In most small and medium-sized UK businesses, the person who can say yes to a new supplier is a director. Getting your email in front of them, rather than into a shared inbox that someone skims once a day, is often the difference between a reply and silence.
This guide walks through a reliable, manual process for finding a director's name and a working email address, and explains how to stay on the right side of the rules while you do it.
Step 1: Find the directors on Companies House
Start with the official register. Search for the company on Companies House and open the People tab. You'll see the current officers, with their names, roles and appointment dates.
- Check the company is active before you go any further.
- Look at current appointments only. Resigned directors are listed too, so check the dates.
- Notice how many directors there are. In a small firm with one or two directors, they almost certainly make buying decisions. In a larger company, think about which director is most likely to own what you sell.
Our guide to using Companies House data for lead generation explains the rest of the register in more detail.
Step 2: Find the company's website
Companies House doesn't publish email addresses, so the next step is the company's own website. Search for the company name together with its town. When you find a likely site, make sure it's the right business:
- Check the name and location match.
- Look in the footer or legal pages for the company name and number. UK companies are required to show certain details, such as their registered name and number, on their websites.
- Be careful with similar names in different towns, and with web designers' or directory sites that list the business but don't belong to it.
Step 3: Look for published contact details
Many small businesses publish the details you need. Check:
- The contact page and footer.
- The about or team page, which often names the owner or directors and sometimes lists individual addresses.
- The privacy policy, which usually gives a contact address for data enquiries and sometimes names the person responsible.
If you find an address for the director by name, that's ideal. If you only find a general address like info@ or hello@, you can still write to it and address the email to the director by name. A named greeting reads as personal, and it's much more likely to be passed to the right person than one that starts "Hi there".
Ignore addresses that obviously belong to someone else, such as the web designer's address in a site credit, and no-reply addresses, which won't reach anyone.
Step 4: Work out the likely email format
If the website shows one person's address, you can often infer the pattern the business uses. Common formats include:
| Format | Example for David Hartwell |
|---|---|
| first name | david@ |
| first name and surname | david.hartwell@ |
| initial and surname | d.hartwell@ or dhartwell@ |
| first name and initial | davidh@ |
A guessed address is only a guess, though. Never send to one without checking it first, which brings us to the most important step.
Step 5: Verify the address before you send
Sending to addresses that don't exist causes bounces, and bounces damage your sender reputation. Mailbox providers notice when a sender keeps hitting invalid addresses, and they start sending that sender's mail to spam, including the emails that were going to real people.
Before you send, check that the address can receive mail. Email verification tools do this by checking the domain accepts mail and, where possible, that the specific mailbox exists. Some servers accept every address, so a "valid" result isn't a guarantee, but verification still removes most bad addresses. Our cold email deliverability guide explains why this matters so much.
If you can't confirm an address will receive mail, don't send to it. A shorter list of good addresses beats a long list that bounces.
Stay on the right side of the rules
A director's work email address is personal data, so UK GDPR applies even in a B2B context, alongside the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations (PECR). In practice that means:
- Only collect contact details that are published for business purposes, and only what you need.
- Make sure your email is relevant to their role and business.
- Say clearly who you are, and give an easy way to opt out in every email.
- Keep a suppression list so anyone who opts out is never contacted again.
- Be careful with sole traders and some partnerships, where stricter consent rules for marketing email can apply.
Read our guide Is cold emailing businesses legal in the UK? for the detail.
Common mistakes to avoid
- Emailing a resigned director. Companies House lists former officers alongside current ones. Always check the appointment and resignation dates.
- Matching the wrong website. Similar company names are common. A site for a business with the same name in another county is the wrong business, and your email will make no sense to them.
- Emailing the same person several times. One person can be a director of several companies. If you write to each company separately, they'll hear from you more than once, which looks careless. Check for repeated names before you send.
- Sending to unverified guesses. A guessed format that turns out to be wrong bounces, and enough bounces harm every email you send afterwards.
- Using a web designer's or agency's address. Site credits and hosting contacts often appear on small business websites. They reach the wrong company entirely.
- Forgetting company groups. Several companies in a group may share one website and one set of directors. Decide whether you want to contact the group once, rather than each company separately.
Doing this at scale
The process above takes a few minutes per company when it goes smoothly, and longer when it doesn't. That's fine for a shortlist, but slow if you want to reach a steady stream of new businesses every week.
Pucky automates it. It finds each business's website, collects the addresses published there, matches them to the company's actual directors and filters out junk and wrong addresses, such as a web designer's address or a no-reply address. It also checks an address can receive mail before anything is sent. See how Pucky finds decision-makers.
Frequently asked questions
Does Companies House show directors' email addresses?
No. Companies House shows directors' names, roles and appointment dates, but not their email addresses or phone numbers. You need to find contact details on the company's own website or other published sources.
Is it better to email the director or the info@ address?
A director's own address is best. If the business only publishes a shared inbox, write to it but address the email to the director by name, so it reads as personal and is more likely to be passed on.
Why should I verify an email address before sending?
Emails to addresses that don't exist bounce, and a high bounce rate damages your sender reputation. That makes it more likely your other emails land in spam.
Is it legal to email a company director without consent?
UK rules generally allow relevant marketing email to limited companies and LLPs without prior consent, as long as you identify yourself and offer an easy opt-out. UK GDPR still applies to their personal data, and stricter rules can apply to sole traders and some partnerships.
Want to see the directors Pucky finds for businesses in your area? Book a demo.