In this newsletter

1. How to Manage your email year in, year out
2. privacy, un subscribe

• The main points (so they're not lost in the words) are
  • Have a meaningful folder system based on the year
  • Quickly get rid of the Spam
  • Manage your old emails with
    • Archive
    • Backup
  • Keep the Inbox as empty as possible
    (It's only for current, activities).
    Once it's done, file it.
  • In the New Year,
    • Backup,
    • Archive, then
    • rename the year for folder storage, and
    • you're ready for a great successful new year.

1. Email vital, necessary in the on-line world

2. Choose the right email program

Business User. Microsoft Outlook.

If you using Microsoft Office, Outlook is supplied with Office. It's main audience is the business users as it has features tailored for business and server use.

Home User. Microsoft Outlook Express.

Microsoft's Home email  system is Outlook Express and it's free with Windows. Some customers mix up the email systems (called clients) so they're not able to tall me which one they're actually using.
Outlook Express has Identities so different people can use the one Windows account and keep their email private and separate from the rest of the family.

This article is mostly about Outlook, but most of it equally applies to Outlook Express users too.
If you're using some other email system, then there's still a lot in common to consider.

3. Using more than the very basic settings

1. Preview Pane, Reading Window
   The Preview Pane is a handy way of seeing part of the content of an email without opening it. I prefer to have preview turned OFF, so any Spam that you happen to click on is not opened and marked as being read.
   Similarly the Reading Pane is turned off in my main email folders, such as the Inbox, Spam folder, deleted item folder.

2. Identities in Outlook Express
   Mum can have an identity, Dad and each f the children can have their own identity. Identities can be password protected and each has it's own email account at an ISP or email provider (like hotmail or Telstra) of their own (Identities are part of Outlook Express only).

3. One or more email accounts
   I have about 4 email accounts. This has happened over time as my ISP's have changed and I've gained extra email accounts to manage. But I use one email account for 90% of all email. If you have more than one account you can set one or all to be checked each time you send and receive email. Replies to received emails are usually sent out from the account they were received in.

4. Backup your email (really, yes, back it up)
   Outlook (the business email from Microsoft) has a utility for copying your personal email folder system (in total) every so often. It's called PFBackup. I don't understand why it's not provided as part of Outlook.
   The other interesting thing is that whenever I've setup PFBackup it has never followed the plan Microsoft lays out as how it's installed. Once it's installed and set-up it backs up my emails every 7 days, overwriting the previous backup.

5. Delete the trash, rubbish, the unwanted email
   Some customers delete emails they don't want anymore, and leave them in the deleted items folder. When I ask to empty the folder, they're adamant that it has to stay. They use the Deleted Items folder as their storage system. Would you hide your wallet or purse in the garbage bin? (Probably not.)
   Empty the Deleted Items folder regularly, or set it to be emptied every time Outlook is closed.
   ((I take a different course of action, whenever I want to delete emails for good, I select the email (emails) press the SHIFT key and hit the Delete key and then confirm I want all the emails deleted. They don't go to the Deleted Items folder at all.))

6. Compact the folders
   Every Week or Every month, Compact the email folders (all the folders) It can save a lot of valuable hard drive space.

4. Create a meaningful folder system.
     Year, main groups, sub-groups.

Here's part of our email folder hierarchy. It describes the main feature and the sub-folders well. The main points are : create a year folder create meaningful sub folders of the year. eg accounts, customers, networking, personal, suppliers. Pixel ITT has many suppliers and it's often necessary to find emails later, (sometimes years later) about a transaction. Name the subfolders of your main sub-folders with a short easily remembered name (the short suppliers company name or the customers surname to match the way you work. Other people will occasionally need to manage your email system too, so don't be cryptic.

5. Email filter software (Ella for Spam Control),
Other Spam filters, Junk email settings.

Ella for Spam Control

Spam filtering, without deleting spam is an important feature of our email system.

Ella for Spam Control is trained by me (or you) what I consider to be spam and what is a newsletter type item. It remembers about 100 things about emails that are spam, so if (or when) it comes across the same type of email it does the same action again.

