17 tips and tools to make Gmail better
Live your life in Gmail? These tricks and add-ons will
make Google's email service more powerful, productive, and pleasant to use
By JR Raphael, InfoWorld, May 30, 2013
Take control of your inbox
For as much time as many of us spend in Gmail, the
service is essentially a virtual home. And as any good homeowner knows, there's
always something you can do to spruce up your living space and make it work
better for you.
In Gmail's case, there's a lot of handiwork just waiting
to be done -- advanced settings to enable, interesting features to be embraced,
and third-party programs to install. Google itself just unveiled a new tabbed
interface that can change the way you think about email. But that's barely
scratching the surface.
So dig in and try a few of these less publicized inbox
improvements. Your e-property value will skyrocket -- and your quality of
virtual life is guaranteed to improve.
HelloSign
If you're anything like me, you waste a lot of time
downloading PDF attachments, applying electronic signatures, and sending the
documents back. Fun times, right? A handy little plug-in called HelloSign makes
that headache a thing of the past: HelloSign adds a simple Sign prompt into
Gmail anytime you open a message with a PDF attachment. Click it, and -- once
you've completed a one-time setup -- you can drag and drop your signature
wherever it needs to go, then resave the document and attach it to a response
with a single click. That, my friends, is a level of convenience I'll certainly
sign off on.
HelloSign is free.
Boomerang for Gmail
Ever wish you could type up an email and schedule it to
be sent at some specific future time? An add-on called Boomerang for Gmail
gives you the power to do that -- and a whole lot more. Boomerang adds message
scheduling support to your inbox along with the ability to set follow-up
reminders for messages. You could tell Boomerang, for instance, to archive a
message, then bring it back to the top of your inbox if you don't get a
response after four days.
Boomerang gives you up to 10 actions per month for free;
if you want more, you'll have to pay $5 to $15 per month for a higher-level
plan.
Gmail labels
Gmail doesn't have traditional folders, but it has
something even better: Labels, which can help you stay organized and save time.
While folders are generally limited by their nature to one per message, Gmail's
organizational system allows you to apply as many labels as you want to a
single email -- so one email could have the label "Invoices," for
example, as well as the label "Business." You can easily customize
your labels and control which are displayed in the main sidebar, as well as
which show up within the in-message Labels menu; just head to Gmail's settings
to get started.
Customizable addresses
Here's a little secret: Your Gmail account actually comes
with numerous email addresses, all of which go straight to your inbox. First,
you can add a period anywhere within your username to make a unique address --
changing johnsmith@gmail.com to john.smith@gmail.com or jo.hn.sm.ith@gmail.com.
Second, you can add a plus sign and put anything you want after your user name
-- johnsmith+banking@gmail.com, johnsmith+amazon@gmail.com, and so on. Finally,
you can swap gmail.com out for googlemail.com; the domains are interchangeable
for all accounts.
The real power of those options comes into play with our
next item....
Gmail filters
Gmail's native filtering feature is one of the best ways
to keep your inbox from getting insane. Within Gmail's settings, you can set up
advanced rules for processing incoming messages. You could tell Gmail to
automatically archive certain messages so that you'll never see them (but can
find them if you need to) or to automatically apply specific labels based on a
message's sender or subject line.
The aforementioned customizable addresses can come in
handy here, too: You might give out a unique address when signing up for a new
service, for example, in order to retain control over any messages it sends
you.
Copy2Contact
Google has a robust contact management system, but its
integration with Gmail often leaves something to be desired. That's where
Copy2Contact comes in: The free app puts a special box in your Gmail sidebar;
once it's there, you can highlight someone's signature within an email, drag it
over to the box, and let Copy2Contact extract all the relevant details and
create a new entry in your contacts. It'll even automatically place all the
person's details in the appropriate fields.
Copy2Contact is currently free for use with Gmail, though
its maker says the pricing may change at some point in the future.
Google Tasks
Sometimes you need a quick to-do list -- and Gmail actually
has one; it's just a little hidden from view. From your main inbox view, press
G, then K to open up the Gmail Tasks interface. You can also click the word
"Gmail" at the top left of the screen to access a drop-down menu with
the same option.
You can add tasks directly to your list from emails, too:
Just press Shift-T (or click the More menu, then select "Add to
Tasks") while viewing a message. For Tasks access on the go, search your
phone's app store; plenty of third-party programs are available that provide
elegant mobile access to the platform.
