Forwarded emails are a pain. You might be thinking that it’s a bit harsh to put them in the same category as spam (referring to the introductory image), but frankly they practically are – not technically, but as far as what we view as important in our inbox, they might as well be spam.

If you’re cursed with multiple chronic forwarders (contacts who forward everything), your inbox is likely to be overloaded with emails that you never intend to read. Sure you could ask the person (or persons) to not send you forwards, but what if they’re difficult to deal with, or perhaps continue to forward them to you even after you’ve asked them to stop? Thankfully, there are ways to deal with this on your end instead of relying on others’ habits to change.

Setting Up Folders & Filters

The magic in keeping forwards out of your inbox lies in filters and folders, which most email clients have. We have an article that extensively covers how to do this in Gmail, Hotmail (now called Outlook.com) and Yahoo Mail. This article is your best friend if you have any or a combination of these web mail accounts.

Now what if you don’t have Gmail, Outlook.com (not to be confused with the desktop program) or Yahoo Mail? Perhaps you have AOL or some other webmail account? If so, there are likely ways to create folders and filters in these too. However I highly recommend you look at Gmail or Outlook.com as an alternative. With both Gmail and Outlook.com you can actually import email from another account without having to change your email (although it might not be a bad idea to do that too if your email is something like kooldude293@aol.com).

We’ve covered how to do this with Hotmail and Gmail, but if you have something different than an Outlook.com account, the process in Gmail would be similar for any webmail client. I’ve also personally written an article on MakeUseOf about Hotmail/Outlook.com and how to get control of your inbox. This includes creating filters, folders and staying on top of new mail. The article refers to it as Hotmail, but the features haven’t changed in that regard.

As far as desktop clients go, there are ways to do this with them too. Below are two links of the more popular clients – Microsoft Outlook and Thunderbird – however if you have a different client and can’t figure it out by searching MakeUseOf, post your question on MakeUseOf Answers or do a quick search on your preferred search engine – or both.

• MS Outlook Tip- How to Automatically Organize Incoming Emails
• How to Set Up Message Filters In Thunderbird

Which Is Better For Filtering Forwards? Outlook.com Or Gmail?

Now that we have established that creating filters is the most efficient way to manage forwards, let’s take a look at which webmail client allows you to do this the easiest – Outlook.com or Gmail. Gmail has long been the go-to email client for establishing filters and organizing email through labels and recently they have made it quite a bit easier to do so.

Above is all you have to do to create a filter. Once you fill out how you want Gmail to detect the filter, click “Create filter with this search” and choose what Gmail does with the emails.

Now there is another way to do this, which is explained in the article I previously linked to regarding setting up filters in Gmail, Hotmail and Yahoo. This was published before Gmail made this change, but is still relevant and you can create filters that way as well.

In order to filter by a term such as “Fwd” or “Fw” in Outlook.com, you must go to Options, then More mail settings. Under Customizing Outlook, click Rules for sorting new messages. Click New. If you want to filter out forwards you might change the dropdown menu in Step 1 to Subject and the dropdown menu next to it to contains then type fwd in the text field below it.

In step 2, deciding if you want to use a new or previous folder will decide which option you use. If you’ve already created a folder that you want your forwards sent to, select it from the dropdown menu where “Move to Inbox” is. If you haven’t created it yet, type the name of the folder in “Move to a new folder” text field.

Outlook.com has several other options allowing you to easily filter out senders. In fact, this is a strong point in Outlook and it’s quite impressive how easy it is to manage emails now with Sweep, Categories, Folders, and Flags.

Both have other options which allow you to delete the message before it even comes to your inbox. If you are 100%, and I mean one-hundred percent, positive that you won’t ever need to read any forwards, this isn’t a bad option, but “blocking” can be dangerous as it takes away your discretion. I would much rather recommend choosing the setting to skip the inbox and send to a folder. This allows you to still keep the email, but also not worry about it clogging up your inbox.

