My kids go to separate schools now.

 

If you’ve done the two-drop-off, two-pickup schedule, you already know where this is going. I officially have 25 hours a week to work... most weeks. Talk about a drop in focus time!

 

 

This week’s answer was a big one. My inbox.

 

It was 10 pages long... I’m a little ashamed to admit that.

 

In less than fifteen minutes, Claude took my inbox from 10 pages down to just the emails waiting on a reply from me, with drafts already written. 

 

Every task I needed to do was assigned inside my CRM. I read through the drafts, tweaked a few, hit send... and I was at inbox zero.

 

If you’ve only been using ChatGPT or Claude for copy... it's time to start utilizing them more. These tools can now do things, not just write them. They can read your email, file it, draft replies and create tasks in the apps you already use. That’s what people mean when they say “AI agent.”

 

 

1. Start with a couple of labels (or let Claude make them).
I started with two labels in Gmail, Receipts and No Action Needed. Then, Claude made two more on its own: “In Moxie” for anything it turned into a task that needed to live in my CRM, and “Response Drafted” for anything it wrote a reply to. Now I can see what happened to every email without opening a single one.

 

2. Connect your email (and your CRM, if you can).
In a Claude chat, click the + button, go to Connectors and turn on Gmail. It’ll ask you to sign in with Google (or Microsoft).

 

Then I connected my CRM, Moxie, too, and that’s where this went from helpful to kind of magical. When Claude found an email I needed to act on, it didn’t just tell me about it; it created the task right inside Moxie, then labeled the email “In Moxie” and archived it.

 

That label is my favorite part. My old system was to leave everything in my inbox until it was done, then move it to “No Action Needed.” …And yes, I know, that’s how you end up with 10 pages! 

 

Now, the email can leave my inbox right away, because the task already lives in Moxie, where I plan my week. The label tells me it’s handled and where to find it. No more staring blindly at my inbox each morning to get the day started.

 

If your CRM or task app has a Claude connector, turn it on. But if it doesn’t, Claude can also hand you a task list at the end, and you can add the tasks yourself.

 

3. Give it your rules.
Here’s a starter prompt you can copy and adjust:

 

 

4. Watch the first run.
Start with 50 emails, or less if you are anxious. Read through its plan and correct anything it got wrong. You’re training it the same way you’d train a new assistant, just a lot faster!

 

5. Save it so you don’t have to explain it again.
Once the rules work, ask Claude to save them as a skill so you can run the same triage anytime. If you’re using Claude’s desktop app, you can even schedule it to run every weekday morning like I do now! You could even have it run twice a day if you're email heavy in your business.

 

What made me comfortable trying this is that it doesn’t send anything for me. Claude asks before it sends by default, and my prompt tells it to draft only. I still read every reply and decide what goes out.

 

If you are timid about starting to use AI but know it's time to move past the chat, you don’t have to automate your whole business. Just start with one boring thing that has clear rules and give yourself some time back!

 

Next week, I'll share how I built my weekly dashboard and how Claude helps me see my business at a glance with tasks, finances, and more.

 

CJ
 

P.S. If you try it, hit reply and tell me how many pages your inbox was beforehand. No judgment, mine was ten!