Email Verification Tools

Buyers guide

Using email lists for bulk email campaigns can be challenging. These lists have to be scrubbed regularly to ensure all addresses are correct and to avoid bounced emails. However, manually identifying and correcting incorrect addresses is a mammoth task.

Email verification tools automatically validate the authenticity of email addresses to help minimize bounce rates. They filter out incorrect addresses to increase deliverability and improve the performance of email campaigns.

Given the many solutions available on the market, it can be difficult to find an email verification tool that’s right for your business. In this buyers guide, we’ve included all the information you’ll need to make a purchase decision.

Here’s what we’ll cover:

• What are email verification tools?
• Common features of email verification tools
• What type of buyer are you?>
• Benefits of email verification tools
• Key considerations when purchasing email verification tools

What are email verification tools?

Email verification tools are software applications that allow users to verify if an email address or a list of email addresses is valid. They conduct email pattern analysis and DNS verifications to label recipient addresses as valid, high risk, or spam. They also filter out incorrectly formatted and duplicate email addresses.

Some email verification tools offer simple mail transfer protocol (SMTP) validation, a type of email verification technique in which mail servers are pinged (without sending an actual email to the inbox) to check if an email address has a valid mailbox.

Common features of email verification tools

Selecting software with the right features is easier when you know what the most common features are and what they do. Following are the key features of email verification software tools:>

Email list categorization: Verifies your email lists to categorize addresses as valid or invalid. It also identifies syntax errors and typos in addresses, thereby helping create clean email lists.

Mail server validation: Performs email server tests to validate the authenticity of email addresses. For an email to be valid, its domain exchange server must be able to receive emails.

Email list reports: Generates reports that help analyze various aspects (gender, location, etc.) of your email lists to target the right audience.

What type of buyer are you?

Before you start evaluating software options, you should know which buyer category you belong to so that you pick the right software. Most buyers belong to one of the following categories:

Small and midsize businesses (up to 1,000 employees): SMBs have smaller marketing teams and set up fewer email campaigns than large businesses. These buyers should invest in an email verification tool that offers the list categorization feature, which helps clean up email lists to ensure maximum deliverability.

Large businesses (over 1,000 employees): These businesses have larger marketing teams and thus more complex email verification requirements than SMBs. They usually organize bulk email campaigns that are targeted at different audiences. An email verification tool with the list categorization, server validation, and reporting features should be suitable for such buyers.>

Benefits of email verification tools

In this section, we’ve listed the key benefits of email verification tools.

Improved campaign ROI: Every bounced email costs your business money. A clean email list with verified addresses reduces the bounce rate of your email campaign and saves you money. You’ll be sending fewer but more targeted emails than before. Also, since all addresses are verified, you have a better chance of engaging the recipients.

Fewer spam complaints: Email verification tools allow you to identify and filter out recipients that are likely to mark your emails as spam. This ensures that your business has a low spam complaint rate, which helps avoid potential blocking by internet service providers (ISPs).

Key considerations when purchasing email verification tools

These are some factors that you should keep in mind when investing in an email verification tool.

Accuracy level of email verification: Different tools use different approaches for email verification. Some use publicly available contacts to validate your email list, while others run email server tests. Thus, the accuracy level of each email verification tool will differ. Perform due diligence to assess a tool’s actual accuracy rather than simply believing the vendor’s claims. Read user reviews to check out what actual buyers have to say. You can also ask the vendor for some product case studies.

Pricing tiers: The pricing tiers of most tools vary based on email volume, i.e., the number of emails to be verified. Some tools provide free checks for a limited number of addresses, but as the number increases, the price also increases. Thus, there’s a possibility that the cost can get significantly high for large email volumes. Ensure that the tool you select covers your required email volume but doesn’t exceed your budget.

Note: The application selected in this article is an example to show a feature in context and is not intended as an endorsement or a recommendation. It has been obtained from sources believed to be reliable at the time of publication.