SPAM driving you nuts?
What a waste of time; sifting through your Inbox and trying to determine which emails are actually from valid contacts and which are SPAM.  I too was flooded with SPAM until I developed these rules as a simple technique to ensure my Inbox was SPAM free.  Although the SPAM keeps coming in, it's much easier to deal with now.

Rule 1: Only see emails from your contacts
Using simple email rules available in most email programs, you too can get rid of unwanted SPAM. 
o Create a new folder in your email program, name it Suspected SPAM
o Then create a new email rule for all incoming emails: If the email is NOT from one of your contacts, move it to the Suspected SPAM folder.  Viola! No more emails from people you don't know in your email box!

Great!  But what if someone I know sends me email and is not on my contact list?
It happens;  I'm at a network event and hand out tons of business cards, people then email me before I can add them to my contact list.  This is where rule number two comes in: 
Rule 2:  On my business card, under the email address it states "If you email me, please use 555 in the subject line."  The email will then bypass all my rules and will directly go into my Inbox.  No questions asked.  So if you want someone's email to get through, create a new rule which will then allow emails with a specific number of your choice to reach your Inbox.

Rule 3: Start your own SPAM filter 
I onced used an anti-SPAM program that labeled the email subject lines with [SPAM].  But it would not delete the emails; instead it would only move them to a SPAM folder, which I still had to review before deleting them.  Furthermore, it would label valid email from my contacts as SPAM,  forcing me to delete it from the subject line when I replied!  As you can imagine, this was not too effective for me.  I have since started my own list of SPAM keywords and have created Rule #3, delete any emails that contain any words I specify in the Subject line or the From address.  Now when I get email that is NOT from anyone on my contact list AND has any of the banned words in my list, it gets deleted automatically.  Although I can't tell you all the words included on the list, (some are not family friendly), you can probably guess at them.  Sure, it took me a while to add words to my rule, but I only added a few at a time, and after a few weeks it really started to payoff!  For example, I started seeing a lot of SPAM with North Pole in the subject or from email.  I added North Pole to my SPAM  list and now I don't even see them.

I'm hoping with these three simple rules, (add them in the order above to make the process work), you will be able to take back your Inbox!

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