Fun post, thank you for sharing these ideas. Welcome to the Fix!

Why thank you Paul. I’m delighted to be blogging with this savvy group. And I’ll admit it: this debut post is a bit long. I just couldn't stop writing about all those fun headlines.

Thanks tons...check this headline out:

Sorry To Hear You Are Having Trouble With Your Computer...

:)

Haven’t seen that one, Jennifer. I love the Important Initial Caps!

Here’s another:

The URL for downloading and installing the plugin necessary to run the current object's embedded data

(I’m wondering what the verb would be if I had to complete that sentence.)

All I can say is that you're lucky...

The majority of my spam subjects are inappropriate for this audience.

Still upset.

I have to say, as someone who works for a firm that provides a permission-based email marketing service (StreamSend), that I am not thrilled to see a post that seems to be encouraging spam.

I know it was meant to be funny and it was funny but spam is a real problem and it hurts legitimate email marketers. Plus, spam is really annoying on a daily basis.

Let me clarify, I do not believe that the author was intentionally encouraging spam. I hope my post did not come across that way.

Fantastic resurrections Gwyenth.
There seem to be a lot of direction toward E-mail...
but we still do majority business the Old fashioned way....
Direct Mail.

Many of these headlines
are very useful.....

I will run 100 postcards tomorrow with a few and see
Results.
I change my content off-line and on-line wekly...Maybe that is why we get Response?

I still don't understand the emphasis about Spam...we only Mail to people who have
asked for our Content,
and most look forward to the information

Are you trying to proof that marketing is spam?

Neil — You’re right, I am most assuredly not encouraging spam. It’s ill-mannered and illegal. I support responsible, professional permission e-mail marketing.

But spam does exist. And if we have to live with it, well, then, at times it’s healthy to laugh at it.

Mike — No, marketing is not spam. In the post, I’m simply having a bit of fun with common spam subject lines, evaluating them from a writer's perspective.

Chuck,

Yes, there is a fundamental difference between permission-based email marketing and spam. it is important to emphasize that.

As you suggested, permission-based means they asked to hear from you. Spam means you are sending to a list you purchased, emails you harvested from the web, etc.

Email Marketing Service Providers have to constantly work to bring in legitimate email marketers and exclude spammers.

As you noted, people often look forward to receiving their legitimate email marketing but are made angry by spam. The spammers out there have made legitimate email marketing more difficult by cluttering your inbox with garbage.

Sow's purse out of a silk ear....

I love it when we find the extraordinary hidden amongst the commonplace. Ok, spam headlines are not exactly extraordinary, but pulling something fun and creative out of what is otherwise the bane of our digital existence will bring us all a little entertainment AND perhaps open our eyes a bit more. Interesting insights.

Thanks for making me look at my spam in a different light. On a marketing note, other places to look when brainstorming subject line copy include headlines in newspapers and book titles on Amazon.

Problem is, we're used to these headlines and fed up with them. Humans are better than spam filters at spotting spam, so headlines like these - even though some are amusing - means the message goes in the waste basket unread. So you need to make something up that doesn't sound like spam - which happens to be exactly what the spammers are trying to do at the same time. - Also, a side point, you need to deliver. A writer in the latest issue of The Spectator (British) actually read all spam he got during a period - and he says they weren't selling anything! Makes you wonder, but that means that whether you want Viagra or not, you don't click.

Clark — Finding the extraordinary in the ordinary. That’s what marketing is often about.

Jenni — Newspaper headlines and Amazon are wonderful sources for inspiration. I particularly like the headlines in The New York Times- Week in Review because they are written to play off incredible conceptual illustrations. I like to check Amazon.com book titles after I write a headline to make sure what I’m writing is original.

Anders — I never, ever click. I’m just a spam subject line reader, like most writers I know. How long did it take the Spectator author to read all that spam? Send the link to the article if you have it.

Thanks for the comments everyone.

One reader who linked to this post led me to the “Free Range Spam Poetry Clinic.” More fun with spam! Here’s the link:

http://www.stephendann.net/free_form_spam_poetry.htm

Anders,

I think you make a key point. We kind of know what looks like spam and condition ourselves to be repelled by it. Even outside of the email context, a spam-like wording in copywriting would repell me.

It is kind of like worn, trite sayings: we are tired of hearing them and they have lost their power.