The Move to Gmail...Why? & How?

Posted by: Brian Brugger in Blog on Feb 1, 2010

Tagged in: info , email , business

For some time now I have been growing increasingly frustrated with my vast number of email addresses and the time it takes to keep up with all of them.  In a desperate search for what to do about my frustration, I have contemplated everything from deleting email accounts to giving up and admitting defeat to the grip of technology.  I settled on the move to Gmail.

Why Gmail? A very simple, yet profound, answer.  It just works with everything!  The collaboration tools and the ability to forward all my accounts to one system (yet retaining the integrity of those accounts) just couldn't be topped.  Especially in a format that is accessible from the web, my personal computer, my work computer, my phone, and other methods I have yet to discover.

 

So how did I do it?

 

  1. Make sure you have a Gmail account.  After-all, none of this really works without one.
  2. Create labels in Gmail for the various accounts you will be forwarding to your Gmail account. Gmail labels function much like folders in other mail programs.
  3. Copy email from existing email accounts into Gmail.  Having had all my accounts in Mac Mail, I simply dragged and dropped messages from one account into the other. 
  4. Add additional email addresses to your Send Mail As options. Be sure to set your default email address as well as check the radio button next to "reply from the same address the message was sent to".
  5. Export/Import all your contacts from other mail systems into Gmail.
  6. Set all email addresses to forward to your Gmail account.
  7. If desired, set filters in Gmail to label all incoming messages according to which email address they were sent to.  This will help organize your inbox identifying each message according to "sent to" address.
  8. Set all email accounts to forward to your Gmail address.
  9. Sit back and enjoy all your email in one location, organized, labeled, and happy.

Have questions about this or other processes? Feel free to email me at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it , I'd love to help out!