Once you’ve finished with an email, you’ll often want to keep it to look up or refer to later. You might be tempted to create a complicated hierarchy of folders by projects, customers, or events to sort and save these old emails – but trust me, that’s a waste of time. Building and updating all these folders will take more time than you actually spend on the email, and the more complicated the structure, the more problems it can cause when trying to retrieve the emails we need down the track.

Far better to use a single filing folder. For one, this ensures your folder structure will never be out of date! Some email clients like Gmail already have this functionality built-in, allowing you to simply use an archiving button to file emails. If your email client doesn’t offer this option, it’s simple to make your own: just by adding one more folder (‘Filed Items’) to your action folders.

You may get a little nervous about putting all your email messages in a single folder. ‘How am I ever going to find anything?’, I hear you ask. The key to this single-filing method is your email client’s search function. In fact, your email’s search bar is one of the most powerful Speedmailing tools at your fingertips. Later, we’ll look in detail at how you can harness the power of your email client’s search capabilities.