The bottom line is you should use whichever one you feel most comfortable with. If you use Gmail and want to give Outlook.com a try (or visa versa), you can easily do that. Also, please realize that I am not biased towards Outlook.com or Gmail, I simply feel I would be doing a disservice to you by recommending Yahoo Mail, AOL or any other web mail client that is far below par and that leaves Gmail and Outlook.com as the two best options for managing not just your forwarded emails, but emails in general.

Conclusion

Really, filtering out forwards is quite simple. And it’s not just forwards that you can filter out – we get loads of graymail that needs to be removed and filtered out. James wrote an excellent article on removing and managing graymail. And actually, Outlook.com does an excellent job with this. I would even go to the extent of saying that it makes it easier to handle than Gmail does.

So, tell us, who’s that one person who always sends you forwards? And what do you think about blocking these emails versus skipping the inbox? Looking forward to your thoughts in the comments!

Image Credit: Important Mail Hidden Under Spam Mail via Shutterstock, Letter-Mail From Sky With Recycled Paper Craft via Shutterstock

The post Save Your Sanity: Block & Filter Those Forwarded Emails appeared first on MakeUseOf.

We’ve put together a guide for all the major email providers, making it easy for you to figure out how to get all of your emails into one inbox, and do away with the time-waster of checking several inboxes every morning. Get all of your email in one place using the guidelines below.

Gmail

With Gmail, getting all of your other email accounts into your Gmail inbox couldn’t be easier. We’ve already walked you through the process in the past here. The feature is built into Gmail’s native settings, by going to the Accounts tab, where the process hasn’t changed much.

• Under Accounts and Import click Check mail from other accounts. 
• A pop-up window will open up where you can enter your other email address – whether Yahoo, AOL, Hotmail or other POP3 accounts.
• Enter the password for that account when prompted, the POP server, and port. You also have certain customizable features to choose from including automatically archiving messages sent to that email address, as well as adding a label to them.

The next step is to ensure that you can send email from that account. You will be prompted to set that up after adding your account:

• Enter your name as you want it to be appear to recipients.
• Choose whether to send it through Gmail or through your email provider’s SMTP servers.
• Enter the verification code sent to your secondary email address.
• When composing a new menu, you should now have a drop-down menu in the From field where you can choose which address to use to send a message.

The final step, which is optional, is to enable Multiple Inboxes in Gmail labs. If you want to be able to a more organized view of your separate inboxes, enable the feature in Labs. Once it’s enabled, it can be configured under Settings.

• Click the Multiple Inboxes tab in the settings menu
• For the search query, type label: followed by your label exactly as it appears, but make sure you don’t leave a space between the colon and the label itself.
• You can further configure the settings – choose how many messages should appear, and where the panel should appear on your screen.

Outlook

With Outlook launching a web-based interface, and taking Hotmail’s place, you can now use the service to create a unified inbox. Sign in with your Microsoft Live account, or sign up for a new account if you don’t have one. These are the steps you have to follow to add other accounts to your Outlook.com inbox:

• Click on the gear icon to access More mail settings and under Managing your account click Sending/receiving email from other accounts.
• Click on Add an email account, and enter your email address and password.
• You can then decide where you want new emails from that address saved – either your inbox or a new folder.
• After going through these steps, you should receive a verification email at your secondary email address to allow you to send emails from your Outlook account.
• Like Gmail, you’ll be able to select your ‘sent from’ address using a drop down menu from the compose window.

Yahoo

If you prefer to use Yahoo Mail as your primary inbox, log in to your account, and do the following:

• In the menu at the top of the page, click Options and select Mail Options.
• Click Mail Accounts, and from there you can add other accounts.
• Hit the +Add button and you’ll be prompted to type in a name for the account and the email address.
• Gmail and Outlook make it a little easier by automatically generating your settings, but with Yahoo you’ll have to look up the POP settings for each of your accounts.
• After saving your settings, you should also receive a verification email sent to you secondary email account so you can send email from your Yahoo Inbox.
• Like Gmail and Outlook, you’ll be able to select your ‘sent from’ address using a drop down menu from the compose window.

