Free and Easy Email Reminders

Creating a successful system for following up on To-Do items is key to increasing productivity and effectiveness. There are a lot of tools available that will help remind agency personnel to follow up. One such tool is FollowUpThen.

FollowUpThen is a new type of reminder tool that sends you an email reminder — at the specific time you specify — of the activity that needs to be completed.

Here’s how it works:

Simply forward an email you have received, or create a new one, with the information you want to be reminded of using the scheduling formats suggested by FollowUpThen. It could be a reminder to call someone in two days so you would forward the email to 2days@followupthen.com. A reminder is created in their system and an email is sent to you in two days with the content of the original email.

You just might be able to clear out your inbox by forwarding emails to FollowUpThen!

Here are some suggestions for how you can use FollowUpThen:

• An email is sitting in your inbox, but you don’t need it for two weeks: Forward it to 2weeks@followupthen.com, then archive the message.
• You have to have a response to this email: Send the email to the person and add 3hours@followupthen.com to the CC or BCC field.
• You need to call someone while in the car: Email 10am-sms@followupthen.com with the phone number in the subject line.
• You want to follow up with a prospect in a few months: Send an email saying, “Hi Customer, I understand there’s not a need now. I’ll follow up in a few months.” And then in the BCC line add 3months@followupthen.com.
• A producer can be reminded in three days to make contact with the prospect about the proposal: Add 3days@followupthen.com to the BCC line of the original email.

Is it really that simple? Yes. It’s easy, free, safe and secure. It sends only one email reminder per request and takes only seconds to use.

Here are some key points:

Basic Version: FollowUpThen offers a basic free service, which allows you to send an unlimited number of reminders for free.

Premium Version: The premium version ($24 per year) adds SMS reminders, attachment support, calendar support, and online management of your reminders.

CC & BCC: When you add the FollowUpThen email to the CC field, a reminder will be sent to both you and the person receiving the email. When added to the BCC field, only you will receive the reminder.

Format: The FollowUpThen emails support just about any type of reminder you might want. These include time intervals, days of the week, common scheduling terms like “tomorrow” or “nextweek,” specific dates, specific times, a combination of date and time, as well as recurring reminders, such as everywed@followupthen.com.

Privacy: According to the company, your information is kept safe on secure FollowUpThen servers. They automatically delete your email content once the follow-up has been sent, as well as your recipient’s email address.
Will this service replace Outlook Tasks or setting up a suspense item using your agency management system? Probably not. But if you’re anything like me, there are lots of tasks you want to be reminded of that don’t fit well into either of those systems. FollowUpThen.com just might be the tool you need to make sure you remember.

What have you found to be the best way to remind yourself to follow up on an item or task? Let me know.