Email Marketing is known to be one of the best direct marketing methods out there. It will get the results you are looking for whether you are trying to promote a new feature or wanting to attract potential customers. But as an email marketing provider, we realised there are a lot of customers who send emails to invalid non-existent emails causing their open rates and click rates to be not as great as they should be. We take pride in delivering emails with 100% inbox placement guarantee but we cannot do much when it comes to reducing the hard bounces or customers sending to spam trap email addresses.
We searched long and hard for a solution that could help our customers eliminate bounces and increase the engagement rates with their customers. This is where email validation services come in handy. There are 100s of providers out there with varying degree of features that allow customers to verify email with ease.
These services imitate sending an email and getting their validity status before disconnecting the line. So they don’t send any emails to your contacts but they are able to accurately tell whether an email contact is valid or invalid. Many of them have advanced features like typo correction, spam trap removal, complainers removal, disposable email address removal, risky address detection and more. When you are sending an email marketing campaign, you need to be certain that what you are sending is actually reaching your intended recipients. Email validation software allows you to do just that. It is a way of confirming whether email or list of email addresses are deliverable.
Common features of email list cleaning apps
DNSBLs and URI DNSBLs for Blacklisting
Most providers check domains if they are listed in any of the blacklists to ensure you are not sending to addresses that are known for spamming.
Spamtrap / HoneyPot Detection
Very few providers have databases that have been used in training computers to accurately indicate if the emails belong to spam traps. Spam traps are a collection of emails which are published online to attract email harvesting programs to collect. If you send to one of these honeypot emails, you are highly likely to get your IP address blocked from further sending.
DEA or Disposable Email Address Detection
Most providers seem to check whether an email address belonged to a disposable email address and if it is, they usually mark it as a risky address. Sending to disposable addresses would mean contacting unknown recipients who might or might not still have that inbox. So you are left wasting your email credit on invalid recipients.
MX Records and MTA Checks
Most providers seem to check MTA for its response. This ensures the mail server is active and readily accepting mail coming through from other servers. We found that only some providers seem to check MX records which are crucial for emails to be sent. Without records, there is no way of contacting correct MTA for sending your email campaigns through.
Email Syntax Checks
Most providers seem to check the syntax of the email but a reasonable number of providers didn’t check it according to RFC protocol. This is essential for email addresses because some may contain characters which are not normally associated with email addresses (Eg. Addition Symbol). Invalid syntax usually relates to a dead or invalid email address.
SMTP Checks
Most providers seem to contact SMTP to simulate an email sending. It is often referred to as deep level SMTP verification. This is a crucial part of the email validation process because it determines whether that particular inbox exists with the provider. Many providers we looked at lacked the ability to accurately confirm if a Yahoo or Hotmail email address existed. They seem to label them as “Accept-All” addresses but a select few managed to accurately pinpoint if the Yahoo or Hotmail email address existed.
Top 5 email validation providers
Email Verifier App
Top features
Advanced Email Scrubbing Service – Uses 12 stage email validation process that goes through deduplication, domain checks, spam trap detection, complainers check, risk analysis, syntax check, MTA check, suppressed email removal, unbalanced delimiter detection, mailbox error analysis, custom TLD removal, and SendEV proprietary scoring for each email.
Spamtrap and Complainer Removal – Boasts in having 380 million spam trap addresses and 128 million complainers as a training set for their advanced spam trap and complainers analysis. Their intelligent email verification tool is bound to protect your email sending reputation by getting rid of these addresses.
Deliverability Guarantee – They are highly confident in their email validation results that they back it up with a guarantee of up to 98% deliverability. This is the highest in their industry and they claim to verify email highly accurately.
Advanced Email Validation API – Email Verifier App provides three sets of email validation APIs to the public including single email address validation, form validation API, and bulk email validation API. Each has their different set of use and their response times are in milliseconds which signify fast responses.
Yahoo & Hotmail Email Accuracy – This is one of the few providers who are accurately able to verify Yahoo and Hotmail email addresses. They claim to have developed proprietary systems and through the partnership with networks, they are able to accurately verify Yahoo and Hotmail email addresses with ease.
Cost – They charge $35 for 10,000 email validations. They also have a pay as you go, model. They are now rebranded as Spotzee Email Validation
Visit Email Verifier App
Quick Email Verification
Top features
Deliverability Guarantee – They guarantee up to 95% on the emails they verify. They have claimed to have verified 455 million email addresses to date and prevented in excess of 154 million bounces.
Bulk Email Verification – Email List Cleaning is as easy as drag & drop. You may either upload email list from your computer or import the subscriber list from your Email Service Provider (ESP) for validation. Once email address verification is done, you can either download list verification report or unsubscribe invalid and risky emails from your ESP account.
Verification Statistics – View detailed statistics of the verification results. Graphical Analytics will give you quick insights of quality email addresses and important contacts.
Real Time Email Verification – A simple copy-paste of a couple of lines of code will provide you with the power to verify email addresses real-time, using our REST API. Real-Time email validation API service protects your web forms and prevents unreachable and risky addresses from entering your database.
Cost – They charge $60 for 10,000 email validations. They also have a one-time payment model. |
Visit QuickEmailVerification
Kickbox.IO
Top features
Fast Email Verification Service – Quickly verify your email data to gain insight into the quality and deliverability of each contact. Improve campaign performance, drive segmentation decisions, and maintain a high data quality standard.
Recipient Authentication – Kickbox will guide your users through a one-step email confirmation process. Ensure your users own the email address they provided and gain insight into each step. Perfect for account signups, password resets, and anywhere email addresses are captured.
Developer APIs – Integrate Kickbox directly into your applications with our Email Verification and Recipient Authentication APIs. Get a head start with the Kickbox API libraries for Node.js, PHP, Python, and Ruby.
Cost – They charge $70 for 10,000 email validations. They do not have any other pricing models. |
Visit Kickbox.IO
NeverBounce
Top features
Real-Time Email Verification Service (API) – NeverBounce provides seamless integration into unlimited platforms including Newsletter Sign-Up Forms, Contact Forms, Registration Forms, Landing Pages, POS Terminals, Data Entry Platforms, Call Center Software, CRM’s, WordPress, Mobile Apps, iOS / Android/ Windows, Joomla, Drupal, Bulk Integrations, and more.
Bulk Email List Validation – NeverBounce can handle any sized list you have. All you have to do is follow 3 simple steps – Upload your existing list, Download your new (clean) list, Deliver over 97% of your emails. Guaranteed.
Instant Bounce Analysis – Test your data at no cost. They’ll report back whether it’s safe to send or needs to be cleaned. Any size.
Cost – They charge $50 for 10,000 email validations. They do not have any other pricing models. |
Visit NeverBounce
DataValidation
Top features
Email Marketer’s Platform – Their self-service platform is the perfect solution for any email marketer looking to keep their lists clean and always ready to send! They offer a comprehensive validation process, Free List Quality Reporting, competitive pricing and an awesome support team to guide you along the way!
ESP Friendly – Their APIs are designed to provide you with comprehensive validation for the lifecycle of your email marketing. Use the Batch API to determine a list’s deliverability and if the email list quality is poor, use tokens to access a cleaned email list. Implement the Real-time API on your web form and validate email addresses as they sign-up for your mailing list. If you have high volume or special requirements, they do custom jobs too!
Cost – They charge $50 for 10,000 email validations. They have pre-purchase tokens as their other pricing model. |
Visit DataValidation
