Given the ever-declining response rates from e-mail marketing initiatives, e-mail list management is a top priority for retailers. Consumers who opt-in to receive e-mail from a retailer will hold that brand personally responsible for how it uses e-mail. When they unsubscribe, they expect to do it once. Having a central system for list management simplifies the process, ensuring unsubscribe requests take effect system-wide. Further, a centralized list management system can help ensure compliance with CAN-SPAM and reduce SPAM scores by improving the quality of the messages.

Something Smells Phishy
Many brands struggle with avoiding phishing scams, which are fake e-mails that appear to be sent from a trusted company, yet they're scammers sending customers to a spoof Web site to steal their personal information. Most companies educate their customers on how to spot and report these spoof e-mails and Web sites. If your company has multiple legitimate Web sites, how will your customers distinguish between official sites and phishing scams?

Here are four actions you can take to improve your e-mail marketing:

1. Centralize the management of e-mail lists and create a global unsubscribe.
2. Always link to one main, official Web site to avoid looking like a phishing scam.
3. Maintain and enforce a corporate privacy policy.
4. Localize the e-mails and include announcements on local events and promotions.

What are other retailers doing?
Let's leave off with some retailers who exemplify these principles in action. While some retailers struggle with legacy technology that impedes the ability to aggregate local and regional microsites, the following SEO-friendly retail franchises maintain a single top-level domain structure for their Web sites:

• Red Door Spas uses one top-level domain with SEO friendly location microsites: http://www.reddoorspas.com/RedDoorLocations/newyorkcityspa.aspx
• The Little Gym uses one top-level domain. All location-specific top-level domains 301 redirect to the location microsites within the site. http://www.thelittlegym.com/ashevillenc/pages/default.aspx
• The UPS Store uses one top-level domain with location microsites:  http://www.theupsstorelocal.com/2020/
• Life Time Fitness uses one top-level domain with a sub-domain for location microsites: http://clubs.lifetimefitness.com/page/Allen-McKinney/11274/
• LA Fitness also uses one top-level domain with location microsites, but could benefit from search friendly URLs: http://www.lafitness.com/Pages/clubhome.aspx?clubid=458&clubStatusID=1
• SuperCuts is also similar to LA Fitness:
• http://www.supercuts.com/salondetail/default.asp?salonid=9676&searchAddr=85282
• Tony & Guy has a good URL structure, uses Geo-IP on the search page but could benefit from moving the Geo-IP list to the home page:
• http://toniguy.com/salon/chandler_fashion_center/default.aspx
• Brite Smile has microsites with an SEO friendly URL structure:
• http://www.britesmile.com/teeth-whitening-med-spa-beverly-hills.html
• State Farm Insurance also requires that even agent domains like www.SharonLayman.com redirect via Web forwarding to their microsites on the State Farm domain. http://online2.statefarm.com/b2c/sf/agent/03/1237

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