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How to Handle Scam Emails Like a Pro

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At Great Big Digital Agency, we are very busy. So busy, that when we get an email from a lead and start the follow-up chain, only to quickly realize our time is being wasted, we get annoyed. 

But annoyance is not a productive emotion. We quickly turn that emotion into opportunity…to laugh. 

Because, without laughter, isn’t the day just kind of boring? And what better way to entertain yourself than talking to someone whose primary purpose is to continue trying to talk to you to get you to send them money. 

With that said, here are Great Big Digital’s tips on how to respond to a scam email like a pro. 

1. Confirm that the “lead” is a scam first: 

Always confirm your suspicions by prodding the person to give you more details, to make sure you don’t presumptuously start “messing” with an actual lead.

2. Find out the details and get overly excited to talk to someone:

What throws a scammer off right away? Getting way too excited to participate in their scam. Cry, Scream, Shout, give TMI, but most importantly, sign the email “love” because you want them to start questioning you right away. Also, make sure you talk about how inexperienced you are and how you will build the site for “so cheap, it’s too good to be true” (because it is), because this would drive away any “bad” lead and confirm that they are truly a scam. Don’t worry, they will continue to talk with you. This is just round one. 

3. Get weird and personal and weird and more personal:

Now is the time that you really want to lean into what you’ve begun. They came back for another round, and here’s your attempt to truly scare them into leaving you alone forever. You want to start trying to freak them out, make them feel like you may be unstable, make them question why they ever reached out to you in the first place, scare them, and think that you may be scamming them! Also, remind them that you love them deeply. 

4. Be a god damn mad man:

Make them so frustrated they finally realize that the conversation is not going to amount in any money for them. They obviously have not been paying attention, so make them pay attention. Start making up people that don’t exist. Use your imagination. Get hyper-specific about a topic that has nothing to do with the ask. And finally, keep up the love thing, cause at some point (you hope) they will run screaming. 

5. Don’t Get Discouraged:

That was the last time I heard from Jackson, and I have to say, I was a little disappointed. When you share your heart and soul with someone, you hope they at least give you a respectable goodbye. 

But my heart will go on, and there’s plenty of fish in the sea. And just like that, today, a brand new fish swam out to my hook! Can’t wait to reel this one in too.

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