In today’s digital world, email marketing plays a crucial role in business success. But your cold email marketing campaign’s success is only as good as the accuracy of the email addresses you target. That’s why verifying email addresses should be a crucial part of your strategy to ensure that your message reaches the right inboxes every time.

In 2023, email marketing continues to play a crucial role in business, as evidenced by the following statistics:

1. Email marketers make $42 in sales for every $1 spent, demonstrating a remarkable return on investment.
2. With an estimated 4.5 billion email users by 2025, email marketing has a vast reach, making it an essential tool for businesses to connect with their audience.
3. Email marketing outperforms social media in key metrics like conversion rates, clickthrough rates, and the likelihood of being seen.
4. As many as 69% of marketers use email marketing as a method of content distribution, proving its importance in disseminating information and engaging with customers.

This guide will help you understand the importance of email verification and explore the best practices to enhance your email campaign. With the right practices in place, you can bid farewell to high bounce rates and unresponsive recipients, and unlock the full potential of your campaigns. So, are you ready to elevate your cold email marketing game? Let’s get started!

What is email verification?

Email verification is a procedure that checks if an email address belongs to a genuine user and isn’t a fake or deceptive email. 

Email confirmation, also known as email validation, is a process often used by companies to verify the ownership and validity of an email address. It typically involves sending an email to the given address, containing a unique link or code that the recipient must click or enter to confirm their ownership of the email address.

Organizations and websites use email verification to prevent spam, minimize the chances of fraud, and make sure that their email lists are accurate. It can also be used to validate the email addresses of users while setting up an account to ensure that a legitimate email address has been provided.

How it’s different from email validation?

Two terms email validation vs email verification refer to different processes used while checking your emails. Email verification involves confirming the authenticity of an email address to ensure that it belongs to a legitimate user and is not a fake or fraudulent email. In contrast, email validation is a process that checks the technical aspects of an email address to ensure that it is correctly formatted and capable of receiving emails.

source: datanyze.com

Email validation checks if an email address meets the syntax and formatting standards of Internet email addressing. It also verifies if the domain exists and if the email server can receive emails. For example, an email validation check may confirm that “example@email.com” is a properly formatted email address with a valid domain, but it cannot guarantee that the recipient is actively using or has access to that email address.

On the other hand, email verification goes beyond technical validation to confirm that the email address is active and belongs to a real user. It ensures that the user can access the email address and is willing to receive emails.

Importance of email verification for outreach

Email verification is critical to the success of outreach campaigns because it helps prevent various issues that can hinder email marketing efforts. When it comes to email outreach, it’s important to not only focus on the content of your emails but also on email security, including email verification. 

Failure to use email verification can result in the following issues:

Sender reputation

If you neglect email verification, you increase the likelihood of sending emails to invalid or non-existent email addresses. This can lead to higher bounce rates and complaint rates, which can damage your sender’s reputation and ultimately impact your email deliverability.

Deliverability issues

Having a poor sender reputation due to unverified email addresses can lead to deliverability issues, such as landing in recipients’ spam folders or not being delivered at all. If your email list contains just 1% of bad emails, it can lead to a significant reduction of 10% in your deliverability. This undermines your outreach efforts and reduces the effectiveness of your email campaigns.

Bounce rates

Email validation can help reduce bounce rates by ensuring that you only send emails to active and valid addresses. After the process of email verification, email campaigns experience a significant drop in bounce rates, amounting to 90%. High bounce rates can negatively affect your sender’s reputation, ultimately hindering your outreach campaign.

Open rates

Verifying email addresses and maintaining a clean email list can improve your open rates, as recipients are more likely to engage with your content. Invalid or non-existent email addresses will never open your emails, leading to lower open rates and overall campaign performance.

How often should you verify your outreach email list?

Validating your email list is an essential step for every email marketer to undertake. Nonetheless, it’s not necessary to perform this task on every occasion. While conducting an email validation assessment, be sure to consider these crucial factors.

Confirm your email contacts for a fresh list

When planning to launch a new email campaign using an entirely new list, it’s highly recommended that you authenticate it beforehand.

A new list, especially one with a vast amount of data, may include erroneous, spam-like, or invalid contact details, which could have a detrimental effect on your email campaign’s success. By validating the list, you can proceed with emailing confidently.

Once the list is authenticated, there’s no need to repeat the process for subsequent follow-ups or initiate a new campaign with the same contacts.

Regularly confirm your email contacts

It’s highly suggested to carry out email list validations every quarter or twice a year.

Email addresses are often changed when an employee departs from a company or when an individual closes their email account. Frequent email verification assists in eliminating invalid addresses from your outdated lists. This practice aids in preserving your sender’s credibility, guaranteeing that your email marketing efforts consistently yield favorable outcomes.

Re-confirm your email contacts when a persistent rise in bounce rate is observed

When utilizing an email list for an extended period and spotting a growing bounce rate in your campaign’s success, it’s crucial to reassess it. A surplus of email bouncebacks can adversely affect your email account. To prevent such circumstances, it’s essential to re-validate the email contacts and remove any invalid ones.