Minimalist for Everything
Over the years, Google has added a lot of clutter into
Gmail -- ads, features, and cross-service integration that you may not want and
might rather have off your screen. If you use the Chrome Web browser, a free
extension called Minimalist for Everything offers an easy way to clean up the
look of your Gmail and make the interface more productive for you. Minimalist
gives you options to hide or tweak practically every element of the Gmail
interface; with its help, you can create a clean and user-friendly UI that'll
let you focus on the important stuff without all the distractions.
AwayFind
Most of us drown in email -- and making sure urgent
content catches your eye is sometimes easier said than done. A service called
AwayFind aims to fix that. AwayFind makes sure you know when you get an
important email by sending you an alert via text, voice call, mobile
notification, or instant message. You tell the service what's important based
on sender or subject. You can even set time-sensitive alerts -- if, say, you
want to be notified when a certain person emails you anytime within the next 48
hours.
AwayFind offers a limited free plan and charges $5 to $15
a month for its fully featured services.
Priority Inbox
If the new tabbed inbox isn't your thing, Google has
another way of helping you sort through messages while you're sitting at your
computer: a native Gmail feature called Priority Inbox. Priority Inbox uses a
variety of variables to determine what incoming messages are important to you;
it then separates the important messages out from the less pressing stuff and
presents it all in a single screen to make your inbox easier to manage. It
learns over time, too, responding to your habits and taking the hint when you
manually adjust something it has sorted.
You can activate Priority Inbox (and choose to use it in
place of the upcoming tabbed interface) within the Gmail settings.
Keyboard shortcuts
One of the simplest ways to save time is to quit messing
around with your darn mouse. Gmail has a host of keyboard shortcuts that let
you quickly navigate through your messages -- pressing R to reply to a message,
for instance, or C to compose a new message. To enable keyboard shortcuts, just
activate the option in your Gmail settings; once it's on, you can press ? from
anywhere in the system to see a complete list of available commands. And if you
aren't happy with the shortcuts, you can change 'em; just look for the
"Custom keyboard shortcuts" option in the Gmail Labs settings.
Canned Responses
If you suffer from a serious case of email-writing dĂ©jĂ
vu, you gotta start using Gmail's Canned Responses feature. Canned Responses
are quick templates you create, then insert into messages with a couple of
clicks. To get started, first go into the Gmail Labs settings and enable the
Canned Responses option; then, when you compose a new message, click the small
arrow at the bottom of the window, and select Canned Responses.
Monotony's never been so beatable.
ToutApp
For even more advanced template tools, try ToutApp -- a
browser-based app that brings business-grade automation to your Gmail inbox.
ToutApp puts one-click buttons in your Gmail compose window for pasting in
fully formatted templates with optional file attachments. It'll even fill in
preset fields on the fly for you, like the first name of your recipient.
ToutApp also provides mechanisms for organizing your inbox, tracking messages
after they're sent, and integrating with CRM platforms like Salesforce.
The service starts at $30 a month.
Preview Pane
Do you find yourself yearning for the Outlook-style
preview pane that put a permanent message-viewing window inside your inbox?
Fear not: Gmail actually has a way to get it. Gmail's Preview Pane feature does
just what you'd think: It splits your inbox in half, leaving the message list
on the left and putting a viewing window on the right. An icon at the top of
the screen lets you toggle the viewing window on or off; it also provides an
option to switch to a horizontal setup, if you'd prefer.
Gmail's Preview Pane can be enabled within the Gmail Labs
settings.
Gmail Gadgets
Let's face it: For most of us, the sidebar at the left of
the Gmail Web interface is a lot of wasted space. With Gmail Gadgets, you can
make that space work for you: Start by opening up the Gmail Labs settings.
There, you'll find options to enable sidebar gadgets for both Google Calendar
and Google Docs; you can also enable an option to "Add any gadget by
URL" that places a new dedicated Gadgets section in your main Gmail settings.
That section allows you to add in any compatible third-party gadget (see this
list for a few interesting ones to try).
Embedded content
Why click to open links and attachments when you can view
them right within your inbox? You may not realize it, but Gmail can let you see
all sorts of content without ever leaving the message in which it's mentioned.
Head into those Gmail Labs settings again and look for all the features with
"In Mail" in their titles. You'll find options to activate in-message
viewing of documents, spreadsheets, and presentations as well as maps, Google
Voice voicemails, and photos from Flickr and Picasa.
Mute
We've all been on there -- on the To list of a
mass-recipient email that just won't die. Well, good news: Gmail has a tool to
help you quietly excuse yourself from the conversation. The next time you get a
message with multiple recipients, click the More button at the top of the
screen and select Mute. Gmail will then keep the message archived and out of
your inbox, even as new responses trickle in, unless something changes in the
thread and a message arrives addressed only to you.
Don't worry -- I won't tell
Comments
Post a Comment