Got a large email db (legit) and need to verify
5 comments
From experience (in the past I managed a mailing list with over one million subscribers), the only good list of emails is one where everyone has done a double-opt-in, a.k.a. confirmed opt-in.
We had to do it this way, not only because it is law in many countries (and the site offered legal advice!), but because when running a mailing list that large, you need to do everything you can to run it properly: because you will inevitably run into problems with various ISPs spam traps, having double-opt-in makes it a little easier to get someone to un-ban your servers if/when the situation arises. But I digress.
I agree with a previous commenter, Piskvorr - send everyone a mail asking them to confirm their subscription.
FWIW, we didn't use captchas - we didn't see the need as we were using double-opt-in (analytics said only a tiny percentage of sign-ups on our site didn't confirm)
edit: I meant to include this link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opt-in_email#Confirmed_opt-in_...
We had to do it this way, not only because it is law in many countries (and the site offered legal advice!), but because when running a mailing list that large, you need to do everything you can to run it properly: because you will inevitably run into problems with various ISPs spam traps, having double-opt-in makes it a little easier to get someone to un-ban your servers if/when the situation arises. But I digress.
I agree with a previous commenter, Piskvorr - send everyone a mail asking them to confirm their subscription.
FWIW, we didn't use captchas - we didn't see the need as we were using double-opt-in (analytics said only a tiny percentage of sign-ups on our site didn't confirm)
edit: I meant to include this link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opt-in_email#Confirmed_opt-in_...
Curious what business value will be returned by purging emails. My thinking is that keeping track of 2k email addresses in a person's head is no more practical than keeping track of 30k and likewise tracking 30k in a database is no more difficult than tracking 2k.
A starting point might be including avenues of engagement in the email list such as soliciting feedback.
Good luck.
A starting point might be including avenues of engagement in the email list such as soliciting feedback.
Good luck.
Sending thousands of emails that:
Bounce because they aren't real.
Land in inboxes of people who don't remember your service and therefore mark it as spam.
Land in inboxes and are not opened.
thanks