We get a lot of unhinged spam here at the Studio. A LOT.
For example, who can forget the AI generated email from a Chinese company trying sell us coffee AND bathroom cleaner (!?) we chatted about in a recent livestream.
But one email stands out. I didn't even mark it as spam, so I can keep it for posterity.
It had the the following subject line:
we would love to working with you
All lowercase. No puncuation. 1000% legit!
The sender claimed to be from the marketing department at Interior Design Magazine, representing the @interiordesignmag instagram account. For a fee, they said they’d feature our work and deliver thousands of new followers. The pricing was listed as “29 $” (space and all). It came from a Gmail address and was CC’d to hundreds of other artists and shops.
Asking Questions
Instead of ignoring it, we replied and asked for proof they were actually affiliated with Interior Design Magazine. The answer was exactly what you’d expect: vague, evasive, and full of excuses about “only using this Gmail for promotion.” It didn’t exactly inspire confidence. We went back and forth a few times.
Me:
Can you send some sort of verification / proof that you work with @interiordesignmag? Can't be too careful these days on the internet.Your email address is a regular gmail, not from one of the companies affiliated with @interiordesignmag, so I want to be 100% sure.
I am the marketing manager for Interiordesignmag and have worked here for 5 years helping people like you build a new organic following.
We do not accept messages/requests as there are too many messages/requests, we have chosen to communicate via email since it is easier for us and it makes it easier for us to find out the customer number.We use the Instagram account only for publishing.
I've helped thousands of people and we're glad we can help you out.
We don't send emails to everyone but have just chosen you because you have good content and we love what you do - therefore you deserve more attention for the work and time you put into your Instagram account.
I asked shouldn't she have an @interiordesignmag.net email then?
Response:
Hello,Yes. Although we don't promote through that email address.
We only use this email for promotion.
Checking with the Real Interior Design Magazine
Just to be extra thoroug, we decided to contact the real Interior Design Mag folks. We got their marketing / sales contact and I asked if this person was even remotely legit.
The response was fast and definitive:
Thank you for reaching out to verify this email!
This is not legitimate Interior Design outreach, and is spam.
Please disregard as such.
Reply All 😈
This is where I had a little passive agressive fun.
Since the scammer had kindly CC’d their entire target list, we hit reply all and warned everyone about the scam. We got to do a good dead and ruin the scammer's day, hopefully. I assume assembling the list of small art stores they were trying to bamboozle took some time and effort. I hope so anyways!
Why This Matters
Scams like this hit small artists and businesses constantly. And I mean constantly. They rely on catching people who are too busy, too overwhelmed or too new at this to know better. We clocked it early in this case, thankfully.
Just to be clear: not every unsolicited email is a scam. A lot of them are just hardworking folks who are trying to drum up business for their company or their freelance career. Just trying to put food on the table for their families. Don't hate the player, hate the game, as they say.
But some of them are malicious scammers that prey on the unaware. If you ever get an email like this, slow down. Check the domain. Verify through the company’s real contact info. And if someone’s sloppy enough to CC their entire target list, don’t hesitate to reply all and warn the others. Sometimes the best move is ruining a scammer’s day!