How to Unsend Email in Gmail – AND 9 Other Gmail Tricks

Ever wanted to know how to unsend email in Gmail?!  We’ve all had this happen. We constructed an email, read it as we wrote, sounded, and looked good… BAM! SENT!!!     Oops!… But immediately after we hit send, we noticed an embarrassing typo.  In this short post, not only will we show you step by step how to retract an email, but we have 9 productivity tips, to help speed up your processes and speed up your email marketing strategies. In business time is money!

Sending a less than perfect email to a business client can cost Big Time. It could be the difference between going back to the drawing board or scheduling that much-needed vacation. No worries, my friends, there’s a quick fix. There is a way to unsend emails; but you must enable the feature first, we’ll show you how.

Un-sending emails are just the beginning. We’ll also uncover a few other sneaky Gmail strategies that will increase your efficiency and productivity. The customized email trick is my favorite. This hack is an easy way for you to track incoming emails.  It’s great for tracking sales and promotions campaigns. It’s always more than one way to get the job done, read below as we share these quick but time-efficient lessons. 

Let’s Dive In…

 What’s Covered

• Reading Pane
• Keyboard Shortcuts
• Templates
• Customized email (great for tracking)
• Unsend Emails -in Gmail
• Pre-Set Messages
• Multiple Signatures
• Vacation Responder
• Reduce Gmail Space

       #1.     Reading Pane:

Reading panes makes it easy to read and easier to maneuver through your emails. 

Go to your Gmail account

        Click on gear settings, top right

 Then on “see all settings”

 A side panel will appear 

Scroll down until you see the reading pane,

Choose your option vertical, horizontal, or split pane

   Hit save

 Once there an icon will appear, you can toggle in and out of panes.

#2. Keyboard Shortcut

 To really become a pro at using Gmail, you should learn keyboard shortcut keys. In Gmail, if you click on Shift +? this will unlock all the shortcuts. Some of the shortcuts you are familiar with and others you will have to learn.

The shortcuts are separated by a bold line, the top shortcuts are enabled, The lower ones you can tick the button to choose which ones you want to enable.

         #3. Template

Setting up templates makes responding to emails easier. Custom-written email responses take longer. 

From Gmail look to the far right. 

Click on the setting gear, in the top right corner

“See all settings” 

From the far left click on advanced

Scroll down to the templates

From the right-hand corner

Click on more option 3 dots 

Hover on the template,

2 other boxes will open side by side 

Click on save the new template 

Enter a new template name

Type in your description  

Save your new template 

To test:  

Click on your next message 

click on replay 

Scroll down to the bottom right

Go to save the template

Click on your saved message 

It automatically inserts into your message.

#4. Customize Emails

Customizing emails is an accurate tool to track where your emails are originating from.

Many small business owners are paying a mint to learn where the highest percentage of traffic comes from. When using this customization process you will know exactly where your traffic is coming from via the identifying customized URL.

The all-mighty Google has a few loopholes in its Gmail system. One is you can alter your email address in a few ways that won’t cause your message to return undeliverable.

IE: pytalkbiz@gmail.com

You can place a (.) between any of the words because Google doesn’t’ recognize periods

Secondly, you can add text after the +sign before the @ sign.

Let’s test: 

Pytalkbiz+money@gmail.com

Py.talk.biz@gmail.com

It works!!!

         #5. Unsend Email in Gmail

To unsend message in Gmail: You have up to 30 seconds to 

Undo your sent message.  Follow the simple steps below.

 Click on the gear settings,

Next on “see all setting”

Under the General tab

Scroll down to Unsend email

Change from the default 5-30 seconds

Save changes

After the un- send go to the setting icon on far-right

View “all settings” under the general tab. Click on undo send

It’s automatically set on default; 5 minutes,

 you can reset the time delay; change it to 30 seconds.

Compose your message, on the prompt at the bottom, 

hit unsend, make corrections, then resend.

#6. Pre-Set Messages

You can pre-set messages. If you prefer your message to arrive at a certain time, you can pre-set it. Why would you want to present messages?… it’s one of those simple marketing tactics that could pay off.  I can tell you about the last 2 times I used the pre-set message option.

I needed to respond to an email but didn’t want to send it on a Friday, Mainly, because I knew it won’t be viewed until Tuesday. So, I pre-set the message on Sunday for Tuesday at 11:00 AM. Normally, that’s a good time just before lunch and active online.

Another time I wanted an email to arrive early in the morning. An early arriving email gives a different perception… and perception is reality. I remember how I felt after receiving an early email from one of my mentors…I felt SPECIAL!!! lol!!!  But a creative email subject line gets it open.

 To schedule an email.

Look below for the send button 

Click on the down arrive

Schedule send pop-ups

Pick your date and time.

Click on schedule.

To see all your scheduled messages, look to the left and click on schedule. Here your scheduled messages are stored. If you need to edit your message you can click on resend make changes then click on schedule.

 #7 Multiple Signatures: 

Go to (top right corner) Gmail and click on settings, icon gear

From settings, from the toolbar click general

Scroll down to create a new signature, name your signature

Create your signature.

There you fill in your info you can add a photo and any other formatting options you like.

Hit save changes after you finish.

Follow the same instructions, to create multiple signatures.

#8 Vacation Responder

Planning a vacation and don’t wait to miss any message? you can send out an autoresponder message to inform your contact list that you will be out of the office or on vacation.

From the top right, click on the gear icon.

From there click on “see all settings”

Under the General tab, scroll down to the bottom you will see the vacation responder.

Here you can set your messages, departure, and return times.

Next, save.  

#9 Reduce Gmail Space

 Reduce your Gmail space. Your space is shared across Gmail, Drive, and photos.

 From the top search field, click on the down arrow.

Search for file sizes larger than 10 MB.  10 MB is a large file.

If there are no longer needed, delete them.

To be proactive, as opposed to sending attachments through Gmail

send them via drive. Drive is cloud-based and therefore won’t,

eat up your Gmail space. Just click on the drive icon

at the bottom where the paper clip is and choose from there.

You can even edit your docs in drive and not have to worry about

email.

Conclusion: There are many more productivity tips that will help you save time, hence money.

However, once you start to learn these and others, you will be amazed at how useful they can be.

A few of my favorites from the above list are:

Customizing URL

Unsend Email

Scheduling Email

Please share which ones you like and use the most. And if you have any productivity tricks you use on a regular. 

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