Mail Forwarding

It’s also worth noting that if you don’t want to access your email accounts using POP you can always use the workaround of forwarding your emails to your primary inbox, provided you provide access to send email as that account. Gmail, Outlook and Yahoo all provide users with the email forwarding settings.

• In Gmail go to Settings, and select Forwarding and POP/IMAP. Under Forwarding click Add a forwarding address. You can then just add the email address you want to use as your primary inbox and be sure to click the verification email that you receive.
• In Outlook, under Managing your account, click Email forwarding. You can then enter the email address you want to use as your primary inbox.
• With Yahoo, you can access mail forwarding if you upgrade to Yahoo Plus which will set you back $19.99 a year.

Do you have any tips or tricks on how to combine email accounts in one inbox? Let us know about them in the comments.

Image credit: Iconspedia

The post Combine Your Email Accounts Into a Single Inbox: Here’s How appeared first on MakeUseOf.

Perhaps you wanted to report illegal activity or abuse, but didn’t want to get caught up in all it. Going to a telephone booth is easy, but how about emails?

There are services on the web – mostly online utilities – that allow you to send anonymous emails. You can send simple messages from, and to everywhere in the world, without having to reveal your true identity.

Today we’ll have a look at those services and present to you the three that stand out, following in no particular order.

AnonEmail

AnonEmail is a service by AnonyMouse. It allows you to send anonymous emails by resending your email several time through random nodes, thus making it impossible to trace back.

In AnonEmail, you can fill in your recipient, the subject, and a short plain-text message. Contrary to many other services AnonEmail does not (seem to) log your IP. However, we do urge you not to use it for anything illegal.

As an extra security measure, AnonEmail will then wait for an unknown period before sending your email along. Why? So no one  will be able to prove your ‘guilt’ based on time/location, or make geographic presumptions based on timezones.

It remains the question whether this particular functionality should be obligatory – as it might be a serious disadvantage if you don’t need it.

Formmail Anonymous Mailer

Formmail Anonymous Mailer, developed by Infinite Monkeys & Company, is a great alternative to AnonEmail.

Apart from the usual functionality, this website allows you to specify a sender’s address as well, allowing you to seemingly send it from a normal mail account. You can also select the specific remailers you want the website to use, from a list of 17 possibilities. Note that the message will take increasingly longer to send when re-rooting it through multiple remailers.

After pressing send, you’ll be able to watch the progress of your message through the different nodes. I used three remailers for a prank mail, and it took about a minute or two to send.

The debatable downside of Formmail Anonymous Mailer is that it logs your IP-addresses to keep you from doing anything stupid. They won’t include it in the emails you send, but if you do anything illegal, they’ll give it up.

Send Anonymous Mail

Like the name implies, this one is a third anonymous mailing utility. Although it lacks the complete anonymity of AnonEmail, and the remailer control of Formmail, this is the most simple one around.

You’ll also be able to specify a sender’s address, a ‘supposed’ origin point for your secret message. Nothing else fancy is included, but if you’re looking for simplicity, this is your guy.

Again, this one logs your IP address, so you’ll have another reason not to try anything shady.

Have a blast, but don’t do anything stupid. Which do you prefer, and why? Or do you use another service? Tell us and your fellow MakeUseOf readers about it in the comments below.

The post How To Send Completely Anonymous Emails appeared first on MakeUseOf.

What I first did, was to download Mozilla Thunderbird. I set up of all my Hotmail and Gmail accounts and it worked very well. But if I was away from my desktop computer for a while, I found I was going back to my old ways. Thankfully, Gmail had a solution.

To simplify the whole process, the answer was to make one of my Gmail accounts my main email account. Then, forward all my emails, including those in my Hotmail email account, to that Gmail account. This way I would be able to access hotmail email from Gmail. However, this is not a simple as opening Hotmail, go to options and click forward. The problem is, Hotmail only allows you to forward emails to the following domains: hotmail.com, msn.com, live.com, or a Windows Live Custom Domain.

