Many organizations use email marketing to increase brand awareness and sales. But not all of them succeed. While sending your subscribers valuable content is essential, what also matters is the quality of your email list. How do you maintain it? Checking your contacts manually is difficult and ineffective. Enter the email list validator, a system that ensures your database is up-to-date so you can reach your subscribers.
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What does an email list validator do?
The system scans your email list and removes the bad data you’ve acquired. Whether it’s misspelled and fake emails, spam traps, abuse or temporary emails, the software filters them out and allows you to communicate with real people.
Why it’s vital to use an email list validator
Savvy email marketers are aware that their data quality is continuously declining. An email address is at risk of going obsolete from the moment you add it to your database. Why do email addresses go bad?
- with so many email clients available, people often abandon their email accounts to start new ones. So you’re stuck with a dormant email address that doesn’t add any value to your list.
- people change jobs, so their email addresses become invalid. As a result, they will bounce and hurt your sender reputation.
- dormant email addresses are often repurposed into spam traps. These addresses are a spam prevention method, and continuing to email them can seriously affect your reputation.
- also, some of the people who sign up for your emails use temporary email addresses. These addresses self-destruct and result in bounces.
These are just a few reasons why your data quality needs constant attention. A successful email marketing strategy relies on a healthy, powerful email list.
How you can validate your email list hassle-free
Cleaning your list may sound complicated. But when someone else takes care of the process, you don’t have to worry about the technicalities.
There are two ways in which you can use an email list validator:
- in bulk: this means you can upload your entire email list on a validation platform and download it when it’s clean.
- in real time: this involves installing an email validation API on your signup forms to check emails as they register.
When you clean your list in bulk, the system analyzes it to ensure all the email addresses exist and are formatted correctly. A good email list validator removes misspelled, fake, catch-all, temporary and abuse emails (people who mark you as spam). Also, certain systems weed out spam traps, thus helping you maintain a positive sender reputation.
How verifying your email list boosts your email marketing
Internet Service Providers (ISPs) always keep an eye on your sender reputation. This tells them whether you follow email marketing best practices. A sender with poor email list quality raises a red flag. Therefore, ISPs will start filtering your emails more carefully.
Some of them will start landing in people’s Spam folder. Others won’t even make it there. Bad email hygiene can also get you blacklisted, and ignoring the problem is not a solution. Especially when you have such a simple way of fixing it.
Here is how using an email list validator boosts your email marketing:
- first, you save money by sending emails only to valid, active email subscribers.
- as soon as you start emailing a clean list, your sender reputation improves.
- ISPs begin trusting you again, so they deliver your emails in your subscribers’ inboxes
- your open and click-through rates increase
- so you see a boost in conversions, too!
Why installing an API on your website pays off
Let’s say you’ve just validated your list, so you can use it confidently. The thing is, its quality will start declining again. Of course, you can fix that by cleaning it once more in a couple of months. But what if you want to prevent this issue instead of always having to fix it?
You can, thanks to the engineers who have invented the email validation API. This piece of software checks email addresses in real time. All you have to do is copy and paste a few lines of code into your website, and the API will start working in the background to keep your email database clean.
It’s important to know that a reliable API works exactly like a bulk email list validator, only in real time. So, it will prevent risky email addresses from being added to your list, thus preserving its quality.
How can you get an email cleaning API? It’s simple: once you find a validator, ask for the API key and install it on your website.
Other ways to boost your email marketing
In the crowded email space of today, you can’t afford to use an outdated email list. But also, you can’t afford to send your subscribers irrelevant or uninteresting content. Why? Because the engagement your emails get is just as important to your sender reputation.
Your open and click-through rates reflect how people react to your content, and ISPs use these metrics as a guide. So take a look at these bonus tips and use them when you write your next email!
- if you’ve been sending mostly marketing offers, give inbound marketing a try. Send out content that doesn’t aim to sell anything, but establish you as a trusted and helpful source.
- spend more time on your subject lines – they make all the difference in open rates. Most experts will advise you to keep them short, but the truth is longer subject lines can perform just as well, as long as you manage to make them enticing.
- personalizing every message goes a long way. Use data such as location, gender, or purchase history to craft better targeted campaigns.
- are your emails always on the short side? It’s true, people are busy and often only skim their inbox. However, if you have a great story to tell, don’t be afraid to send out a longer email.
- keep testing everything so you can improve. Type of content, length, subject lines or call-to-action buttons – you can always tweak them until you determine what your audience prefers.
Ready to wrap up?
The “spray and pray” email marketing model is not only outdated, but risky to your business. Nowadays, emailing a bunch of email addresses you’ve never checked will eventually get you in trouble. So, before you send out a new email, run your database through an email list validator. Then, take a close look at your content to see what performs best.
What do your subscribers need and like? Send them more of that.
You’ll reap the benefits soon enough, and your email marketing will start yielding the results you deserve.