How to check if an email is valid (5 methods without sending emails)

If you want your cold emails to land in your prospects' inboxes, you should keep your bounce rate <5%. Bounce rate is the percentage of your emails that didn’t get delivered, also known as “bounced”.

A high bounce rate can harm your email deliverability which means your message won’t reach your target audience, and you won’t be able to get replies and open new business opportunities..

So how do you ensure your bounce rate is as low as possible?

By doing email verification of the address you're contacting without reaching out first (which can hurt your sender reputation).

In this article, you'll find 5 proven methods to validate email address without sending emails.

5 ways to check if an email is valid

#1 Check the email address syntax

A valid email address should have the following format:
a username + "@" symbol + domain name

✅ peterk.johnconsulting.com
❌ peterk@johnconsulting.com

#2 Hover over an email address

• In Gmail:
  
  Go to New message → Add the email address in the recipient area → Hover your mouse over the email address
  
  If the email address is valid, you should get the leads’ full name and image!

• In Google Sheets:
  
  Add the email address to the cell → Hover your mouse over the email address
  
  If the email address is valid, you should get the leads’ full name and image!

#3 Search email address on Google

A quick search on Google or social media platforms will show you if the email address is used elsewhere and, therefore, legit ⬇️

#4 Check email domain age

Your prospects are more likely to use long-standing domains for work purposes. Newly created email addresses can sometimes be used for spam or similar purposes.

You can check the age of a domain using a domain checker tool like Small SEO Tools!

#5 Use email verifier tools

You can use email verification tools to automate syntax and domain check and confirm whether the email exists on the server and is still active.

Here’s the list of reliable tools to perform a valid email check:

• Clearout: starts at $20 for 1000 credits
• Bouncer: starts at $0.006 for 1 credit
• NeverBounce: starts at $0.007 for 1 credit
• Emailable: starts at $0.0035 for 1 credit
• TrueMail: starts at $25 for 5000 credits
• ZeroBounce: starts at $0.002 for 1 credit
• DeBounce: starts at $0.007 for 1 credit

Simply upload your email list on their platform, and they will deliver you a CSV report that labels undeliverable and risky emails to avoid. Here's how the process will look like in Bouncer:

How to use Bouncer for email address verification ⬇️

Step #1:  Upload your CSV file to Bouncer

Step #2: Start verification to clean your list

Step #3 Get your clean list & download the results

Step #4 Upload verified addresses to your outreach tool

You can upload your list of verified addresses directly to your outreach campaigns thanks to lemlist x Bouncer integration. This will save you hours of manual work and ensure your emails land in your target audience’s inbox so you can open new business opportunities!

P.S. If you still aren’t growing your business with lemlist, here’s your chance to get a free trial and send emails that get replies!

The key takeaways

You can spend hours writing perfect emails for the right audience, but if you send them to invalid email addresses, you can’t get replies and grow your business.

You will lose valuable resources and lower your email deliverability, risking your emails landing in the spam folder of even valid addresses..

An easy way to monitor and boost your email deliverability is to use a deliverability booster such as lemwarm. It will help you:

• Save time and money by automating your warm-up process
• Gain a good sender reputation with a tailored strategy
• Maintain high deliverability with detailed reporting

You can get create your lemwarm account here! 🔥