Below, I am going to show you how to download Hotmail emails to Gmail.

What you have to do then is go to Gmail ““> Settings”“> Accounts and there will be an option that allows you to download mail from other accounts.

Type your email address, and then click next. You will then be prompted to enter your username, password, select your POP server and choose some other options for your mail settings in Gmail.

Use these settings to add a Hotmail email account:

• POP server: pop3.live.com (Port 995)
• User name: Your Windows Live ID, for example yourname@hotmail.com
• Password: The password you usually use to sign in to Hotmail or Windows Live

Once you are done, click on Add Account. If you want to send email from the account you just added, make sure you click “˜Yes. I want to be able to send mail as”¦”. This allows you select an email address from a drop-down box.

So now, all email received from your other email accounts will be downloaded to your Gmail Account. This allows you to access all your emails in one easy location.

If you only have one Gmail Account and a lot of Hotmail accounts, I’d suggest to forward all your Hotmail account mail to one Hotmail Account as this forward is done almost instantly. The other advantage is if you have a lot of mail, downloading your mail to Gmail will be much quicker as it only has to connect to one account.

So now we have solved the problem of accessing all your mail in one location. But how do we now access these emails offline? If all our emails are being forwarded to one account, how do we split them up? I’ll cover this in my next post. Watch out for it.

Want to learn to be a Gmail ninja and have all the skills necessary to manage your emails? Check out other MakeUseOf posts on Gmail.

What do you use to aggregate your emails to one location? Any alternative ways to access Hotmail emails from Gmail. Do you use a web app that you can trust to access your email accounts or do you prefer a “hack” like this? Let us know in the comments!

The post How To Access Hotmail Email Messages from Your Gmail Account appeared first on MakeUseOf.

Import mail and contacts from other accounts

You know the “Invite Mr. X to Gmail” notice that appears when you send an email to a non-Gmail user? Ever invited someone, only to get a response like, “I have all my mail and contacts in [Yahoo/Hotmail/other email provider], how can I possibly switch?” Or maybe, this very reason was holding you back to make a complete switch to Gmail? Earlier, you could do this via POP3, by exporting and importing contacts via CSV. Well, guess what? Importing contacts just got a heck of a lot easier — down to almost a no brainer.

All you have to do is click on “Settings” and then hop over to the “Accounts and Imports” tab. Specify the account you want to import the mail and contacts from, choose the options and you are done! Most of the major email providers are supported.

Gmail uses Trueswitch to transfer mail and contacts, so you might want to have a look at their Terms and Privacy Policy if you are concerned. The feature is available to newly created accounts but may take some time to reach you if you are a long time Gmail user.

Oh and by the way, you can have new messages from your old account forwarded to Gmail for 30 days just in case you feel like Gmail isn’t for you, although I doubt you would!

Inbox Preview

You ought to try Gmail on slower connections to appreciate how wonderful the idea of Inbox Preview is. Imagine you are waiting for Gmail to load, looking at the progress bar, wondering if you could just grab it and pull it towards the right! Well, how about doing something worthwhile actually related to email? What if you could get a sneak peak of your account while Gmail is still loading?

That is precisely what Inbox Preview has to offer. It present a static (means you cannot read, delete or perform other operations) view of the 10 most recent messages in your account. So now, even before Gmail has finished loading, you’ll know that you only have got hate mail from your ex-girlfriend, so might as well close the browser. Never mind loading! On a more serious note though, I LOVE IT. Can’t believe it was not there all this while.

Insert Images

Nothing too fancy but useful all the same. You can now click a button, upload an image and insert it into the mail. No more copy and paste tricks to add images to your mail. Just enable “Insert Images” from the Labs settings page.

Sender time zone and automatic message translation

“Sender time zone” lets you know the current time in the part of the world from where your good old friend has sent you the email. Primarily, it shows a green or red phone icon depending on whether the sender would be probably awake (9am to 6pm) to receive a call. You can click on the “Show details” link and you will be shown the sender’s exact local time.

