Marketing sarcasm in a slow economy

With the slew of marketing emails I receive (and you too, I'm sure), I was recently taken off-guard by a sarcastic message that turned out to be quite humorous. While I do not use Rackspace and I in no way endorse them, I am, for some odd reason, on their mailing list (imagine that, an email from a company I didn't sign up with). The subject of the email was simple enough and caught my eye for a scan (rather than a quick delete) Helpful hints for maximizing your business budget The email was properly created, using images and text so that a quick scan would tell me what I need to know without downloading images. I saw the bullet points and then decided to download the images. It wasn't until a few moments when it actually sank in. At that point, I got the joke and had to read the rest of the email.  <!--end headline--><!--bullets and prof-->

Helpful Hints for Maximizing Your Business Budget

• Hitchhike on business trips.   • Outsource web design to neighbor's artistic eleven-year old kid.   • Allocate 25% of R&D budget for purchasing lottery tickets.   • Host with Rackspace.

At that point, I had to read the rest of the email (which I wont bore you with here). I will have to note that I did not click on any links, nor do I even care about Rackspace. However, kudos to the marketing individuals responsible for a job well done. Even though they did not motivate me to click a link (I'm just not that kind of person), they did motivate me to do even better and remember their brand in addition to reiterate their message for them at no cost.