Which tools to use to verify emails? 

Email verification tools provide essential information about the validity and deliverability of email addresses. The results typically include:

• Invalid: The email address does not exist or has a syntax error.
• Valid: The email address is correct and deliverable.
• Risky: The email address exists but may have a history of bouncing or causing spam complaints.
• Catch-all: The email address belongs to a domain that accepts all incoming emails, making it difficult to verify its validity.

Here, software ZeroBound has identified the decay of the email list over the course of a year and has provided a breakdown of the data from January 2022 to December 2022.

source: zerobounce.net

Several factors should be considered when selecting an email verification tool. One of the most important factors is the accuracy of the tool. It should provide consistent and reliable results. Another factor is the tool’s speed, which can help you save time and verify numerous email addresses quickly.

It is also essential to look for additional features, such as the ability to check for catch-all email addresses and disposable email addresses.

To choose the right email verification tool, consider the accuracy level, pricing tiers, and user reviews. Some top-rated email verification tools include:

ZeroBounce

ZeroBounce is a reliable email verification tool that helps improve deliverability rates and reduces bounce rates.

Essential features of ZeroBounce:

• Comprehensive email list validation – Effortlessly submit your complete list for processing.
• Individual email confirmation – Authenticate emails that may be questionable on a case-by-case basis.
• Instant verification API – Incorporate ZeroBounce’s validation API into your website’s forms to eliminate the addition of poor-quality emails to your list from the start.
• Valuable customer information – ZeroBounce enhances valid email addresses on your list by adding crucial data. This information could consist of details such as the subscriber’s name, gender, geographic location, and more.
• Seamless integrations – ZeroBounce effortlessly connects with renowned email providers and services. Enhance your integration capabilities by linking the tool with Zapier.

Pricing:

• ZeroBounce has both credit and subscription options for its pricing. 
• Credits are a pay-as-you-go option, starting at $16 for 2,000 email verifications. 
• Premium plans, which offer a 6% discount, start at $15/month for 2,000 email verifications. 
• A freemium plan is available, which allows for 100 email verifications per month.

Clearout

Clearout is a leading email verification and validation tool that performs 20+ validation checks on every email address to give you a 98%+ accurate result.

Essential features of Clearout:

• Bulk email list validation – Users can upload the list directly or import it from the ESP or CRM in use. It can verify large volumes of data in a short span of time & with the highest level of accuracy.
• Real-time email validation – Clearout employs the REST API, and JavaScript Widget to grant developers the ability to incorporate their services into ALL online forms, websites, chatbots, newsletters, surveys/polls, etc for real-time validations.
• Seamless Integrations – Clearout directly integrates with all major CRMs, and ESPs, The remaining platforms can be integrated using Zapier. Additionally, you can effortlessly export a copy of your list and upload it.
• Data Security & Privacy – Clearout is GDPR compliant and ISO and SOC 2 Type 2 certified which confirms their adherence to quality, reliability, and data security.
• Email Finder – Together with email verification services, Clearout provides email finding services that allow users to find individual and bulk email addresses with person and company/domain name.

Pricing:

• Clearout offers a pair of pricing options — a pay-as-you-go model and a subscription plan.
• Opting for an annual subscription grants a 30% discount, starting at $23.20/month for 5,000 credits.
• To test the service, you can validate up to 100 email addresses at no cost.

Verifalia

Verifalia is an email verification service that offers real-time validation and high accuracy rates to help maintain a clean email list.

Essential features of Verifalia:

• Verifalia provides extensive syntax verification, domain/MX/DNS examination, spam trap identification, catch-all server discovery, mailbox accessibility assessment, disposable email recognition, and additional services. 
• Designed with security in mind, the tool adheres to the strictest global data privacy regulations, and its servers can be found in Germany.

Pricing:

• Register at no cost and enjoy the benefit of 25 daily validations with our complimentary plan. 
• Additionally, Verifalia offers monthly subscriptions and bulk credit bundles from $9 to $499

NeverBounce

NeverBounce is a popular email verification tool with a high accuracy rate that ensures your email campaigns reach valid recipients.

Essential features of NeverBounce:

• Comprehensive email list validation — Submit your full list, allow the tool to assess it, and obtain a refined list boasting a 99.9% delivery success rate.
• Email confirmation — Authenticate millions of email addresses from various sources such as contact and lead forms, sign-up forms, CRMs, and more. Enjoy the verification of up to 1,000 emails each month at no cost.
• Prompt bounce evaluation — This complimentary feature, included with all accounts, enables you to swiftly determine whether your list requires cleaning before sending large-scale broadcast emails.
• Integration capabilities — Seamlessly connect with widely-used email marketing tools and customer support software. For custom integrations, Zapier is a viable option. NeverBounce’s help documentation provides guides on integration. Additionally, all accounts come with 1,000 free API verifications monthly.
• Developer-friendly — API wrappers are provided for an effortless integration with the tools you rely on.

