Freelancers and entrepreneurs alike require some better ways to bring emails and messages in good order.
Day-to-day activity of a start-up gets quite hectic very quickly. Quite a bit of extra features to help out with that can be added directly to Gmail.
In this article I will talk about one Chrome plugin that makes messaging more comfortable and lets you organize tasks and customer support.
So, without further ado, let’s start with the introduction.
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Mail Organization
Deskun has some free and some not-so-free (still cheap) features. The freebies include easy mail tracking, snoozing, “send later” functions and message templates. On installation, the usual Gmail interface gets a couple of new buttons and dials:
The icons are fairly self-explanatory:
1.“Send later” actually lets you choose the time and date in a neat calendar
2. Snoozing is quite peculiar in that you can snooze outgoing emails. They will reappear in their original Gmail folder at the set time just like incoming mail. Reminders have a cool system of conditions that you should try out!
3. Templates are like email blueprints – useful both if you simply want to add headers to every message or make fill-out forms.
4. Mail tracking is implemented via a small tracker icon that you should hover over. It lets you know whether and when the message was read by the recipient. Handy when dealing with some less-organized individuals. Sadly, happens a lot out there in the world.
Ticket System
Another good chunk of what Deskun does is workgroup and tech support organization. It works like this: a workgroup shares an email address, and various queries and messages therein become “tickets”. Tickets are like emails on steroids with a bunch of extra attributes, such as completion status, delegated agents, deadlines and associated notes. These attributes enable a clear and transparent working process.
Setup is simple: projects and groups have to be created in the control panel on the Deskun website.
Here you can choose the type of project and queue (workgroup). These will define some ticket and user settings. Customer support is an obviously specialised preset.
The agent in the workgroup will see something like this following the installation:
Looks a bit more professional than normal Gmail account, doesn’t it? The ticket becomes locked to the rest of the group once someone picks it up. It is possible to change the ticket status after the task has / has not been completed, and redirect the ticket to someone else in the queue. This is useful for keeping track of coworkers’ responsibilities and performance. Ticket history tracks all that has happened with the ticket and it is easy to review at a later point. Reviews save plenty of time on discussions you would rather not have.
Routine Automation
To top it off Deskun streamlines various other aspects of day-to-day work. You can write your own message templates with handy tags like {my email} or {my name}, so that everyone can use them. The templates can then be accessed directly in Gmail. Useful for more than just typical response letters. Combine it with the scheduling from the “send later” function and get a ready solution for newsletters and tutorials for the new employees.
The autoreplies feature is fairly similar in nature. As an example you could write a simple text that is sent out to your customers as acknowledgement of their input; or just to inform them that their request is being taken care of. These are sent automatically when the right message lands in the right mailbox (e.g. support).
Is it Right for You?
Deskun is a solid solution if you want to avoid clunky additional software, unnecessary buttons, ads, dials, sliders and so on. At the same time there is no shortage of features.
It all fits quite well with a small enterprise or just about anyone who uses email these days (that is to say, a good number of people). Several things are particularly pleasing about Deskun though: lots of free unlimited stuff, a long trial period for some advanced features, very low prices (Deskun is cheaper than the coffee you are holding now) and developer responsiveness.
The Deskun team is really out there for you and you can see improvements and new features being added constantly, many of those influenced by the users. A huge update is planned soon with more freebies and even more advanced features. Tis’ a good time to join the Deskun community and perhaps influence it in many cool ways.
