Valid means the checks passed, not that the person will reply
Valid describes an address that passed verification: it is correctly formatted, its domain can receive mail and the mail server’s response confirmed it. It is a statement about the address, not about the person behind it or their relevance to your offer. A valid address at a company that was never a fit is still a wasted send. Verification and qualification are separate jobs, and a list that is strong on one can be weak on the other.
Invalid covers everything that could not be confirmed
Invalid means the address failed a check or could not be confirmed. That includes addresses with a broken format or a domain that cannot receive mail, and addresses where the server gave no reliable answer, such as domains set up to accept mail for any address. Rather than handing you those as a separate category to judge, Prospectal marks them Invalid, so they stay out of your sends by default.
Not found is a different question
Not found belongs to email finding, not verification. When no email can be found for a person, the row says Not found instead of guessing a pattern that looks plausible, which would only produce addresses that bounce. A researched account with no findable contact is still useful information about that account. It is not a contact.
What each result costs
Email Verify uses 0.5 credit per email processed, whether it comes back Valid or Invalid: the check is the same work either way. The Verify Emails option on scraper projects uses 0.5 credit per email verified, on top of the scraper’s own rate.
A workable send policy
- Send to the addresses marked Valid.
- Leave the addresses marked Invalid out of your sends.
- Re-verify any list you have not checked recently before you use it again.
- Do not try to rebuild Not found rows by guessing an address pattern.
Why a clear result is worth having
Every send draws on one finite resource: the reputation of your sending domain. Complaint and bounce thresholds are enforced automatically, and recovering a throttled domain takes far longer than building the list did. A single, consistent result per address lets you spend that resource deliberately instead of by accident.
Put it into practice