Searching in Google apps can be difficult
Sometimes it can be hard to find what you're looking for in Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Keep, or any Google app product. But I've started to use something to really make my labels pop and make sure that I'm finding exactly what I'm looking for.
Let me show you how in today's video. (air whooshing)
So let's get started here within Google Keep, and then we'll move on to other popular Google products such as Calendar, Google Drive, and even Gmail.
The reason why I wanted to start here within Keep is that perhaps it is the most limiting when it comes to our labels. Here you can see I've got three different labels: Family, Personal, and Work; however, there is not even any color coding beside them.
They just give us this sort of generic label icon beside them. And if you come down here to edit labels, you may say to yourself, "Oh, great. Here, I can add a label. I can just go in and..." No, it's just text-based.
Adding emojis to Google Keep
So this is what I like doing. I will come in here and I'll usually put it at the front of the label.
Now, if you're a Windows user, you can just use Windows + . and that's gonna bring up your emoji icon, your emoji dialogue. So you can start to search and start to type in something or use from one of the more frequently used ones here down below.
Otherwise, you can go to a website such as Emojipedia, which is one of my personal favorites. If you wanna search through and maybe spend a bit more time looking at some particular icons.
But let's do this quick and fast. So maybe under Family, I'm gonna select this family icon.
Now, one thing of note, before you come down here and edit the next one, make sure you hit the check mark here to lock it in. So there you can see that we now have that icon down below.
I'm gonna get to why it shifted to the bottom in just a moment because it's treating this as something special here. But let's go to the other ones first.
I'm again, gonna bring up my emoji dialogue here. And for Personal, I'm just gonna put this individual person here in front. I'm gonna hit that check mark.
And then for Work, why don't we use something like a laptop, I think would be appropriate. Usually, I'll put a single space in between just so it's easier to read the label.
I'm gonna hit the check mark here and I'm gonna say Done. And so the great thing is, is that these really pop. Now I only have three at the moment but what if I had 27 different labels here within Keep?
Now it's gonna make it that much easier for me to find those labels that I'm looking for. And also keep in mind, you don't have to do this for every single one, maybe there's just a particular one.
But even when it comes to the notes themselves, here you can see that they really stand out that much more. I don't have to come down here and read. "Oh, is this a personal label?"
No, I can actually see my little icon on here and see that these two labels are indeed Personal. If I go over here to Family, it's quick and easy to see that I have that label immediately on it.
And even when you're adding labels from within an existing note or taking a new note, right, if I come down here and say that I want to change the labels or add a label, it makes it that much easier in all cases.
Using emojis in Google Calendar
So let's move on to something that we don't often attribute to labels themselves, and that is Google Calendar.
So here I've got a very basic calendar and I've just got a couple of recurring events that are listed here but already, you can see that my exercise time stands out a little more, right? Because I've got this little running man beside it.
So not only do I have it perhaps in a different color, but I've got this icon, I've got this emoji right next to it. If I want lunch to maybe stand out that much more, If I come in here to edit it, and again, I'm gonna bring up my emoji icon here.
And let's see, let's just type in something like, Oh, I dunno, food. We're just gonna search up some food. I'm gonna put in a nice, green, healthy salad here.
I'm gonna say Save and let's do it to the following events as well. So now, again, I've got that icon that emoji, sorry, that is gonna be in front of all of my events.
It actually makes it maybe a little less important that I use the color changes here, right? 'Cause as you know, unless you're using different calendars here on the left-hand side, when you're creating a new event, it's gonna go to your default color.
And yeah, you can select a different color down below. If I go into more options here, I can choose any one of these colors if I want to, but that becomes a little less important when you start adding these types of emojis.
And you can start to build sort of your own glossary or your own index of what these emojis mean. So for example, maybe I've got a very important meeting, right? This is something that is very important.
But if I want it to stand out as something that's gonna grab my attention or something that's going to stand out, maybe I wanna start using this green check mark.
So anything that is extremely important or something that I need to prepare for in advance, I'm gonna use that green check box. So, again, you don't certainly have to use this for all of your appointments or your events but they can really help things to stand out.
