Use color-coding to prioritize your email

Just as you finish responding to one email, three more arrive. Before you get through those, there are twelve more and one requires an immediate response. The beat goes on.

How do you prioritize the onslaught of incoming mail?

Wouldn't it be great if you had a system in place that automatically identified messages that are higher in priority than others? You can!

By using your email client's tools to prioritize incoming mail, you can color-code categories of emails to stay on top of communications.

This demonstration shows you how to prioritize incoming emails in Microsoft Outlook 2007, although the principles apply to any sophisticated email program.

In this demo, you'll see how you can go from an inbox that looks like this...

...to easily apply automatic color-coding like this...

... to an inbox this clean within minutes.

Inbox white space is the goal. The more white space you have in your inbox and folder directories, the more room you make in your mind to manage your professional life effectively.

Let's get started.

You can use any system that works for you to prioritize emails. One method is to prioritize emails into High, Medium and Low categories:

• High Priority emails include messages in which you're the only person listed on the To: line. Because you were singled out as the recipient, these messages require action on your part and are the most critical to read first.
• Medium Priority emails include messages in which you and others are listed on the To: line. Because you're not singled out as the only recipient, you're likely not solely responsible for action.
• Low Priority emails include messages in which you're listed on the CC: line rather than the To: line. Because you're not a key recipient of the message, the message is unlikely to contain action items for you and therefore you can prioritize reading these messages last.

Let's use the following color coding scheme:

• Use green for High Priority messages.
• Use black for Medium Priority messages.
• Use gray for Low Priority messages.

There are several ways to color-code emails in Outlook, and we'll explore one of them. This method involves automatic colorization using Outlook's Organize feature.

To use this feature, select Tools from the main menu, and then select Organize.

Click the Using Colors link in the middle of the list.

To color-code High Priority incoming emails, you must first click the Turn off button to change settings.

Open the Color drop-down list, and then select Green.

Now let's create categories for Medium Priority and Low Priority emails, and configure the settings.

Click Automatic Formatting at the top of the window.

Click Add, and then type the words Medium Priority in the Name field to name this rule.

Click Font. The font is already set to Black, which is our desired setting.

You can also use different fonts and font sizes for different categories. This a great workaround to color-coding if low-lighting conditions prevent you from seeing the color-coded email entries clearly.

Click OK to save any changes.

To set the rule for Medium Priority emails, click Condition.

Check the Where I am checkbox... and then open the drop-down list.

Select the on the To line with other people item... and then click OK.

The Medium Priority rule is set and appears in the list.

Create the Low Priority category in the same manner, selecting Gray as the color and on the CC line with other people rule.

When the rule is set, click OK.

Click the Turn on button and close the formatting window to view your color-coded emails.

Notice that High Priority messages are in a green font color, Medium Priority messages appear in black and Low Priority messages are gray.

Also notice that unread emails are bolded. Once you read them, Outlook removes bolding.

This email was read and is no longer bolded.

In this demonstration, you learned how to prioritize email using color-coding. Close the demo's browser window to end the demonstration.