# Lead List Cleaning Checklist: Before You Hit Send

> A step-by-step checklist to turn a raw scraped or imported list into one you can safely email. Work through it top to bottom, once per list.

You pulled a few hundred leads, and now the list is messy. Duplicate businesses, generic inboxes, blank first names, cities spelled three ways. Send to it as-is and you get bounces, awkward emails that say "Hi ," and a sending account that starts landing in spam.

This checklist fixes that. Copy it into a doc or spreadsheet tab and tick each box per list.

## Step 1: Set up the working file

- [ ] Keep the original export untouched. Work on a copy.
- [ ] Add a **Status** column with values: keep, fix, remove.
- [ ] Add a **Removed reason** column so you can spot patterns later.
- [ ] Make sure these columns exist, even if empty: business name, first name, email, website, city, category.

Those last columns map to the merge tags you will use: {{params.name}}, {{params.firstname}}, {{params.website}}, {{params.city}} and {{params.category}}. If a column is wrong, every email built from it is wrong.

## Step 2: Remove duplicates

- [ ] Dedupe by **email address** (lowercase everything first).
- [ ] Dedupe by **website domain**. Two locations of the same chain often share one inbox.
- [ ] Dedupe by **phone number** to catch the same business listed twice under slightly different names.
- [ ] Decide on chains: one contact per company, or one per location. Write the rule down and apply it consistently.
- [ ] Check against people you already emailed or who unsubscribed. Remove them.

## Step 3: Verify the emails

- [ ] Run every address through an email verifier before sending.
- [ ] Remove addresses marked invalid.
- [ ] Put "risky" or "unknown" results in a separate small batch, or drop them if your sending account is new.
- [ ] Remove obvious typos the verifier missed (gmial.com, .con).
- [ ] Remove role addresses you do not want: noreply@, abuse@, postmaster@. Keep info@ or hello@ for small local businesses, where they are often read by the owner.

## Step 4: Clean the merge tag fields

This is the step people skip, and it shows in the email.

### Business name ({{params.name}})
- [ ] Strip keyword stuffing: "Joe's Plumbing | 24/7 Emergency Plumber Near Me" becomes "Joe's Plumbing".
- [ ] Remove legal suffixes if they read stiffly: LLC, Ltd, Inc.
- [ ] Fix ALL CAPS into normal case.

### First name ({{params.firstname}})
- [ ] Only fill it when you are fairly sure. If an owner name came with a confidence score, keep high-confidence names and blank the rest.
- [ ] Remove values that are not names ("Admin", "Office", "Team").
- [ ] Capitalise properly: "mARIA" becomes "Maria".
- [ ] For blank names, plan a version of your template that does not need one ("Hi there," or open with the business name).

### Website ({{params.website}})
- [ ] Remove tracking parameters and long paths. Keep the clean domain.
- [ ] Flag leads whose "website" is only a social page. They may need a different pitch.

### City and category ({{params.city}}, {{params.category}})
- [ ] Standardise spelling and case for each city.
- [ ] Rewrite categories into how a person would say them: "Pest control service" becomes "pest control".

- [ ] **Final check:** read five random rows aloud inside your actual opening line. If any sounds odd, fix the column, not the single row.

## Step 5: Remove leads you should not email

- [ ] Businesses permanently closed or with no recent activity on their listing.
- [ ] Companies that are clearly outside your offer (wrong category, wrong size, wrong country).
- [ ] Personal-looking addresses where you have no business reason to contact the person.
- [ ] Anyone in a region whose rules you have not checked. B2B cold email rules differ by country; read [our GDPR cold email B2B notes](https://getclient.pro/blog/gdpr-cold-email-b2b) and check the rules that apply to you. This is not legal advice.

## Step 6: Segment before you send

- [ ] Split by category so each segment gets a relevant message (for example, [gyms](https://getclient.pro/industries/gyms) and pest control should not get the same email).
- [ ] Split by city if you mention location.
- [ ] Split "has first name" vs "no first name" so each gets the right template.
- [ ] Keep segments small enough to send within your account limits. See [Gmail daily sending limits](https://getclient.pro/blog/gmail-daily-sending-limits) before you plan volume.

## Step 7: Pre-send test

- [ ] Preview each step of the campaign with three real rows, including one with a blank first name.
- [ ] Confirm an unsubscribe link is present.
- [ ] Send a test to yourself and read it on a phone.
- [ ] Write down the clean count: started with X, removed Y, sending to Z. Useful when you compare lists later.

## Quick reference table

| Problem | Fix | Remove? |
|---|---|---|
| Duplicate domain | Keep one contact per your rule | Extras |
| Invalid email | None | Yes |
| Risky email | Small test batch | If account is new |
| Keyword-stuffed name | Trim to real name | No |
| Low-confidence first name | Blank it | No |
| Unsubscribed before | None | Yes |
| Wrong category | None | Yes |

## Keep lists cleaner from the start

The less junk you collect, the less you clean. Tight keywords and specific cities produce better raw lists; the [Google Maps scraper guide](https://getclient.pro/resources/google-maps-scraper-guide) covers how to set searches up. Once your list is clean and the campaign is live, have your [reply handling templates](https://getclient.pro/resources/reply-handling-templates) ready so good replies do not sit unanswered.

## Frequently asked questions

### How often should I re-clean a lead list I already used?

Re-verify before every new campaign if the list is more than a few weeks old. Businesses close, staff change and inboxes get shut down, so an address that was valid last quarter may bounce now.

### Should I delete leads that bounced?

Yes. Remove hard bounces from the list permanently and note the reason. Sending to them again only hurts your sender reputation.

### Is it fine to email info@ addresses?

For small local businesses it often reaches the owner or front desk, so it can be worth keeping. For larger companies, a named contact is usually a better target. Treat it as a judgment call per segment.

### What do I do with a lead that has no email but has a phone number?

Move it to a separate call or manual-outreach list rather than deleting it. It should not go into an email campaign.

### Can I clean a CSV I bought or built elsewhere?

Yes. Import it, map the columns to the fields your templates use, then run the same checklist, including verification, before sending anything.

Source: https://getclient.pro/resources/lead-list-cleaning-checklist