Automatic message translation, as the name implies, helps you translate emails written in a language other than your own. You get a “Translate message” link in your email if Gmail detects another language. Click on it and you are done. Useful if you have friends who can’t write/read language you are well versed in.

View PowerPoint and TIFF files

Gmail has always had the option to view PDF, .doc, .xls and .ppt files as HTML or provided you with a link to open them in Google Docs. Not so long ago, Gmail added an online PDF viewer that presents the file as it is, displaying images and proper formatting. Well now, you can view PowerPoint and TIFF files similarly with all the same features.

What do you think is the one feature is most useful to Gmail? Okay, make that two. Or as many as you like! We would love to hear about them in the comments. Also, what else would you like to be added to Gmail Labs next? How about a Google map showing where the email originated from?

The post What’s new in Gmail: Imports, Images, Previews, Translations and more appeared first on MakeUseOf.

Which one do you think is more effective? My own thinking and experience says that a URL though short and sweet just does not catch the eye as a full webpage does. Call it a human habit; we put off clicking a link when we have to go through quite a few emails in our inbox. An entire webpage has a better chance of grabbing my eyeballs because a glance says whether the information is relevant to me or not. Also the lurking danger of clicking an unsafe link makes me lean in favor of seeing the content first hand.

Most webpages do not include an option send full web page via email. For such pages here are some solutions I have found handy.

Send Web Page as Email in Outlook 2007

Since I use Outlook 2007 for most of my mailing, it makes sense to use this to send webpages. A few steps let you open a webpage within Outlook and send it as a whole in an email instead of as a link.

1. Open Outlook 2007. Navigate to View ““ Toolbars ““ Web.

   

2. Use the Search toolbar (located on the right) to go to the desired URL.

   

3. Once the page loads, click on Actions ““ Send Webpage by Email. A new message box opens up with your webpage pasted in the content window. Fill the address fields and mail it out.

   

Email The Web

EmailTheWeb (v2.12) is a web service which lets you send the exact webpage to anyone right from your browser. Presently, there are three ways of using it ““

1. As a web service – copy-paste the page link in the URL field on EmailTheWeb.com and click email web page.

   

2. As a button in Internet Explorer ““ Add the Google toolbar and single click function to the browser. But you might feel it is redundant as the latest edition of the browser has its own email webpage mode.
3. As a Firefox add-on – Adds a sub-menu entry under File ““ Email this Web page“¦A configuration box gives you two emailing styles ““ Exact Page lets you capture session specific, dynamic and password locked pages.The Quick Page though faster is more geared towards static pages.

   

The browser add-on works with Firefox 1.0 to 3.0+.

Once you use any of the three options, the service authenticates you using your Google account. As a Google account is free and most of us have one, I don’t think it’s too much of a bother. The compose email page lets you add the recipient IDs and optional notes. The captured page can be previewed. To speed up the email, the captured page is also sans dynamic ads and pop-ups. All you need to do is send the page and sign out.

Internet Explorer 8

The new Internet Explorer 8 makes it convenient to send a webpage as an email. IE8 has two instantly accessible buttons located on the Command toolbar. The use has the choice to click any of the two to send a webpage either as a complete webpage or as a link. The Send Page by Email button loads the webpage into the default email client.

If you do not see the buttons on your browser, click on View ““ Toolbars ““ Command Bar.

Sending a complete webpage might bulk up the download, but in the age of broadband a few extra bytes should go by unnoticed. And at least you the sender would know that the recipient has cast a glance at the webpage. The webpage often might not retain its formatting as it is used in different style environments. The spruceness of a perfect newsletter might be a lacking but the information you want to send forth is not.

So which of the modes do you prefer when you need to send web page via email? Did I succeed in changing your mind about sending a complete webpage as against just a link? Do let us know in the comments”¦

The post 3 Easy Ways To Send a Complete Web Page via Email appeared first on MakeUseOf.

