On average, employees spend just over 4 hours a day checking work emails. That’s more than 20 hours a week — 1,000 hours a year.   Clearly, we all need to learn how to organize Gmail Inbox with a few tricks.  Google has been slow to evolve Gmail Business with features that simplify life.

It’s hard to imagine that spending that much time dealing with our Gmail inbox is the best use of our time (or anyone else’s, for that matter). However, by understanding how to organize Gmail, you will be able to significantly reduce the time you waste on email and better focus on critical tasks. 

15 Gmail Tricks: 🪄

• Add Emails to Google Task

• Save Photos Directly to Google Photos

• External Recipient Gmail Label

• Confidential Mode

• Google Smart Chips

• Mute Annoying Threads

• Setup Multiple Inbox Views

• Prioritize Your Emails

• Skip the Gmail Inbox

• How to Create Gmail Labels

• How to Create Nested Gmail Labels

• Google Search Chips

• Search Alias Addresses

• Google Storage Full – Bonus

• Organize Google Drive – Blog Post

Add Emails to Google Task 📝

Few people know how simple it is to convert an email into a Google Task.  There are two ways to accomplish the tasks, no pun intended.

Method 1 – Add multiple emails simultaneously

Method 2 – Add a single email quickly

Save Photos in Gmail directly to Google Photos 📷

You no longer have to download the attachment and then upload it into Google Photos! Gmail has a new “Save to Photos” icon that automates the process between the two solutions.

Gmail Labels for External Emails 🏷️

Gmail has added a new “External” label to emails sent from recipients outside your company. The “External” label, along with the reply warning banner, helps avoid unintentionally sharing confidential information with recipients outside of their organization.  Additionally, users can use an advanced search for emails that have the word “External” to narrow down results to communications with 3rd parties.

Protect Confidential info with Confidential Mode 🤫

Assure that private information cannot be forwarded, copied, printed, or downloaded. Furthermore, this feature lets you set an expiration date and passcode for specific emails. To use the Confidential feature, create an email and click on the clock icon. See diagram for reference.

Mute Annoying Email Threads 🧵

It’s time to leverage the mute feature when you no longer have to follow an email thread. Open the email, click the eclipse (three vertical dots), and mute.

If you need to get up-to-speed quickly, you can find it in the All Mail view of Gmail. You can then unmute the conversation by opening the email thread and clicking the X button next to the Mute label at the top of the page. Once unmuted, the next time you receive a reply, it will show up at the top of your inbox.

Google Smart Chips in Google Docs 🎰

This is a new hidden feature that’s broader than Gmail but worth sharing. Insert smart chips into a Document, Sheet, Slide, and Calendar invites to add context about people, files, dates, and events. Just insert your @ sign into a document as you see in this screenshot and a list of options are available to insert. This is handy when you want to insert and reference a related document, GSheet, calendar invites, etc.

Prioritize Your Emails To Organize Gmail ⭐

The priority inbox setting is a great place to start when it comes to figuring out how to organize Gmail. It automatically splits up your email into three sections: important and unread, starred, and everything else.

A more sophisticated approach to prioritize your inbox is to have Gmail’s machine learning analyze your messages to determine what’s important, considering things like how you’ve treated similar messages in the past, how directly the message is addressed to you, and many other factors.

A few others include, set up Gmail’s Inbox categories to automatically sort messages into different tabs such as Updates which includes email confirmation, receipts, bills, and statements. Then, turn on Gmail’s browser notifications for important mail rather than all new mail.  Gmail classifies important mail based on whom you mail and how often you email them, which emails you open, which emails you reply to, keywords in your emails that you usually read, and which emails you star, archive or delete.

You can change your inbox setting to any of these by clicking on the drop-down menu of the inbox tab. Then, select whichever one works best for you.

Skip Your Gmail Inbox 📥

There are plenty of important emails that you receive daily that you might not actually need to read yourself, such as receipts. Surely, you don’t want to delete your receipts, but you don’t need them distracting you and bogging down your inbox.

Thankfully, there is an easy way to make these emails skip your inbox, directly filed away for when you or your team needs them.

Click the small caret (arrow) pointing down in the search bar. At the bottom of the screen, you’ll see the “create a new filter” option in which you can establish parameters, such as emails with the word “receipt” in the subject line.

