What is Email (Inbox) Management

Over the next few blogs, I would like to discuss some of the services a Virtual Assistant can offer. The first one is email inbox management. When people hear about this service, they are often curious about what exactly it entails. Hopefully, this will clear things up.

Flagging Important Messages That Need a Reply

When you first hire your Virtual Assistant to manage your email inbox, you will need to give them your login credentials. Once they have access to your inbox, they can set up a number of folders (or labels – depending on the program you’re using). This will help in organizing your emails. One of the files to be set up would be Urgent Messages. This is where your Virtual Assistant would put all of your messages which require immediate attention. Instead of having to wade through who knows how many emails to find those important messages, you would simply have to check that one file to get to the really important emails.

Replying to Common Questions

In any business, you have the standard inquiry questions sent to you. Rather than taking up your time by answering each of these standard inquiries, your Virtual Assistant can draft a standard response for your approval and then send those responses out. They can either come from the Virtual Assistant, or you can have them sign your name so it is coming from you.

Following Up on Sent Emails

How many times do we get busy and forget to follow up on emails we have sent out? You can work with your Virtual Assistant to come up with a schedule you would like them to use in order to follow up on any emails you have sent which require follow-up. This saves time as you no longer have to remind yourself to do the follow-up. Your Virtual Assistant does the work for you and lets you know the results.

Deleting Spam/Unsubscribing

How many times do we open our inbox to find all kinds of spam and newsletters, et cetera that we never subscribed to? Your Virtual Assistant can sort through all your emails to delete the spam, make sure it’s tagged as junk mail, and unsubscribe to all those pesky advertisements cluttering up your inbox.

Tagging and Archiving Emails

Again, when you start working with your Virtual Assistant, you will decide on some categories for the emails to be filed under. You might receive newsletters you actually do want to read but don’t necessarily want to look at them when you receive them. You may have certain emails from individuals you wish to save for future use. All of your emails will be cataloged and filed in all those folders so you can look at them whenever you have the time.

Forwarding Messages and Inquiries to Other People

As your Virtual Assistant learns the ins and outs of your business, they will be able to forward messages and inquiries to other people who might be more appropriate to answer the questions.

Drafting Responses

Again, as your Virtual Assistant becomes more familiar with your business, they can start to get a feel for what the appropriate responses to certain emails will be. They can then draft a response to send to you for your approval before they send the response saving you the time of crafting your own responses.

Conclusion

Many of us don’t realize just how much of our time is spent on emails. It doesn’t take any time at all for a successful entrepreneur’s inbox to become inundated with a plethora of emails. By hiring a Virtual Assistant, you can have them flag important messages needing prompt attention, reply to common questions, follow up on sent emails, delete spam and unsubscribe from unwanted promotional lists, tag and archive emails for easy review at a later time, forward messages as needed, and draft responses for you. The amount of time saved by having someone assume these tasks can add up very quickly!

If you’re interested in handing off some of these tasks, please feel free to contact me either via email and start making your life easier!

I would love to hear your comments. Unfortunately, Google doesn’t allow comments on these websites so please feel free to send me an email with any comments or questions.