By Ron Hauenstein, CLU, ChFC

I must be the luckiest man alive. Every day I open my email inbox and find new treasures, untold riches, wealth without effort, and winnings, winnings, winnings. I get things I didn’t even know I needed, and I’m taught that I need to worry about parts of my body that I have long ignored. People everywhere seem to want to help me become more successful in my business or, if I’m dissatisfied where I am, help me get started in a new business. My joy overflows at these gifts from cyberspace.

For example, one site wants me to send a picture of my face for a chance to win a $500 shopping spree. Clearly, these people have never seen my face. I’ve submitted a mug shot to Advisor Today dozens of times but they refuse to run it, so I’m not counting on the shopping spree.

Just like J-Lo’s
Some days I just cannot believe my luck. Did you know that I have been offered a sterling silver replica of J-Lo’s engagement ring for just $39.95? Unbelievable, isn’t it? For those who don’t get to the dentist enough to read People magazine, J-Lo is the singing and movie star Jennifer Lopez. Ben Affleck recently asked for her hand in marriage and threw in a 6.5 carat emerald-cut diamond reportedly worth $1.2 million. Can you imagine my wife’s joy when I tell her I got it for under $40?

An unbelievable number of people in cyberspace are concerned about my appearance. The sender of Stay Young Longer has offered to send me the most important anti-aging solution ever developed. (I wonder if I sent them the photo of my face by accident.) I can try it free if I just click, they said.

After several months of receiving these messages, I began to wonder if all this luck was being showered just on me, or if others might be getting a share of what they deserve. When I did a Google search for the word spam, I was rewarded with more than 8,190,000 hits. One website told me that more than half of all email messages sent today is spam. In 2001 it was just 7 percent. The Federal Trade Commission used to get 10,000 spam-related complaints a day in 2001. Today, it will receive 130,000. So I guess the luck is going around.

Wowzers!
I’m willing to share, too. I have so many opportunities to become rich that I don’t know where to start. Another email sender is looking for just 100 people to make rich, and they picked me! They have millionaire secrets they are going to reveal to me and just 99 other people. Wowzers!

I know some of you are so envious by now that you have probably stopped reading, but I just have to share with you this news: I have been offered magic words that automatically close a sale. I never knew selling could be so easy. I think I’ll just put these words on a cassette and mail it to all my clients. After all, I’ll get 300 percent more sales and 50 percent more profit for each sale.

Some return addresses and subject lines puzzle me. One message was from Ogxxlnwgktwy and was about imuacad ovimkwljt. I nearly went by that one, but that would have been a huge mistake, since I can now capture my dream and earn financial independence. I can join a multitrillion dollar market. Really.

Admittedly, some of the spam I get lacks imagination. Wiley told me about a huge inventory of prescription meds available from Your Trusted Online Pharmacy. Does he think I would buy from my Distrusted Online Pharmacy? And an anonymous sender named Your Friend says I can get 12 CDs for the price of one, but that is so Sunday-supplement-dullsville.

A bad target
Some spammers just haven’t done much market research. Shed No More promises to get rid of pet hair around my house, but I don’t have any pets. And I have no interest in an Online Casino with No Download, whatever that means.

So there you have it. I wish you could have just one-tenth of the luck that arrives in my inbox every day. Because of my newfound wealth, I am happy to now share these riches with anyone who sends me an email at the address below. Soon you will be lucky, too.

Ron Hauenstein, CLU, ChFC, is a veteran insurance agent who signed his first contract in 1983. Comments on this column can be addressed to Ron at rhauenstein@ft.newyorklife.com.

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