Many of you know that I like to use the all-day event area up top, and I'll often use them for things such as tasks or agenda items, not just things like a vacation.
But if I wanna separate out the difference between perhaps something that is just an agenda and a reminder versus maybe I am gonna take some vacation time up here, why don't I start with an emoji?
And let's see what comes up for vacation. Yeah, plane, travel, things that many of us haven't been able to do recently. (Scott chuckles)
And I'm gonna say vacation and it's gonna span over a few days, the whole weekend or something like that. So again, it just stands out that much more.
I'm not going to question, "Oh, am I really flying somewhere? Am I really going somewhere?" Well, yeah, you added the emoji, Scott. That's why you put it there in the first place.
Adding emojis to Google Drive
Let's move on to something else that many of us are using and that is Google Drive. And here I've got a test folder where I'm already using some color coding, right?
I'm using green for my finance folder and I'm using red for sales. And if you come up here and just right-click, of course, you can change the color on any of your folders, right?
Any folder, doesn't matter what level, you can choose a different color, and that can be very helpful, right? That can be very helpful to make sure that things are in place here or that certain things stand out.
But maybe I wanna come down here to Support and I'm gonna select Rename in this case. And at the beginning here, what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna bring up something like maybe a phone, maybe something like that. Phone, support, would that make sense in this case?
And I'm just gonna hover over this for just a second. It says telephone receiver. Okay, so I just wanna know what the actual name is.
I'm gonna say OK here. The reason why I wanted to see that is 'cause number one, you'll see something with an emoji, in most cases, will sort to the very top.
It's gonna treat it almost like a special character. So you wanna keep that in mind as well as this one sorts to the top. But the other thing you want to consider is that if you are using multiple emojis here,
Is that whatever that emoji name is, so in this case, this was telephone receiver. It's gonna sort it by that T in telephone. So let's come down to Development and use this as an example.
So I'm gonna click on it and I'm gonna say Rename, and I'm gonna come to the front of it just like we have been so far, and this time I'm gonna choose this question mark, right?
So I'm gonna choose the question mark, I'm gonna give it the space, I'm gonna say OK. Now you'll see that it's actually not sorting this based on the D in development, because, yeah, D does come before S.
It's actually sorting it on the Q in question mark, instead of the T in support. If we come down here to support and say Rename, and let's purposely get rid of the phone, and let's do something like, oh, I don't know something like a baseball, like the letter B in this case.
So what we should see now is that yeah, the B in baseball is now sorting this ahead of the Q in development. So you wanna keep that in mind if you do want your folders or your labels or wherever you are using emojis to sort properly.
Now, of course, the easy way to get around this is to put the emoji at the end and not the front. The challenge there is that sometimes it can be a little out of balance because your emojis, some will be way out here and some will be a lot closer in and so forth.
But again, that can be another way to just highlight certain things within your folders.
Using emojis in Gmail
Last but not least, let's jump into Gmail where many of us often have a long list of labels here on the left-hand side. And yes, Gmail gives us the ability to add color coding, but sometimes we wanna go one step further.
So if you come over to any label you select the three dots and say Edit, what we can do here is again, add some emojis. And if this is a newsletter, maybe I'll select something like a newspaper.
That seems appropriate in this case. I'm gonna hit Save. Now, if I come down here and actually select the newsletter's label. And I'll just open up and sample email, you'll see that that emoji carries over everywhere.
So you're gonna see that label here. If I wanna come up here and change my label, the emoji is going to be listed there as well.
So you don't have to worry that it's gonna appear in some places and not others. A helpful way to keep everything organized.
Now, keep in mind that you can apply these same emoji tips to almost any other application, whether it's on your mobile device or on your desktop computer.
Now, I would love to hear from you next. What are some creative ways that you are using to help you stay more productive? Be sure to let me know in the comments down below.
And if you enjoyed this video, you may also like the video that YouTube is recommending to you right here. Thank you so much for watching, and remember, being productive does not need to be difficult. In fact, it's very simple.
