Get Organized and Increase Your Productivity With Evernote

[rtoledo 16]

"Getting away from my email inbox. This allows me to stay focused on a task based on how I toss ideas and documents into Evernote"

http://smallbiztrends.com/2011/04/get-organized-increase-productivity-evernote.html

[burkedroppings 0]

My inbox has devolved into a time-wasting whirlpool into which dozens and dozens of messages descend every week. Its utility as a workspace has become overwhelmed by the sheer volume of data that I have heretofore ruthlessly archived or deleted by the hundreds every few months without giving some which merit my attention their due. I have allowed the urgency generated by a swollen inbox to overcome the importance of information lost in the flood.

The following quote from TJ McCue's helpful article (referenced above) landed beside me like a life ring to a drowning man. It reads:

Evernote provides a way to toss all your ideas, to-do’s, photos,

and virtual sticky notes into a large bucket and then sort and find them

using tags and a super-powerful search function

Of course I knew this -- and I had already begun forwarding selected emails to EN to rescue them from the confusion that is my inbox; but my new process, effective today, will result in a "touch-once" approach to incoming mail. If I can't assign a given message to a notebook, with or without tags, I'll delete it immediately.

"All" means ALL and henceforth absolutely all incoming messages will either be tossed into an Evernote bucket (notebook) or tossed into the trash.

I feel wonderful about this plan. That ever-growing backlog of mostly worthless information has been like a cancer that has grown back again and again after every surgery. Dr. Evernote to the rescue!

[Metrodon 2,184]

You only have to worry about dozens every week? Oh god I wish......

[Tracey Smith 82]

No kidding! I am a recruiter and between job postings, internal emails and candidate emails I EASILY process 200+ emails EVERY DAY!!!

Information overload! Hoping to use Evernote to help me organize my business and personal life once and for all!

You only have to worry about dozens every week? Oh god I wish......

[davidward 13]

I wrote a post about my plan for achieving "inbox zero" using Evernote: http://www.attorneymarketing.com/2011/10/11/evernote-and-my-plan-for-achieving-inbox-zero/

And this one, about using Evernote (and email) search instead of filing: http://www.attorneymarketing.com/2011/10/13/save-time-by-not-filing-email-study-proves-search-is-quicker/

David Ward

P.S. If you're interested in my other posts about Evernote: http://www.attorneymarketing.com/?s=evernote

[Joshua Zerkel 7]

@davidward, that is a very interesting process you've come up with for combining Inbox Zero with Evernote. How is it working for you so far?

[davidward 13]

Thanks, Joshua. I still haven't done the big purge. I've got 16,500+ in my Inbox and I'll probably start on a weekend. I've been removing labels and filters and doing some unsubbing in preparation.

Several times, I've clicked the arrow next to the gmail inbox, causing the entire "everything else" box to disappear. My inbox is then temporarily empty, and against the pale blue of my selected template, it looks sublime. I can actually feel myself relaxing as I gaze at the empty screen. . .

So, I'm looking forward to it!

In the mean time, I'm using my one @Reply label and forwarding important emails to Evernote to be tagged for action or reference.

In another thread, I was asked why I would need @Reply, couldn't I just leave those few emails in the Inbox for the day? I think that might work, which would mean having no labels and archiving or Ever-noting everything.

David

@davidward, that is a very interesting process you've come up with for combining Inbox Zero with Evernote. How is it working for you so far?