This is a list of tips and tricks to use Email2Log to it’s full capacity.
Setup
Under Logs, click on Email2Log. There are 3 fields:
- Keyword: this is to create your unique, private Email2Log email address that others generally won’t see. Your keyword provides a bit of security so that others can’t guess your Email2Log email address, or use it. Do not put a password or anything private here. My keyword is simply “log”.
- From Emails: These are the emails that are authorized to use your Email2Log email address. Put in any email that you would use, as well as any emails from people using JibberJobber with you (spouse, admin, etc.). I have the three emails that I have used over the years, as well as the email address of my admin. If an Email2Log is received with the right address, from any of those 4 senders, then JibberJobber will accept and process the email.
- Log End Line: This is a string of characters that tells the server to ignore anything below it. For example, mine is “~!~!~!~!~” … in an email I send to Email2Log, everything above that line is put into the Log Entry. Everything below it is ignored. That way you don’t create Log Entries that are too long. I recommend you create a Log End Line with a string that people won’t normally put into regular emails. Notice, people would likely not freehand type what I put in, since it’s hard to do, but they might regularly put in something like —— or _______ (so, those would be bad Log End Lines).
OOPS!
What if you forget to put your ultra-secretive Email2Log email address in the BCC when you send an email to someone? There are really three options:
- Copy the email and paste it into a Log Entry in JibberJobber. This is what people on the free account do, and it works fine, but it’s much faster and easier to do either of the next two options.
- Reply to your email, sending to the same people, and add more information… so you are sending a second email with a “Oh yeah, I forgot to mention….” When you do this, you’ll put the entire email thread into one Log Entry (remember to remove the Log End Line). This will make sense sometimes.
- Forward the email to the JibberJobber server. Instead of putting the Email2Log email in the BCC field, just put it in the TO: field, and send ONLY to the server. You’ll need to make sure you change a bit of the body, so that the server knows what to do with it (see special lines, Contact:____ line). I do this 99% of the time.
Special Lines
There are special lines, anywhere in the body of an email, that mean something specific to the Email2Log logic… These would each go on their own line.
[LogEndLine]
For me, this is “~!~!~!~!~”… yours might be different, depending on how you set it up. This truncates the email and only puts what’s above the Log End Line into the Log Entry. See above, in Setup, #3 for more info.
startdate:[date]
This is used to create a due date for an action item. If I put startdate:+1 week in an email, on it’s own line, then the email will become a Log Entry, with a due date, or Action Item, one week from when I sent it. That example is a “relative” start date, or one week from today. You can also do “absolute” start dates, like startdate:4/1/2016 or startdate: April 1, 2016.
contacts:[contact_info]
Typically I put an email address in, like Jason@JibberJobber.com. The system will look for any Contact records with that email address and put the email into a Log Entry under that/those records.
You can put in multiple contacts, separated by commas.
If that email is not in one of your Contacts, it will create a new Contact (you can merge later, if it’s a duplicate). If I know I’m sending to someone who does not have a Contact record in JibberJobber, I will do something like this: “Jason Alba” <Jason@JibberJobber.com> and that will create a new Contact record with the first name, last name, and email address.
NOTE: from the OOPS! section above… if I am forwarding an email to the server, because I forgot to put the Email2Log email address in the BCC when I sent the email, I will go into the body of the email and find the line that shows the TO information (name, email), and simply edit that line so it now looks like this: contacts:“Jason Alba” <jason@jibberjobber.com>
companies:[company name]
Works the same as contacts… if the exact company name is the name of a Company record, it will find it and put the Log Entry under that record. If not, it will create a new Company record.
You can put in multiple company names, separated by commas.
jobs:[job_title]
Works the same as contacts… if the exact company name is the name of a Company record, it will find it and put the Log Entry under that record. If not, it will create a new Company record.
You can put in multiple job titles, separated by commas.
In the Getting Started video series, you can see all of this in action in videos #4 and #5.