Randy Dean shows how to convert Gmail messages into Tasks, Calendar events, and Contacts using Google Workspace. Drag emails to Tasks to create actionable items with due dates, use the More menu to turn emails into Calendar events with guests, or add senders as Contacts. Moving actionable items out of your inbox prevents repeated reads and reduces clutter.
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All right. Hi everybody.
I hope that you're all doing well.
Um, I made a video a couple of years ago about how easy it is to convert emails in Gmail to task items, calendar items, and new contact items in the Google Suite. But alas, Google has changed how you do it. So I thought I would give you a quick update as to how easy this process is, because I'm a big fan of taking stuff you can't get done, that you can't do right now, turning them into tasks or calendar, possibly contacts, rather than leave them in your inbox and starring them and marking them unread, because that means you got to read them over and over again, which isn't a good behavior. So let me show you what I think is the better option and how easy this is inside of Gmail using the new process that they've created. So I'm going to pop out here. Let's go into my inbox. Let me just move me down here so I'm a little bit out of the way. And the first thing that you got to realize is when you're in Gmail, you've now got the major functions over here: Contacts, Tasks, Google Keep, and Google Calendar. And the nice thing is, is that, you know, especially with Tasks, what you can do, which is super easy, is you can take an email in your inbox. Uh, like I got this article from Pocket, which is an app that I featured previously in my e-newsletter. And what I, what I want to do is just take this email and I can pick it up and drag it and drop it just like in Microsoft Outlook. Now it's going to come down here, but now what I can do is really quickly just change this. Review new article, An Ode to Procrastination. That one actually did catch my attention. That's why I want to take a look at it. And then if I want, I can even set up date and time. And, uh, maybe I'll move this out to June 30th and hit OK. And now that it's there, now let me show you something that's really cool about doing drag and drop in Gmail to make an email. You can click right here and open the email. So what it does is it links a link to the previous email that prompted you to create the task. And so if you're working on the task and you need to go back to the email, you don't need to go find it. You just click on the link that's inside the task that takes you right back to the email. Very cool. But wait, there's more. I mentioned that you can also easily turn an email into a calendar item. And this, you take one more step. You got— you actually want to open it and then come up here to the little ellipses here at the top, the three little dots, click on More, and and just come down here and hit Create Event. And what that does is that will take you into the Google Calendar and allow you to now create a new, you know, calendar event based off the email. Review Pocket article. That easy. And let me show you something that's sort of cool is, you know, I made this from that email of mine. Look what it brought in. It brought in the text of the message. Now I'm not going to save this. I'm just going to get rid of this, but I wanted to show you how easy it is to create an event. You can even turn it into a meeting by adding guests right here.
You can adjust the times right here.
You can adjust the dates right here. Super easy for you to do this if you want to take an email and even include the text that was inside the email, possibly any additional information, get it in there. Set up a meeting. But wait, there's one more.
I also mentioned that you can turn an, uh, email into a new contact in your contact database.
Now, and this one's sort of interesting. Let me show you two different options.
I'm already in my own contact database, so as you take a look, it brings up sort of a business card that already has my info because I'm already in there. If I hit more info I can actually see all the info and then come up here to the top and hit Edit to edit this item, or come down here and hit Edit This Item. And it'll even show you recent interactions, including previous emails and different things that you've done.
So that's sort of cool. Um, but I'm already in there. I want to show you how you make a new one.
So I left this Pocket one in here, but let me give you a quick little tip that might save you a lot of time when you're creating a new contact. If you're about to create a new contact in your contact database in Gmail before you do the step to actually create the contact, open the email and come in here and grab the signature info if they have signature info. And I'm just going to do a Ctrl+C. Now I can copy all this info into that contact to make it really quick and easy to create the contact. Now I'm going to jump out, go back, and let me show you. Here's one that's not in my database. Let me go over here to Pocket and just hover. See, I'm hovering over the sender name, and you can actually do this from inside the email too. You just hover and wait a second, and it's going to bring up that contact option. But let me hover over this one, come down here to More Info, and then when you do that, what you'll see is right up here in the upper right corner, Add to Contacts. Now if I hit Add to Contacts, it's just going to probably add in the email address. But notice that right here is the edit option. So I can hit Edit Contact, it's going to bring up a full-page contact manager for this. But remember, I did that copy and paste, so what I can do is come down here to Notes, do a Ctrl+V, which is a paste, and now I've got this info right here. So watch what I can do. I can grab that job title, Ctrl+X, which is a cut, Ctrl+V, which is a paste, and then I can come down here and grab that phone number right there Ctrl+X, which is a cut. And, um, let's hit Edit again and go back down here and do a Ctrl+V, paste. You know, and every time you do one of these copy and pastes, you know, you're going to want to, you know, populate the fields. But now you got all the info right here on the screen. That way you're not jumping back and forth between tabs or back and forth between different screens. You can make the contact that fast. Just remember that quick little tip. Copy and paste their signature inside the email before you hit Create New Contact. And then when you hit Edit, drop it into the notes field so you can do your copies and paste. It'll make— just make it a really quick and easy process for you. So, um, like I said, it's super easy. And, and because of that, then you don't need to hit the stars and you don't need to click the checkbox and come up here and hit Mark Unread. Don't do that. That's why you're reading your emails over and over and over again. Stop. And instead, do what we just showed you. If you can't do it now, put it on your task list or your calendar, or maybe into your contacts. Hope you found this useful, and, uh, hopefully this will make you more efficient. Let's finish this thing up. Uh, I'd like to say thank you for your time. I once again am Randy Dean, the Email Sanity Expert. Uh, if you like this video, you want to find out more about what I do, including see some options for paid full-length programs, go out to my website randydean.com. Um, you can find out about my programs clicking on the programs tab, find out about my e-learning options on the e-learning tab. If you like my YouTube videos, uh, please like the video, please subscribe, please leave me a comment. And, um, if you'd like to get a whole series of tip sheets on time management, email management, uh, Gmail and Google usage, Microsoft Outlook and 365 usage, Google Suite stuff, smartphones and tablets, just send me an email, randy@randaldean.com, and, uh, just put YouTube PDF in the subject line, and I'll know that you would like to get that bonus and additional information. So with that, thank you for your time. Hope you had a good night. See ya.
