Switching To Google GMAIL

Here are the problems:

1) MS-Outlook is terribly slow and virtually stops me in my tracks when I'm using my computer and it goes out to the server to check email. It has crashed three times on me this year in part because of either MS-Outlook, Norton Anti-Virus, spam filtering, or who-knows-what.

2) 99% of the email I get is junk email. I definitely need a spam-filtering solution.

3) Cloudmark, the filtering software I am using (was using) was causing performance problems. Too bad, because it actually did a pretty good job at one time. It also costs $40/year and for $40/year it has to work flawlessly or pretty close.

4) I access my email remotely 90% of the time and need a stable platform that works that way. My basic web-interface doesn't do the trick (folders, filtering, etc.).

5) I need a better way of tracking ongoing "conversations" I'm having with people. Digging through email to find the last email I sent them (that they didn't read) is a time-waster.

6) I find myself using my phone (Treo) to get and respond to email when I'm out of the office. It's really nice not to be tied to my office and in today's world there is no need to be. But email on smart phones isn't very pretty - in most cases.

The solution, I think, well, at least 24 hours into this, is Google's GMAIL.COM.

I'm using it as my primary "bucket" that collects all my email, email from four different accounts, and it's working very well. VERY well.

If you have any of the problems above, you'll find GMAIL a likely solution.

And you don't have to change your email address (yourname@yourdomain.com) !!

And it integrates into my Google Calendar, which notifies me via phone of appointments!!

And the storage limit is WAY WAY up there, I don't think I'll hit it and I get tons of email. So the average person isn't going to ever hit it. There are upgrade options that seem quite reasonable, if I reach that point.

Imagine never having to delete another email (you "archive" it)?

That's pretty cool.

No more paying for SPAM filtering software (OMG).

Easy, remote access to my email.

No more missed appointments and phone calls.

A more effective way to store and track email?

One account with access to my EMAIL, this blog, Google Analytics, Adsense (PPC), Google Alerts, my calendar (available to me anywhere in the world now), my Google Groups (WIGG - Wedding Industry Google Group), email-to-smartphone connectivity, document storage and sharing, valuable productivity tools and a customized homepage at http://www.google.com/ig/

Could this be Heaven?

Here are the "downsides," if you want to call them that:

1) Google has your email... if you're concerned about privacy and don't trust anyone, or Google, this might not work for you.

Frankly, I'd rather put my egg's in Google's basket than Microsoft. I think Microsoft is on the verge of a meltdown and Outlook 7.0 looks like another MS-Disaster.

2) You can only gather email from 5 email accounts. That's probably not a problem for most people.

3) It probably doesn't work with email accounts at HOTMAIL, YAHOO!, or AOL.COM. It should work fine with your myname@mydomain.com account - which is how I'm using it.

4) It took me about 3 hours to go through all the documentation and figure out how to set it up right. Time well spent, if you ask me, 24 hours into this...

5) The way Google has created and manages email is VERY different, but smart. The interface is a bit different but after about 30 minutes I really got to like it. Once I figured it out, it actually was very different than how I used to think about email - but a much smarter, organized approach.

It's not really a "downside," but the difference is a "change" and you know how we all don't like "change."

Using GMAIL will force you to look at your email a different way: labeling, archiving, finding email...

For me, it's working and my hat is off to the folks at Google for making me think differently and allowing me to be more productive using GMAIL.COM. http://www.gmail.com



Chris Jaeger
Book More Weddings
http://www.bookmoreweddings.com

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