I get all kinds of stuff in my email. Lots of it I just delete because it has no direct bearing on anything I do, did or want to do.

Like voice acting.

Nevertheless, when I received an email this morning from someone pitching a voice acting class, I did a double-take and paid some attention. Why? Well, it wasn’t because of the font (yecch) — it was the first line of the email.

“Sure,” I thought, “I have 50 seconds to spare.” Even though I have no interest in voice acting (though I’ve often been mocked for my tendency to sound like a radio announcer on my voicemail messages), I opened the email and took a look.

The brilliance of this tactic is that it works on a level that goes beyond whether or not I’m interested in voice coaching: It respects my time. Few email marketers do that, and certainly no one does that to this degree. Before Warren Garlin is trying to sell me anything, he’s effectively saying: “Look, I know you’re busy and you get a ton of email, but this one will take less than a minute to read, so hopefully you have those 50 seconds and you’re willing to share them with me. If not, I understand; no harm no foul.”

Of course, if everyone started doing this, the unique nature of the message would be lost and it would become just another aspect of our daily email annoyance. But it’s a great object lesson in how something so simple — like respecting your recipient’s inbox — can be so powerful.

Takeaway for marketers: When everyone’s zigging, a zag can stand out from the crowd. Oh, and remember to respect your recipient’s inbox … and schedule.

LLsocial.com reports on Pinterest doing something that is fundamentally very smart … while simultaneously doing something very stupid.

Smart: They’re rewriting URLs that Pinterest users are posting to the service so that those URLs are affiliated links that will generate income for Pinterest.

Stupid: They don’t disclose this on their site.

Did Pinterest blow it? Is it no big deal? There’s lots of discussion on both sides of the issue over at that LLsocial link. My $.02 is that they blew it by not revealing this from the get-go, but that it’s not a deal-breaker, mainly because the Pinterest community will forgive them. They’ll apologize, revise their disclosure, and their audience will continue to post pins and boards by the bazillions.

However, it does put Pinterest on a kind of double-secret probation. A lot more people will be paying far closer attention to them than might otherwise have been the case. Another misstep or two, and they could have some real trouble on their hands.

Takeaway for marketers: Transparency matters.

The world of comic books is lousy with reboots these days. The New 52 initiative over at DC is probably the highest-profile example (of the titles I’ve read so far, the Aquaman relaunch is my favorite; even Koothrappali won’t be able to say “Aquaman sucks” anymore), but it’s far from the only one.

Over at Marvel, one of the newest reboot examples is Fantastic Four: Season One, which celebrates the 50th anniversary of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby’s classic by updating the team’s origin tale. It’s received mixed reviews: USA Today called it outstanding, while IGN rated it mediocre.

I’m not here to review the book, though. Instead, I’m here to review the one panel you see above.

Back in 1962, when the FF first encountered cosmic rays, news about their powers was spread by television, radio and newspapers. In Season One, news travels a lot faster: For example, Johnny Storm is the top-trending topic on Twitter and has his own website.

Except he doesn’t.

I mean, he does if you read the panel above. But just try and go to the site he names. No, seriously. Try. I’ll wait.

See?

Is it really that difficult, people?

How many writers and editors and marketers read that book and saw that panel? And you mean to tell me that no one at Marvel thought to register that domain before I did?

And they ought to be damn happy I did, by the way. Imagine if they similarly ignored a domain that was registered to a porn site — which is not at all out of the realm of possibility given the domain in question.

Worse yet, no Marvel marketer had the forethought not only to register the site, but to set up a Twitter account for Johnny Storm? For goodness sake, you’re saying he’s the top-trending topic on Twitter — and you’re not even going to get an intern to do some tweeting for him so you can add an actual social media dimension to the story you’re telling?

This seems to me to be a gigantic missed opportunity on Marvel’s part. In the Venn diagram of comic book fans and social media users, the overlap of those two circles is pretty significant. To be talking about social media components in one of your A-list releases of the year and not follow through by reflecting those components in the real world is a pretty big mistake.

But I get it: Marvel publishes dozens of titles each week. Even with their massive marketing resources, they probably don’t have the time to dot every I and cross every T, much less create a full-on social media initiative. Fine. At the very least, then, spend the six bucks it requires to register the domain and redirect it to the Fantastic Four page of the Marvel Universe Wiki.

Epic fail. ‘Nuff said.

Takeaway for marketers: If you’re going to use a fictional web address in some piece of published material, make sure you own that domain. Then actually do something with it. Otherwise, what’s the point?

Ehhhhh, maybe not so much … at least if you believe some *ahem* “sponsored content” from the folks over at Destination CRM.

Actually, it’s from the folks at intelliresponse (Destination CRM only blasted the info to their mailing list), and while it’s the sort of information that’s hardly coming from someone without any skin in the game, it’s nevertheless tough to ignore. Here’s the salient point:

The number of questions asked via social media channels account for less than 1/100th of a percent of questions asked via customer-facing websites.

In other words: When customers have a customer service question, are they looking for answers in social media or on a company’s website? Overwhelmingly it’s the website.

Which begs the question: With spending on social forms of CRM on the rise big-time, is this really where dollars ought to be spent?

Takeaway for marketers: Sure, explore social customer service channels … but make sure your website is up to snuff first.

That’s the question asked by Todd Wasserman over on the American Express Open Forum. The article doesn’t really answer the question, though. Instead, it talks about ways to manage all the cards that come your way.

I’ll answer the question: No, it’s not.

But: If you’re not placing your social media information on your card, you’re a schmuck. That screenshot up there is a scan of the back of my business card, and I can’t count the number of compliments I’ve received on it.

By contrast, I’ve seen business cards from self-proclaimed marketing experts that don’t even include a website address, much less a social media icon. These days, that’s downright pathetic.

Takeway for marketers: If part of your marketing expertise is digital and social media and your card doesn’t reflect that reality, you have some work to do on your personal collateral.