Next, you’ll decide what the filter does. If you don’t want the email to go to your inbox, click “skip the inbox (archive it).” From this point forward, emails that meet the parameters you set up will no longer end up in your inbox, but will still be available if you need them.

By using this technique to organize Gmail, you can start limiting the number of extraneous emails distracting you and vying for your attention.

How to Create Gmail Labels 🏷️

Another automatic filtering method that will help you keep your inbox clutter-free and organized is auto Gmail labels incoming emails. The best part about auto Gmail labels is that you can focus on the emails that are the most important to the task you are currently working on — such as only the ones that are labelled as relevant to the task.

Gmail labels can range from project-specific and people-specific labels, to general labels, such as “My Projects.”

By again navigating to the filter creation section of the settings menu, you’ll be able to set parameters for when each filter is applied. Then, you will want to click on the checkbox next to “apply the label” and choose the Gmail label you want to use from the drop-down menu. If you don’t see the label you want, just choose “new label”.

How to Create Nested Gmail Labels 🏷️ 🏷️ 🏷️

By nesting labels, you can further organize Gmail. For example, a useful sub-label could be individual employee names nested within a parent label for “employees.”  Gmail’s ability to apply multiple labels to an email offers a richer search experience that doesn’t force you to pick only a single location for an email.

You can create these nested labels by checking the “nest label under” box when creating a new label for an email. You’ll then be able to choose a parent label from a drop-down menu.

We often think about labels for incoming messages. However, they’re beneficial for outgoing messages too.  As you compose a message, click the three dots more button to add a label to composed messages. Think about all the wasted hours you spend searching your sent folder for an email you have to reference to CYA?

Search Chips 🔎

Search chips are clickable filters that appear underneath the search box when a search is performed. Simply enter your search, press enter and the Gmail Search Chips will appear. For example, if you type someone’s name, Gmail will present a list of filter options so you can narrow it down. However, the search chips can help refine the search with a tap. For example, you could click a chip that excludes calendar updates or removes any emails that don’t have an attachment.

Search Alias Addresses 📍

Email alias addresses are super helpful to route unwanted emails to a specified address or support, sales, or marketing emails that a group of individuals manages. When you search for an email address in Gmail, it will show all emails associated with that specific address and any aliases it’s a part of too. The results will be pulled from the to, from, cc, bcc fields, or anywhere in the email. This new advanced searching feature makes it easier and results more comprehensive, as users won’t need to remember all of someone’s aliases and run multiple searches for each.

Gmail Storage Full – Bonus! 💾 💾 💾

Google Account’s include up to 15GB of storage space. However, that’s shared across your Gmail, Google Drive, and Google Photos so space can go quickly.  We’ve listed a few options from the easiest to more involving.

1. Start by reviewing your largest files here

2. Review files that have been shared with you here

3. Open Gmail, in the main search bar type, has:attachment larger:10M – Then Enter

Bonus: The easiest way to organize with Google Drive Tags 🏷

Google Drive is an excellent repository, but its limited organizational folder hierarchy creates chaos with unstructured data.  What if you need to find multiple files scattered across sub-folders? You’re stuck clicking through layers of folders, downloading each file, and then uploading those files into other systems to manage a broader set of tasks.

Digitile a Google Drive Tag Management solution automatically categorizes and creates a unified system to tag, access, and manage files across your Google Workspace as well as Social Networks, Marketing, and eCommerce platforms.

It works on top of your Google Drive folder structure making your content easy to find for anyone who needs to access it.

Google Drive Tag Use Cases

Tag unique attributes about Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator assets to quickly reference them down the road when you need to reuse creative work

Tag sales enablement materials to help your sales team quickly reference the information they need to be up to speed

Tag product images by brand and line to create themed social media campaigns

Final Thoughts: Organize Gmail Like a 😎 Boss with 15 Tricks in 10-Minutes

Though dealing with your Gmail inbox can be a detrimental drain on your workday, it doesn’t have to be this way. By properly using labels and organizing your Gmail Business account, it’s possible to significantly cut back on the amount of time you spend wading through unnecessary content.

If you want to organize Google Drive take advantage of Digitile’s Google Drive Document Tag Management Demo Request.  Digitile automatically categorizes and creates a unified system for easily tagging, accessing, and managing images across your Cloud Storage, Social Networks, and eCommerce platforms.