With the dominance of the internet in our lives, email horror stories as abundant as snow in the East coast this winter. Emails have played a role in major lawsuits and have made up the more salacious aspects of tabloid stories. This is not a petition for removing emails from our lives; on the contrary, emails, if properly managed can be kept for a variety of reasons.
Business Policy on Emails
For many companies, especially larger enterprises, managing emails is simply a part of the company’s records management policy. For this reason it is best to avoid using the company’s email for personal correspondence. Company emails are kept as part of the company’s records for reasons including:
- Dealing with possible future litigation
- Evidence of business activity
- For archival purposes
Ways to Manage Email
Most email applications like Outlook have their own built-in management features. Even so, a high volume of emails can still be overwhelming. Below are a few simple steps to keep track of emails:
- Use folders generously and label them properly. Nothing is worse than digging through a long list of old emails to find a specific one.
- Answer emails promptly and delete those no longer needed.
- Keeping your message succinct – this will make answering them easier.
- Set up an address book and use it.
- Use special tags for categorization.
- Subject lines should reflect content of the email.
Storing Email Attachments
In business communication emails frequently come with attachments. By storing the emails on your computer and removing them from your inbox will prevent your email storage quota from being reached too quickly. No one wants to have an important email bounced because of a full inbox.
Email is often a convenient way to transfer files used in web presentations. This further highlights the need to title emails properly and organize them in appropriate folders. This way they can easily be inserted into PowerPoint presentations without a hitch. Emails itself can also be inserted into an . This will be guided by the company’s policy as it relates to employee hierarchy and viewing policy. The format also allows for the creation of video emails, which can be saved and viewed later depending on the web conferencing solution being used.