To evaluate the email programs of the top online retailers, their research team logged on to the Web sites of 820 top retailers
identified by Internet Retailer and registered to receive emails from
each that had an email marketing program (94 percent of Top 500
companies vs. 83 percent of other companies studied). Then they compared
the practices of Top 500 retailers to the other 320 retailers.

Among the findings:

• Not surprisingly, nearly six out of
  10 retailers in the Top 500 offered a preference center at opt-in,
  while only one out of four other retailers studied did so.
• However,
  nearly three-quarters of the companies in the Top 500 with email
  programs didn’t offer customers any alternatives to unsubscribing, such
  as choosing different subscriptions or altering message frequency. And
  even more interesting, three out of four companies that had offered
  choices at opt-in didn’t offer to let recipients change those choices
  when they went to opt out.
• And the most surprising finding: one
  out of five companies that didn’t offer recipients any choices when
  they opted in to receive emails did give recipients choices when they
  tried to opt out. As a last ditch effort to keep subscribers on board,
  these companies offered to send less often or send different types of
  content.

While this may be a successful strategy for some
companies that want as much freedom as possible in their frequency and
content up-front, the impact of this tactic should be closely measured,
since recipients may choose to hit the spam button instead of going to
the trouble of unsubscribing, jeopardizing your deliverability.

While the study underscores that leading retail companies do
optimize their programs for best results. It also reveals that even the
best programs can improve and take results to new levels of success.

Source: Silverpop