Unboxing: BriteVerify

Key to good inbox delivery is having a clean, verified list. Today I'll be unboxing one of the top Email verification services: BriteVerify.

There are a number of ways to get started with BriteVerify, the easiest being just to upload your list into BriteVerify for processing. If you use a tool like Mailchimp, which is what I use to send out the Only Influencers newsletter, then you can import directly from the BriteVerify interface. If you choose to have it import directly, it will also automatically unsubscribe invalid emails from your list. 

BriteVerify breaks your list into various categories:

1. Valid
2. Invalid Emails
3. Unknown
4. Accept All
5. Role
6. Disposable

Valid emails are those that have been confirmed as good to send to. Invalid addresses are those that are either syntactically wrong, or are no longer active and you should not send. But between the Valid and the Invalid, there is a grey area and it is this area you will need to look closely at before proceeding. 

Accept All are usually business and corporate email addresses where ALL of the addresses appear normal, but may not be. Some corporate email servers are configured to return a "valid" code regardless if the email address is actually valid or not. In this case, BriteVerify recommends that if your ESP's bounce threshold is 5% or less, to NOT mail to these addresses. But if you have a dedicated IP address, then to MAIL SLOWLY. 

Unknown are addresses that appear normal, but associated domains are not responding, for whatever reason. BriteVerify suggests the same process as Accept All addresses. 

Role addresses are addresses such as marketing@mycompany: where it is not addressed to a specific person, but is directed to a role at the company. While these addresses are valid, they usually do not perform well, so you need to use your judgement on whether to send to these addresses or not. 

Disposable addresses are temporary throwaway email addresses used to sign up for information, but that don't actually connect to anyone. BriteVerfy recommends not mailing to these addresses, but I have found that, with my database, these throwaway email addresses are actually valid, but that they identify OI as the source of the sign up. Use your own judgement. 

BriteForms: 

A new tool from BriteVerify is BriteForms. This allows you to verify the email address at the point of signup. A simple bit of code is dropped into the sign up form which validates the email address in realtime: 

Pricing: 

Pricing for BriteVerify is based on list size. Under 250,000 email addresses is priced at a penny a email and pricing per email goes down on lists in excess of 250,000. 

Conclusion: I found BriteVerfiy to be an easy to use tool but depending on your market you need to carefully scrutinize those emails marked Role, Disposable, Unknown, or Accept All. I found for my list, Role and Disposable email addresses were actually quite active, so I chose not to delete them. But if you have a sign up where access to free content is based on capturing an email address, these categories will need close attention.