them, again if you are like me, are digests, summaries, information from various sources. Personally, I’m subscribed to more than a few blogs, marketing lists, LinkedIn Digests, Facebook feeds, Google Alerts, etc.

And I shouldn’t forget about the three (more?) different feeds from Wayne Schulz’s different properties!

There is no problem with all these information sources … if you are actually reading them and getting value from them.

If there are certain feeds that you read religiously and rely on as great information sources to guide your actions (think of them as a new world version of reading the daily newspaper), then these are keepers.

But what about the rest of them?

You know … the ones that just seem to pile up in your inbox and give you that twinge of “man … I really need to make time to read those”.

I was recently given a great suggestion by the one and only Ed Kless.

It was so simple, so damn stupid simple that I almost blew it off.

Here it is: Unsubscribe.

Shocking, right?

Just unsubscribe from those sources that you don’t rely on and don’t regularly read. Most of them are available at the originating  source so … let go.

So you miss a post or two? So what? Life goes on.

Besides – you are probably missing them anyway as they stack up in your inbox.

Getting rid of them will do nothing but boost your productivity and will have a side benefit of eliminating the twinges of remorse of not finding the time to read them.

You no longer need to find a lazy Saturday to go through them. Reclaim your days and peace of mind!

Some might suggest that it’s no big deal to delete them. I would suggest that attitude is much like having a newspaper delivered that you never read. Sure – you can just take them out to the recycling bin every once in awhile but, in the meantime, they pile up and clutter up your space.

Unsubscribe – save yourself the hassle.

Part of the reason why this simple suggestion took a bit longer than necessary for me to act upon was the old view that unsubscribing from a list lets them know that you are a legit email address. The concern is that will bring more and more junk to your inbox.

I think that was true years ago but with new and improved spam guards and spam laws, it is no longer true.

So … take this simple advice and free yourself by unsubscribing from those distracting sources.

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