And the “˜>‘ which goes onto become “˜>>‘ with each forward doesn’t make for a pretty mail.  Essentially if I want to use that same text I have to take it with all the undesirable formatting.

It is an irksome problem which begs for a simple solution. My earlier way involved copying the text to Notepad (or NotePad2) and using the Find/Replace functions to remove the undesirables from the text. I was looking for something which could cut down on the three steps of Notepad.

The outcome of my hunt introduced me to the following ways :

StripMail

A handy freeware utility designed for just this problem. StripMail (v0.99j) can be used with any email program to clean up the text. StripMail formats the mail text by cleaning the “˜>’ and “˜|’ from forwarded e-mails. It organizes the text into paragraphs and indents the right margin thus making the text easier on the eyes.

The 279KB executable runs as a standalone executable. Yes, I still have to do the copy paste thing but thereafter StripMail handles the cleanup operation with one touch operations. There is a Do it all button which is like a master switch handling all the stripping and pasting operations in one go.

eMailStripper

Get rid of all those pesky “˜>’ characters with this freeware utility. Paste the message text into eMailStripper and Strip It. The software bumps off the indentation characters at the beginning of lines and also brings together the lines to make the whole message a bit more legible.

EMailStripper (v2.2) was probably not meant for sophisticated operations as it lacks configuration options. But for a neat little formatting job, the light program is worth a download. The program is compatible with Microsoft Windows (all versions) and Linux (under WINE).

You might also like to read Mark’s review of the software here.

Clippy

Clippy takes the pain away from the painstaking task of reformatting multiple-forwarded emails. Apart from removing the “˜>’ character, Clippy also realigns the lines, wipes any HTML tags, converts case and removes line breaks among a host of functions. Copy the text to the clipboard and click on Clippy installed in the system tray. Clippy works on the text and all you need to do is to paste it back where you need it.

Clippy can also be configured with other functions (like count words, convert between DOS and Unix formatting and also between white space characters and tabs, change the case of characters and even replace strings) through its Edit option.

Clippy (v1.20) is compatible with Windows (Windows 9x/ME/NT/2000/3/XP) and can be alternatively be downloaded from here as the author site seemed to be down.

If you have been at the receiving end of emails populated with “˜>’ and “˜>>’ then you should surely save the next soul some annoyance by cleaning it up and only then sending it forth. It’s not only for the sake of clarity but it is also in the interest of good email etiquette.

Do you think that clean email forwards make for a good practice? If you do clean up your emails, what methods do you apply? Give us your opinion without a “˜>’.

Photo Credit : Tim Morgan

The post 3 Ways To Remove Unwanted Email Formatting & Clean Your Text (Windows) appeared first on MakeUseOf.

Chances are you are receiving too many. Hopefully you’re receiving little spam, but certainly you have a lot of mail hitting your inbox that doesn’t need your immediate attention. Maybe you even receive private stuff at work that you should rather not attend to at all until you’re home.

So what to do about it? Ignore it while it’s staring at you from your inbox? Waste some time by sorting it manually?

If you’re using Thunderbird I can show you a smart solution: set up message filters and have Thunderbird auto-sort messages into different folders of your choice.

In Thunderbird go to >”Tools” >”Message Filters”.

From the >”Filters for:” menu choose the account you wish to set up a filter for. Then click the “New…” button on the right side and the “Filter Rules” window for a new message filter will open.

You can set as many rules as you like, for example mails from your mom’s eMail address that contain your sister’s name in the message body and are CC’d to your dad should be sorted into the urgent family business folder. For each new rule click the + button behind the last rule.

You can also sort several different mails that you receive on a daily basis into one folder. For example set up a rule that catches all mail from MakeUseOf (Sender contains MakeUseOf.com), then set up a different rule within the same Filter for each of the other newsletters or eMail updates you would like to sort into the same folder.

Of course you cannot just sort mails into folders. You can have the message filters perform several other actions as seen in the menu pictured above. For example, automatically “Mark As Read”, “Tag Message” or (the coolest) reply with a template. If required you can have the message filter carry out multiple actions on the same eMail.

