If you’re sending cold emails for B2B outreach, you’ve probably run into a wall: high bounce rates, spam folders, and that sinking feeling your messages aren’t making it through. This guide is for sales teams, founders, and anyone sick of seeing their campaigns torpedoed by bad emails and a trashed sender reputation. We’ll walk through how to use Debounce to clean your lists, keep your domain healthy, and make sure your emails actually get read.
Why Bounces Kill Your Outreach (and Why Debounce Matters)
First, the basics: a “bounce” is what happens when you send an email and it never lands—either because the address doesn’t exist (hard bounce) or the inbox is too full/temporarily unavailable (soft bounce). Too many bounces, and inbox providers (think Gmail, Outlook) start treating you like a spammer. That means your real prospects might never see your message.
You can’t avoid all bounces, but you can get rid of most with a proper email verification tool like Debounce. Ignore this, and you’re just burning your sender reputation for no reason.
Step 1: Why Clean Your List Before Every Campaign
It’s tempting to skip list cleaning, especially if you’re in a hurry. Don’t. Old, scraped, or bought lists are loaded with junk—typos, dead domains, spam traps, and abandoned inboxes. Even high-quality leads get stale after a few months.
What happens if you don’t clean your list? - High bounce rates: More than 2–3% and you’re on thin ice. - Blacklisting: Too many bounces flag you as a risk. - Spam folders: Even valid emails can get junked if your sender reputation drops.
Bottom line: If you don’t know if an address is safe, don’t send to it.
Step 2: How Debounce Works (Without the Hype)
Debounce is an email verification service that checks if an address is real, safe, and able to accept mail. You upload a list (CSV, Excel, or connect via API), and it spits out a report labeling each email as valid, invalid, disposable, or risky.
Here’s what it actually checks: - Syntax: Is the format correct? - Domain: Does the domain exist and accept mail? - Mailbox: Does the actual inbox exist? - Disposable/role accounts: Filters out stuff like info@, sales@, and temp emails.
Things Debounce does NOT do: - Guarantee 0% bounces. Some emails pass every check but are still dead. - Warm up your domain or fix bad copy. It’s not a magic bullet.
Step 3: Cleaning Your List with Debounce—A Real Walkthrough
Let’s keep this practical. Here’s what you actually do.
1. Export Your Email List
- Export your list from your CRM, spreadsheet, LinkedIn, wherever. Use CSV or Excel format.
- Make sure you have a column just for emails.
Pro tip: Remove obvious junk before uploading—blank rows, duplicates, weird characters.
2. Upload to Debounce
- Log in to Debounce.
- Upload your list. The interface is pretty idiot-proof.
- Choose your settings—usually, you want the default options (validate everything).
3. Let Debounce Process
- Depending on your list size, this can take seconds or a few minutes.
- You’ll get a report tagging each email: valid, invalid, risky, disposable, etc.
4. Download and Filter
- Download the cleaned list. Most people just keep the “valid” addresses.
- Up to you if you want to keep “risky”—these might be catch-alls, which sometimes work but are higher risk.
- Delete or move the rest.
Pro tip: If you’re sending high-volume, stick to “valid” only. For small, hand-picked campaigns, you can gamble on “risky,” but expect a few more bounces.
Step 4: Import the Clean List to Your Sending Tool
- Upload your cleaned list back into your sending platform (Mailshake, Outreach, Apollo, whatever you use).
- Double-check mapping so you don’t mix up names and emails.
- If your tool allows, add a custom field to tag the list as “Debounced” for tracking.
Step 5: Monitor Your Bounce Rate and Sender Reputation
Cleaning your list isn’t a “one and done” thing. You need to keep an eye on your results.
How to keep tabs: - Watch your bounce rate for every campaign. Under 2% is the goal. - Use a free tool like GlockApps or Mail-Tester to check your sender score and spam placement. - If bounces creep up, pause sending and clean again.
Warning: If you notice sudden spikes in bounces, you might have a new batch of bad data or your domain could be flagged. Don’t ignore it.
What Actually Works (and What to Ignore)
What works:
- Cleaning every list before you hit send.
- Removing “catch-all” or “risky” emails if you’re doing any kind of volume.
- Warming up new domains and monitoring sender health.
What doesn’t work:
- Blindly trusting “risky” or “unknown” emails.
- Buying lists and expecting them to be clean, ever.
- Thinking list cleaning alone will fix a broken outreach process.
What’s not worth your time:
- Over-analyzing tiny differences between Debounce and other verifiers. Most decent tools use similar tech.
- Spending hours trying to “rescue” invalid emails. Just move on.
Pro Tips and Common Pitfalls
- Don’t just clean once. Data rots fast—clean before each major campaign.
- Don’t send from your main domain. Use a dedicated subdomain for cold email to protect your main site’s reputation.
- Don’t mix opt-in and cold lists. Keep them separate to avoid compliance headaches.
- Do test your template. A clean list with a spammy subject line still lands in junk.
Keep It Simple, Iterate, and Don’t Overthink It
List cleaning with Debounce isn’t rocket science. Upload your list, clean it, send only to valid addresses, and move on. Don’t get paralyzed by chasing perfection—just make list cleaning a habit. Track your bounce rates, watch your sender reputation, and keep tweaking. The best outreach happens when your emails actually show up—and that starts with a clean list.
Got a big campaign coming up? Spend the 10 minutes to run your list through Debounce. It’s a lot less painful than watching your domain get burned.