Each morning, we receive about 40 - 60 emails, most of which are spam. There is usually between 1 and 5 emails that are real business. I subscribe to many news lists, so there's the news coming in as well.

But first up, I (we) need to see the work.

Other Spam filters

Of course, there's other spam filters, but if they automatically delete emails, they could be deleting your business emails.

Other spam filters are notorious for not following your instructions and move real email to the spam folders for no reason.

Junk email settings (Outlook 2003)

I've set Junk email settings to "No automatic filtering" as Ella for spam control does a much better job. (Outlook, Tools, Options, Preferences, Junk e-mail, No automatic filtering)

6. Receiving email (with Virus checking)

All received emails need to be checked as they're received for viruses, that includes the email itself and any attachments and pictures.

Pixel ITT use nod32 anti virus, from eset. Our special settings for email is stronger than the default settings. We make the presumption that any virus detected in a received email is malicious, rather than accidental as was the case 5 years ago. Based on the malicious assumption, any email or attachment with a virus is simply deleted. Nod antivirus replaces the attachment etc with a small file that states what the file name was and that it's been deleted. It also puts the virus name in the subject so it's noticeable by the reader.

7. Brief scan of sender, subject, known or un-known sender

Ella for Spam Control moves the probable spam to the spam folder, newsletters to the newsletter folder and leaves genuine email in the inbox.

8. Move it to the right folder

Reviewing email, I look at the sender, subject and the recipient. If there's any that don't belong, I train Ella to move the email to it's proper folder (spam or newsletters) so it does the right thing next time.

Next I check the newsletter folder and follow the same process.

Next I check the spam folder and if any don't belong there (which happens occasionally) I train the Ella spam filter where it belongs.

9. Remove the Spam (no qualm deletion)

Then still in the spam folder I choose "select all" (CTRL + A) and then use Shift + Delete (delete, don't put in deleted items) and confirm the action by clicking on "Yes".

10. Act on the real email, then file it

Now it's time to read genuine email and act on it.

After I've read and replied to email I shift it to the storage folder. If it was from a supplier, while the email is open I click on CTRL + SHIFT + V then select the folder to move it to. That would usually be by using keystrokes link 2 (start of 2005) right arrow, (Open one level to the right), S (Suppliers), D (first letter of supplier name), then use the down arrow to move to the correct supplier (whose name starts with D), One I have the correct supplier I press enter and the email is filed..

These steps are repeated till all the new email are actioned. After that I have a brief review of the other email in the Inbox and move any that are complete.

The number of email in my inbox varies between 20 and 50 depending just how busy we are.

11. Read the news when there's time, then file it

This is a repeat of the managing the Inbox in 10. above. Though I often select multiple email and move them to the 2005 / News folder for later reading or to be able to search them for particular words.

12. Back up email

If you haven't got PFBackup for your Outlook,
Search Microsoft downloads, then download and install it.

We've put a backup folder in the Outlook storage folder and directed all the backups there.

Outlook can't do a backup while Outlook is open, so once you've set it up, close outlook and watch to make sure it does the backup's properly.

Please let me know if you a have an Archive or Backup utility for Outlook Express.

13. Archive old email

About every 12 months I archive old emails.

We have auto archive turned off.

To archive for year end, click on File, Archive, select Personal Folders, select "Archive this folders and all subfolders", Make sure "Include items with "Do not auto Archive" checked, Review the folder where the archive will be put (it's usually in the same folder as your Personal Folders).

Please let me know if you a have an Archive or Backup utility for Outlook Express.

14. Compact the folders

In Outlook, click, File, Data File Management, Personal Folders (or Archive Folders), Settings, Compact now. When it's finished, Cancel (so no accidental changes are made.

In Outlook Express, Click on File, Folder, Compact all folders.

15. Year end actions, ready for a Happy New Year

• Backup,
• Archive, then
• rename the year for folder storage
  eg from 2005, rename it to 2006, and
• you're ready for a great successful new year.