Gmail Tips and Tricks
Use Gmail Filters
Gmail has great filtering capabilities that allow you to automatically tag, mark as read, or archive emails based on certain criteria. This can help you manage your inbox more effectively and keep it organized. Read more about this in Google's documentation.
Turn off Email Categories
By default, Gmail sorts your emails into categories (Social, Updates, Promotions, etc.). While useful for some, this can lead to missed emails—like when important messages wind up in the Promotions tab. I suggest disabling these categories to keep all emails in one list.
To do this, go to Gmail settings, click on the "Labels" tab, and choose "hide" for categories you don't want visible.
Use the Snooze Feature to Remind Yourself to Follow Up
If you send an email that requires a response, but the recipient isn't always reliable in responding (let's be honest - many people aren't), you can use the snooze feature in Gmail to remind yourself to follow up later.
To set this up, navigate to the sent email, click the snooze button at the top, and select a time to be reminded. This will make this email reappear in your inbox at the specified time, even if nobody has replied yet. This makes it easy to send a follow-up email in the same thread. If they reply to the email before the snooze time, Gmail will remind you that it is snoozed and give you the option to cancel the snooze.
Habits to Support Deep Work
The idea of "deep work" is something I believe strongly in. The idea centers around the practice of maximizing the time you spend on really meaningful tasks every day. One effective way of maximizing deep work is to minimize distractions, and Gmail can be a major distraction. I have found that using the following tips and tricks really help me to stay focused on my work.
Turn off Notifications
Email notifications (really any notifications) are a major distraction. Even subconsciously, the sound of a new email arriving can pull you out of your current task and make it difficult to stay focused. I recommend turning off all email notifications on your computer and phone. This way, you can check your email on your own schedule, rather than being interrupted by notifications.
Close or Hide Your Email Tab
Gmail is a wonderful tool, but keeping the tab open all day can be a major distraction. The "out of sight, out of mind" principle applies strongly here. Even if you don't have the tab active, the "unread emails count" can be quite distracting. To avoid this distraction, it's important to close or hide your email tab in some way.
My personal preference is to put my inbox in a Google Chrome tab group that I can collapse and expand as needed. Collapsing the group hides the unread count and prevents me from being distracted by it, but I can still access my inbox quickly when it's time to check it.