What is email verification and how to check if an email is valid? (2023)

So you've finally made your email list big enough. Now it's time to learn how to verify email addresses to keep that list clean, improve deliverability, and reduce bounce rates.

Email verification is one of the most important steps in email marketing, right after building your lead list. That's why we've dedicated this entire article to email verification and why you shouldn't neglect it.

What is email verification (and how is it different from email validation)

If you only knew how much time and effort it took to find out the exact difference between these two.

Online, on every blog and on every website, verification and validation are used interchangeably; However, the correct definition is a bit more precise.

email verificationis the process of verifying the existence and activity of an email address, also known as valid. A valid email address is one that can receive messages from other senders. Every email scanner, whether en masse or individually, performs (or at least intends to perform) several steps in the verification process. The most common are syntax, domain, catch-all and MX record checks, as well as email address ping (you'll read about them in detail later in this article).

email validationit is the end result of the email verification process provided to the user. Depending on the result, an email receives one ofEmail verification status, usually "valid", "invalid", and "unverifiable" (usually indicated by the colors green, yellow, and red). Validation sometimes also involves verifying additional information provided with the lead's email or verifying the source of that lead.

Why You Shouldn't Skip Email Confirmation

If you're on the fence about why you need to check email validity, let me show you why email verification is important and why it should be ignored.em e-mail marketingcan lead to catastrophic campaign issues that will take weeks to resolve.

Reason 1: helps keep your email lists up to date

Yearly,22.5% of email addressesbecome invalid. It's not my fault; Of course, this happens due to various external reasons. Most of the time it's because people are changing companies and your corporate email addresses that you have on your list are being deactivated. If you don't check your email lists regularly, the 22.5% bounce rate in one year will be 10 times the acceptable bounce rate and your sender reputation will take a real hit. Pro tip: check your email list every two months.

Reason 2: reduces strong jumps

ONE strong impactis an email that is returned to the sender because the recipient does not exist, i. H. The email address is invalid. High bounce rates usually indicate spammers, which is why ESPs don't treat users with high bounce rates kindly. As your bounce rate increases, your sender reputation decreases. Once you exceed a critical threshold, your account will be blacklisted.

Reason 3: Improves email deliverability

If you use an email scanner to filter out invalid email addresses, you can be sure that the remaining emails can receive, i.e.Your messages arrive in the inbox🇧🇷 so yourEmail deliverabilitygets high. This helps save on sending emails and again preserves the sender reputation of the email. Talking about…

Reason 4:Maintains a high sender reputation

Your sender reputation depends on several things. We've already mentioned bounce rate and deliverability, but there's also spam reporting rate and your sending habits (keep in mind thatwarm up new email accounts🇧🇷 Consistent use of email verification services in your marketing will help you maintain sender reputation and avoid blacklisting. Not sure how to check your sender reputation?Find out here.

How to check if email is valid

There are many ways to check if an email is valid, although some aren't as effective as others and some can be useful if you just need to check a few emails.

Method 1:Send a test email to the address

This tactic is the easiest, but we don't recommend using it if you have a lot of emails to check. If you send an email to a false or invalid email address, it will bounce back and you will receive a message that your letter was not delivered or the address could not be found.

However, keep in mind that using this method frequently can increase your bounce rate, damage your sender reputation, put you on spam lists, and mess up your metrics. The solution to this is to use a dummy account and send a test email from there.

Method 2:Search the address on Google

Of course, this method doesn't tell you if an email address is fake, but it can tell you if it's valid. Today, people mention their email addresses all over the internet, whether it's on their website or on social media. If you just need to verify a few email addresses, this method might work for you as it won't hurt your domain reputation.

Method 3:ping the server

Using tools like PuTTY or Telnet, you can ping the mail server and ask if the address is valid. But be careful, although this method is quite accurate, it is complicated and risky for your infrastructure.

Method 4:Use email verification

The best way to check if an email address is valid is to use email verification software that allows you to validate email addresses in just a few clicks. While all email verifiers vary slightly depending on features and the number of email addresses you can validate per month, they are all very easy to use.

This is how an email verifier works

There are many technical nuances to how email verification tools work. The general idea is that each email tester performs verification according to the developers' algorithms. For example,our email checkergoes through 7 email verification steps for maximum accuracy:

• Syntaxprüfung
• check the jargon
• Domain existence check
• MX record check
• Comprehensive domain verification
• SMTP authentication (ping email address)
• Freemail-Scheck

Here are the 5 most common email verification steps explained:

1. Syntaxprüfung

If youWrite a professional email, you are probably using an application like grammarto check your copy to make sure every word is spelled correctly and your punctuation is perfect.

An email verification service does the same.

Syntax checking algorithms look for the following:

• Default email match:the local part, the at sign ( @ ) and a domain name with a dot ( . ) are present
• Number of symbols:no more than 64 characters allowed in local part
• proper positioningconsisting of dots ( . ) and the symbol ( @ ).
• Special characters:🇧🇷 " # $ % & ` * + – _ . / | \^{}~ can be used in the local part of an email address, but not at the beginning or end of the local part (learn more about special characters in addresses of e-mail on here)

2. Domain Verification

A domain name follows the @ symbol and indicates which domain the email address is linked to. for example inpauline@bombom.com,bombom.comis the domain name. Email verification services verify that the domain name is spelled correctly and that the website and domain are genuine and active.

This check is important for one simple reason: websites expire, as do the associated email addresses. Some companies are exiting the market while others are migrating to a new domain and creating new emails linked to the new domain.

3. General check

An email verifier also checks if the email belongs to a catch-all domain. ONEcatch-all domain(also known asunverifiableoraccept all) is the type of domain set to always accept email, even if you write something gibberish in the local part of the associated email.

For example, the domain namenatwest.comit is a panacea. You can mash the keyboard and get an email address likejhfajegdfkldaj@natwest.comthat willyetAccept emails even if they are non-existent and random. All email addresses associated with this domain name will accept email but may result in hard bounces as catch-all emails are usually set up to prevent unwanted email.

A reliable bulk email scanner (and even a single email scanner) will check the domain name to catch everything and notify you to avoid bounces. If you see a verified email marked catch-all/unverifiable, you can act at your own risk and decide whether you want to send them messages or delete them from the list once and for all, email addresses only. valid e-mail addresses for sending.

4. MX Record Verification

In simple terms, aMX recordspecifies the mail server responsible for accepting mail on behalf of a specific domain. It's a more complex solution to identifying junk mail. This feature verifies that the mail exchange record listed in the email address is a real, registered, hosted domain name that can be accessed online.

MX record verification is an unavoidable step in an email verification process. There are some more technical details about this process, but the gist is that an email scanner must use an MX record check to return correct results.

5. Ping the email address

In this check, an email scanner pings an email address to verify that it can receive and reply to messages. If the request reaches the recipient's email address and receives a response, an email is considered active and you can safely send real emails to them. This is also known as SMTP authentication.

What is the next? lead enrichment

As you can see, email verification is difficult only in theory. That's why you should trust email verification services that have it all figured out!

By investing in an email verifier, you can always be confident that the emails on your list are genuine, valid and capable of accepting any emails you send them. This keeps your bounce rate low, your email sender reputation high, and your deliverability at 98%.

What is the next? Why not Enrich your leadsto improve your personalizationand increase sales.

Lots of luck!

Do you have questions about email verification that we didn't cover in this article? Let us know in the comments below and we'll add all the info we missed with gratitude for you!