New projects or new committees often means working with a new group of people, sharing documents and sending email messages. If you find yourself entering the same group of email addresses over and over again, you can save yourself some time by creating a personal Google Contact Group. Create it once and use it many times. It will also ensure nobody is accidentally missed when sharing documents or sending emails.
Personal contact groups (aka email lists) allow you to use a single name that equates to the email addresses of the people on the list. Instead of entering each person’s email address in the To field of an email message, you can enter the contact group’s name and all the members of that group are added to the email.Create a Personal Contact Group:
1. In Gmail, click the drop-down menu in the top-left side of the page
2. There are two main ways to create a group. You can either select all your contacts first, then create a new group, or you can create the group first, then add your contacts. In this instance, we will create a new group first. To create a group, select New Group from the left menu.
3. Add people to your group by searching for their name in the search box or scrolling through your contacts or directory and selecting them.
4. Click the Groups icon to add them to your group.
Your groups will appear in the left navigation and display the number of contacts in the group. 
Another way to add contacts to a group:
Another way to add contacts to a group:
- Select your group in the left navigation
- Click the Add button
- Copy or enter a list of emails
Using your personal contact group
Type the name of your group in place of an email address when you want to email or share documents with your group. It will populate the box with the individual email addresses of everyone in your group.
Other options to consider
There are limitations to how many people you can email at a time, in a day, etc., so for large email distribution lists, you may want to consider a Google Group email list. In addition, if more than one person needs to use the contact group, a Google Group email list may be a better option than a personal contact group.What’s the difference between a personal Contact Group and a Google Group?
The primary difference is that a contact group is for your personal use and a Google Group can be used by more than one person (because it has its own email address).
Summary of differences: Using Personal Contact Groups:
- Only the owner can use
- You create your own groups through Google Contacts
- Managed through Google Contacts
- Can share docs and sites with the group (cannot share calendars)
- Group members see email in their inbox only
- Must be requested
- Managed through Google Groups
- Can share docs, sites and calendars with the group
- Group members can see email in inbox, through the online forum, or both
Comments
Post a Comment