Buying a B2B email list: 9 checks before you pay for a single lead

A bought list can fill a pipeline or wreck a sending domain in one afternoon. The difference is rarely the price per lead. It is how old the data is, how it was checked, and what the seller does when it bounces.

Here are the nine checks we'd run before paying anyone, including us.

1. When was each email last verified?

People change jobs all the time. A list verified a year ago will have a chunk of dead addresses. Ask for the verification date, not the collection date. If the seller can't tell you, that is your answer.

2. What happens when an address bounces?

A fair seller replaces bounced leads or refunds them, within a stated window. "All sales final" on data that decays every month is a warning sign.

3. Can you see real rows before you pay?

Not a screenshot of five famous CEOs. Real rows from your filters: the titles, company sizes and countries you asked for. Check them by hand on LinkedIn. Ten rows will tell you a lot.

4. Are the filters the ones you actually sell to?

"Marketing, US, 50+ employees" is too loose. Write your filter the way you'd describe your best customer: job title words, seniority, industry, headcount band, country. A good seller will tell you the count for that exact filter before you commit.

5. Which fields come with each lead?

At minimum: first name, last name, job title, company, company website, work email, country. LinkedIn URL and headcount are useful. Phone numbers are a bonus and often less reliable.

6. Are the emails work emails?

Personal Gmail addresses in a B2B list are a problem for the rules on emailing and for deliverability. Work addresses on the company domain are what you want.

7. Where did the data come from?

You don't need the vendor's secret sauce, but you should get a straight answer: public professional profiles, company websites, verified with a checker. Vague answers mean vague data.

8. Can your sending setup handle it?

This one is on you. A new domain with no warm-up that sends 2,000 cold emails on Monday will land in spam, whatever the list quality. Set up SPF, DKIM and DMARC first, warm the domain, and send in small daily batches. Our guide to why cold emails go to spam covers the setup.

9. Do you know the rules where your leads live?

B2B cold email rules vary. In the UK, emailing staff at limited companies about their work is generally allowed if you identify yourself and offer an easy opt-out; sole traders are treated more like consumers. France allows B2B prospecting when the message relates to the person's job, again with an opt-out. Germany is much stricter. In the US, CAN-SPAM requires honest subject lines, your address, and a working unsubscribe. This is general information, not legal advice: check your own market.

What a fair price looks like

Prices range from a fraction of a cent to several dollars a lead. Cheap is fine if the data is fresh and bounces are covered. Expensive is not fine if it is neither. Judge on cost per verified, delivered, non-bouncing lead.

A quick worked example

A small IT support firm in Manchester wants office managers and operations leads at UK companies with 20 to 200 staff. The count for that filter comes back at around 6,000. They buy 1,000 first, send 40 a day from a warmed domain, and track replies by industry. After three weeks, accountancy and legal firms reply at twice the rate of the rest. The next order is those two industries only.

That is the whole method: small first, test, then buy more of what replied.

Questions people ask

Is it legal to buy a B2B email list?

Buying the data is legal in many places, but how you email it is regulated and varies by country, as above. Get advice for your market if you're unsure.

What bounce rate is acceptable?

Aim to keep hard bounces under 2 percent of sends. Much more than that and your domain reputation suffers.

How many leads should I buy first?

Around 1,000. Enough to test two or three segments properly, small enough that a bad batch doesn't hurt.