If You Have Your Own Domain

• 1). Turn on the "catchall" setting for your email account. This is commonly a setting in the control panel for your email account (the one from your email provider--not your email program, like Outlook). Contact technical support if you are unsure where or how to toggle this setting.
  
  
• 2). Test whether your email account supports catchall by sending an email to xxyz@yourdomain.com. Replace "yourdomain.com" with your specific domain name. Your email supports catchall if you receive this message.
  
  Contact technical support if you don't receive the message within a few minutes.
  
  
• 3). Create unlimited email accounts by putting any combination of numbers and/or letters in front of your domain name.
  
  Separate work and pleasure emails subtly by giving out slight variations of your name. For example, if your name is Joe Brown, you could give your boss jbrown@yourdomain.com and give friends john@yourdomain.com. This allows you to keep the two separate without making it obvious you're doing any filtering.
  
  Sign up for online services with custom addresses specific to each service. For example, sign up for coupons from Barnes & Noble with books@yourdomain.com or barnesandnoble@yourdomain.com. Not only will this allow you to create custom filters in your email program, but you can also identify if anyone ever sells your email to spammers, because the spam would also come to that specific adddress.
  
  

If You Have a Gmail Address

• 1). Insert a plus (+) sign after your username but before the @ sign in your Gmail email address.
  
  
• 2). Type any word or phrase of your choosing immediately after the + sign to create a custom email account.
  
  For example, if your Gmail address is joe@gmail.com, and you want an email address specific to friends, try joe+friends@gmail.com.
  
  
• 3). Provide custom email addresses using the + sign whenever you give out your email address. Be as general or specific as you like. For example, if you sign up to receive newsletters from Wal-Mart, you may give them joe+walmart@gmail.com or joe+shopping@gmail.com.
  
  
• 4). Create filters (under the "Settings" menu) that sort incoming mail based on the "To:" address.
  
  For example, if you want Wal-Mart emails from Step 3 sorted into a label called "Shopping" put "joe+walmart@gmail.com" (or whatever address you chose) in the "To:" field of a new filter. Check the "Skip the Inbox" and "Apply the Label: Shopping" boxes and create the new filter.