6 Smart Gmail Tricks To Help You Get The Most Out Of It

Gmail has revolutionized the way we communicate and manage information via email. If you doubt it then it means that you are yet to exploit the extraordinary features of this email app to the fullest.

This article explores some of the outstanding Gmail features and tricks which make this tool a must have for anyone using email to communicate. The features discussed here will also help long time Gmail users to dig deeper and get the most out of this amazing service.

1. Consolidate multiple email accounts into one Gmail account
   This is probably the most important reason why one should make the switch if he is using a different email service. With Gmail you don’t have to worry about checking your different email accounts. You can consolidate all the multiple inboxes into one Gmail account.

While the option to combine other email accounts into Gmail was always there, recently Gmail made the process a cakewalk by introducing the import option in the settings. It’s super easy now to use Gmail as your one stop email service.

• Learn to use filters and labels effectively
  No other email service lets you filter and organize emails the way Gmail does. Using “Filters” and “Labels” in Gmail, you could always keep unimportant emails out of your inbox and be much more efficient in email management.

Here is an old but still useful article from Lifehack on ways to use Gmail filters. If you are looking to learn more about labels then this article on about.com regarding Gmail labels should help you.

• Make use of multiple Gmail addresses you get with one account
  This is a gem. And if you didn’t know about this, here’s the surprise – with Gmail you actually get an unlimited number of different email addresses. Yes, unlimited! How? Well abc@gmail.com is same as a.bc@gmail.com and abc+def@gmail.com. More on this here.

Oh, and abc@gmail.com is also same as abc@googlemail.com. Awesome feature, isn’t it? This feature could be used in so many ways. Like in this article, the Digital Inspiration blog points out how you could use one email for multiple twitter accounts. That’s just one use. There could be many more such tricks. Get the picture?

• Use Gmail Labs
  In my opinion, the next best thing the Gmail team has done after launching Gmail is introducing Gmail Labs. I wasn’t gung-ho about it initially but when the different labs add-ons started rolling out, I was completely speechless. Gmail became more amazing each day.

There are a number of Labs tools you could enable. Here are my favorite picks.

• Use Browser add-ons
  If Firefox is your primary browser (it should be if it isn’t), then you could also install certain add-ons which add more functionality to Gmail. Here is an article which talks about some of the best add-ons for Gmail available. 

• Make Gmail your information center
  If you were to ask me the name of one person who has exploited Gmail more than anyone else, I would instantly say Steve Rubel. The man has written some great articles on how he uses the various features of Gmail to organize information efficiently. One such article is about how he transformed Gmail into his personal nerve center. It’s an excellent read.

Hope you like the tricks. If you know of some other cool ways to use Gmail, do share them in the comments.

Cheers,

Abhijeet