Pricing:

• NeverBounce provides both pay-as-you-go and monthly payment plans. To obtain a quote for a monthly plan, you’ll need to specify the number of emails to be processed and register for a complimentary account.
• The pay-as-you-go pricing begins at $0.003 per email for up to 1 million emails and increases to $0.008 per email for up to 10,000 emails.

MillionVerifier

MillionVerifier is an efficient email verification tool that guarantees high deliverability rates by validating email addresses in bulk.

Essential features of MillionVerifier:

• Exceptionally precise validation — Over 99% accuracy ensured by deliverability specialists
• Risk-free investment — Utilize MillionVerifier and request a refund at any moment
• Compatibility — Seamless integration with 14 email marketing platforms

Pricing:

• With MillionVerifier, you can get 1 million email validations for just $299, making it the most competitively priced option available.

Free solutions to verify email addresses

If you’re an individual or small business on a budget, there are several free solutions available that can help you verify email addresses. Some of the popular free email verification tools include Hunter’s Email Verifier, Quick Email Verification, and VerifyEmailAddress.

• Hunter’s Email Verifier offers up to 50 verifications per month and provides validations at multiple levels, such as format, domain, and comparison with their professional email address database. It can also verify a list of email addresses in bulk and provide a validation score for email addresses marked as “Accept All.”
• Quick Email Verification is a free email checker that helps you verify and validate email addresses in real time. The tool checks for correct email format, and domain availability, and identifies disposable and webmail addresses. It also examines MX records and SMTP servers.
• VerifyEmailAddress is another free email verification tool that allows you to check the validity of any email address. It provides information on whether the email address is properly formatted if the domain is valid and if there are MX records associated with the domain.

How to verify emails manually?

Verifying email addresses manually is a critical step to guarantee that the email addresses you’re using are valid and correct. While this process may take some time, it is a worthwhile investment in ensuring that your emails reach the right people. 

Here are the steps you can follow to verify email addresses manually:

1. Using Gmail 

If you want to verify an email address manually, using Gmail is one option. Simply create a new email and start typing the address in the “To” field. If Gmail suggests the email address based on your previous entries or contacts, it’s likely valid.

To determine if an email is legitimate or not, there is a different technique that involves the Gmail compose window. When you enter an email address and if it displays a profile photo, then it is a genuine email. 

This method should only be used on your personal Gmail account. However, if no profile photo appears, you need to do some additional steps. Simply hover your mouse over the email address you have entered in the address section, and a pop-up box will appear. Click on the Open in detailed view button. If the Send message button appears blue, it indicates that the email address is legitimate.

2. Checking emails for mistakes

Another way to verify email addresses manually is by checking them for common mistakes. Ensure the email follows the correct format (username@domain.com), and there are no spelling errors or misplaced punctuation marks. Also, check that the domain name is valid and spelled correctly.

3. Advanced methods

However, there are more advanced techniques to verify email addresses than manual methods. One such method is pinging the email server to check if the email address exists without actually sending an email. Alternatively, you can use email validation tools to verify multiple email addresses at once and check for disposable and webmail addresses.

Syntax validation

Email addresses consist of a local part (before the @ symbol) and a domain part (after the @ symbol). The local part can include letters, numbers, and certain symbols like !#$%&’*+-/=?^_`{|}~, but cannot begin or end with a dot or have consecutive dots. The domain part can include letters, numbers, and hyphens (not at the beginning or end), and cannot have consecutive hyphens. It’s important to use regular expression rules to verify email syntax, but also consider other factors like IETF standards, ISP-specific syntax, quoted words, and non-ASCII domains.

Check for the disposable email address

Disposable email addresses are temporary addresses that are only valid for a short time. To ensure email accuracy, it’s significant to check for disposable emails generated by services like Nada and Mailinator. A third-party API like InboxHit can reliably detect disposable email addresses. Another option is to use a list of domains commonly used for temporary email addresses in your RegEx.

DNS lookup

DNS lookup is the process of requesting a DNS record from a DNS server, specifically the MX record that specifies the email server for accepting emails for a domain name. To perform a DNS lookup, use the online tool or command “nslookup -type=mx [domain name]” in your console app. Look for the email server with the highest priority and use it for the next step.

Email box pinging

To verify the email address, you need to connect to the chosen SMTP server on port 25 and enter the sender’s email address using the MAIL FROM command. Then, enter the recipient’s email address using the RCPT TO command. If the server responds with 250 OK, the email address is valid. If the server responds with a negative response, such as 550-5.1.1 User Unknown, the address does not exist. After the verification, close the conversation with the QUIT command.

Wrapping up

Validating email addresses is a crucial process to undertake before initiating your cold email campaign, and it can significantly benefit your email marketing efforts as well. For those who may be unfamiliar, it’s important to note that cold emailing and email marketing are distinct tactics.

Returning to the subject of email verification, this procedure helps avoid email bounces and protects you from dispatching emails to harmful addresses. It is highly recommended to employ a dependable email verification instrument that enables you to authenticate numerous email addresses at once.

Author Bio

Yurii Shumak, technical content writer and contributor to Mailtrap, is passionate about assisting companies and products in connecting people, processes, and technology. To clarify, Yurii spends the majority of his time in the trenches.

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