Music Teacher’s Helper Blog – Boomerang for Gmail

I recently started using a plugin for Gmail called Boomerang. This has been a great asset in managing my Inbox. Boomerang allows you to do multiple tasks;

1) Write an email now and then send it at a later date.

2) Schedule reminders so you don’t lose track of important emails in your Inbox.

3) Send reminders if you don’t hear back from someone on an important email.

The reminders are very useful when sending emails out to people about any situation that needs to be followed up on within a certain period of time. Usually, that email would slowly get buried in my task list or under a pile of incoming emails. Now if I don’t hear back, Boomerang will “remind” me by sending that email back to the top of my Inbox at a scheduled time. This reminds me to follow up at that scheduled time. That “reminder” feature can be turned off if the original email receives a response within a certain period of time.

Other cool tricks you can do with Boomerang; “future send” an email. For example, at the beginning of the month, you can draft all of your emails to wish folks a happy birthday or anniversary. Schedule the email to be sent on their birthday or anniversary. Don’t forget to blind carbon copy yourself in the email so that you get a reminder that the email was sent on that date.You can wish them a happy birthday (without using Facebook) and then the blind carbon copy will remind you of the event.

Additionally, future send can be used for sending yourself reminders and planning events if you are thinking ahead. You might be out of the office or your home studio and you have a great idea for a project. However, you aren’t in a position to work on it while you travel. Write the idea out in an email, and then “future send” to yourself on the date you are back in your office or home studio when you would best be able to act on it.

Click here for a video overview of Boomerang. Click here to install Boomerang.

Boomerang has been a very useful tool in managing my Inbox. I hope you find it useful as well.


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