One of my side projects is SciFan, a site dedicated to SF&F books and authors. It's not huge, but has some following in its niche. Here's what I just got in my e-mail box from someone working at DNA Studio, a company Lego apparently outsources some online work to:

Hi-

As I was browsing the internet, I came across you site
(http://www.scifan.com/classics/) and it has some great Sci-fi content on
it. I want to invite you to participate in an incentive program for the
new Star Wars LEGO that just hit the store shelves last month. By posting
content from http://lego.dnastudio.com you will be eligible for one of
three 14-inch LEGO Yoda.

Once you reach our media depot (http://lego.dnastudio.com),
just copy and paste the code found below the banners and photos to creatively integrate
into your website. There is also a press release section.

The new LEGO Star Wars Episode II includes the release of 4 new colors:
lime green, dark red, sand green and dark blue. To find out more
information about Star Wars LEGO check out http://www.lego.com/starwars.

If you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to contact me….
[e-mail withheld]

Thanks,
[name withheld]

****
Our selection of who will receive the Yoda will be based largely on (a)
the volume of traffic your site drives to the LEGO site and (b) the
strength of the presence of the banner or photos on your site. Our
decision as to the recipients of the Yoda will be made on July 16, 2002
and will be final, binding and non-appealable in all aspects. The
recipients of the Yoda will be notified by e-mail.
**
If you do not want to receive emails from me anymore, please respond with
"opt-out"

Here's my reply:

Hi,

Thanks for writing, though I'm nonplussed, if not angry, at your e-mail, for the following reasons:

1. Our site is www.scifan.com, while the Classics theme you mentioned is just a small section within it. Looking at http://www.scifan.com/classics/ more than 5 seconds should make this obvious (and BTW this URL has been a redirect for several weeks.) I guess you have to e-mail a lot of webmasters not to have noticed that. I won't tag your e-mail as spam since it looks like it's coming from a genuine inbox and seems sent only to me, so I'll credit you for the grunt work you're probably going through, but I'll only go so far in my magnanimity.

2. With our database of nearly 34,000 books, 7,000 authors and 3,400 series, we get about 1,000 to 1,500 daily unique visitors a day (and about 200,000 monthly page views), which admittedly isn't huge but still makes us one of the big sites about science fiction and fantasy books. The suggestion that we might want to give away space on our targeted site for a commercial purpose (i.e. displaying your banner ads), just for the possibility of winning a toy is plainly insulting.

Thanks for opting me out of your list.

Best regards,

Olivier Travers, owner
http://www.scifan.com - books & links for the science fiction fan

****
Our selection of who will receive traffic from SciFan will be based largely on (a)the interest your site would have for our readers and (b)short of a strong interest to our readers which would get you a free link, the amount of money you'd be willing to pay for a feature on our site.
**
If you do not want to receive emails from me anymore, please stop sending me obviously canned e-mails. Alternatively, I'm available for a real business discussion about sponsorship or advertising opportunities at SciFan.com.

The person who e-mailed me is most probably a junior staff member who just does as (s)he's told. If you're a manager at DNA Studio, and if you don't want to look like a spammer and screw up your relationships with independent site owners (excluding 12-year-old attention-craving GeoCities-based teens the e-mail I received seemed after, and I'm not even sure you're at par), e-mail me, I'll be happy to consult for you. I can be very nice in a different context (eligible for a Lego Yoda, no kidding!) Sorry your guerilla marketing blew in your face, it wouldn't happen if you knew what you were doing. If you're from Lego or another DNA Studio big-name client, and don't quite understand what's wrong with this e-mail, we can talk too.

Update: here's the reply to my reply:

Hi Olivier-

I know you have opt-out and I respect your wishes. I do want to contact you for an apology and also to confirm your belief that there is an actually person who sent you this email and is reading your response. I am sorry if I have insulted you. I realize you do have a very large and targeted site, which is why I found your site noteworthy to contact.

I will not be contacting your further, and I hope you accept my apology.

Best Regards,

[name witheld]

The reply I just sent: "Apologies accepted." Good points for the quick and personal reply, if phrased in an even more awkward English than mine. Now the embarrassment has been shared. I don't know what else (s)he could have done at this point, since it's the whole program that I criticized.