With a bit of discipline you can have the flood of eMails that are arriving in your inbox each and every day nicely sorted within minutes and you’ll never again miss an important message that reaches your inbox totally unfiltered.

MakeUseOf have published several posts about Mozilla Thunderbird before, including 2 part series on Thunderbird addons:

PART 2: 10 Great Thunderbird Addons You Must Have
PART 1: 10 must-have Thunderbird Addons

How do you manage incoming mail? We would love to hear your tips and tricks!

Picture credits: ilco

The post How to Set Up Message Filters In Thunderbird appeared first on MakeUseOf.

Here is how it works:

Most of mobile carriers offer free Email To SMS gateways which can be used to forward simple text emails to a mobile phones. And the good news, majority of those gateways are free and available to the general public.

You just need to know the number and the carrier of the recipient to start emailing them to mobile phone. Below we put together a table listing free email to SMS gateways for different carriers. You can use as quick reference both for US and international mobile numbers.

Free Email To SMS Gateways (Major US Carriers)

Free Email To SMS Gateways (International + Smaller US)

These are all I could find from Wikipedia and other sources. If you’re aware of any other ones please share them in comments and I’ll add them to the list.

UPDATES:

If you can’t find a gatewayd for your current provider here, check out following links:

• http://www.tech-faq.com/send-text-messages-free.shtml
• http://www.mutube.com/projects/open-email-to-sms/gateway-list/
• http://www.notepage.net/smtp.htm

If you are aware of any other free sms to email gateways please add it in comments. Also let us know whether you tried any of the above and your experience with it.

The post How To Send Email To Any Cell Phone (for Free) appeared first on MakeUseOf.

Here are the 4 steps you will need to complete to link your Gmail email accounts together:

Step 1: Add A Second Email Address
Step 2: Forward Incoming Mail
Step 3: Create a Label
Step 4: Create a Filter

———————————————

Step 1: Add A Second Email Address

1. In your Primary (the one you want to send and receive all of your mail from) Gmail account click Settings at the top right hand corner of your screen.
2. Click the Accounts tag.
3. Select Reply from the same address the message was sent to under When I receive a message sent to one of my addresses:
4. Click Add another email address. A window will pop up.
5. Fill in the correct information for your secondary email account and click Next Step.
6. Click Send Verification. Close the pop-up window.
   
7. Switch to the Secondary email account and click the verification link in the email sent from Gmail.

Step 2: Forward Incoming Mail

1. Still in your Secondary email account, click the Forwarding and POP/IMAP tab found under Settings at the top right corner of the screen.
2. Type your Primary email address in the Forward a copy of incoming mail to box.
3. Then pick an option from the drop-down list:
   - keep Gmail’s copy in the Inbox
   - archive Gmail’s copy
   - delete Gmail’s copy
4. Click Save Changes.

Step 3: Create a Label

1. Switch to your Primary email account, scroll to the bottom of the page and look for the Labels box on the left-hand side of the window.
2. Click Edit labels at the bottom of the Labels box.
3. Click in the box under Create a new label: and type a name for your label. You could use the actual email address if you want.
4. Click Create.

Step 4: Create a Filter

1. Still in the Primary email account, click the Filters tab, which is next to the Labels tab, and then click Create a new filter.
2. Type your secondary email address in the To: box.
3. Click Next Step.
4. Click in the box next to Skip Inbox to select it.
5. Click in the box next to Apply the label: to select it and pick the label you created from the drop-down list.
6. Click Create Filter.

That’s it! Now, emails from your Secondary email account will download into your Primary email account and automatically go into the Label (folder) that you specified. Using Filters helps to keep your email separate and organized so you don’t have all of the emails from multiple email accounts going into the same Inbox.

You will also be able to send emails from both email accounts from the Primary email account without ever having to switch to the Secondary email account.

The post How to Link Multiple Gmail Accounts Together in 4 Easy Steps appeared first on MakeUseOf.