Email Verification FAQ: How Email List Cleaning Works
Email verification is the process of validating email addresses to ensure they are deliverable, reducing bounces and protecting your sender reputation. Here are answers to the most common questions.
What is email verification?
Email verification is the process of checking whether an email address is valid, deliverable, and safe to send to. It confirms the address exists, the domain is active, and the mailbox can receive messages.
Does email verification improve deliverability?
Yes. Removing invalid and risky addresses reduces bounce rates and improves sender reputation. Most customers see a 20-40% improvement in deliverability after cleaning their lists.
How does SMTP verification work?
SMTP verification connects to the recipient's mail server and simulates sending an email without actually delivering it. The server responds with whether the mailbox exists and can accept mail.
What is a spam trap?
A spam trap is an email address used by ISPs and anti-spam organizations to identify senders with poor list hygiene. Sending to spam traps can severely damage your sender reputation and get you blacklisted.
How often should I verify my email list?
Verify your list before every major campaign, or at minimum every 3-6 months. Email addresses decay at 2-3% per month due to job changes, domain expirations, and abandoned accounts.
What is a catch-all domain?
A catch-all domain accepts mail for any address at that domain, whether it exists or not. This makes verification harder because the server always says 'yes' even for fake addresses. We flag these as risky.
What's the difference between syntax validation and mailbox verification?
Syntax validation checks if the email follows proper format rules (has @ symbol, valid domain). Mailbox verification goes further by contacting the mail server to confirm the specific address exists and accepts mail.
Can email verification detect disposable email addresses?
Yes. We maintain a database of known disposable email providers like Mailinator, Guerrilla Mail, and 10MinuteMail. Addresses from these domains are flagged as temporary and risky.
What happens to emails that fail verification?
Failed emails are categorized by reason (invalid syntax, domain not found, mailbox doesn't exist, etc.) and separated from your clean list. You receive both files so you can see exactly what was removed.
Does Clean Leads 365 store my email lists?
No. Your data is processed in memory and deleted within 24 hours. We never store, sell, or share your contact lists. All processing happens on encrypted, SOC 2 compliant infrastructure.
Ready to Verify Your Email List?
Clean Leads 365 provides email verification as part of our data cleaning services. Upload your list and get verified emails in minutes.