The short answer
- 1In Sales Navigator, combine Current job title (CEO, Chief Executive, Managing Director) with Seniority level set to CXO and a Company headcount from 201-500 to 1001-5000.
- 2Send the search to Emelia with Export with Emelia, then run Find email on the list: 1 credit per email found, given back when no address is found.
- 3For a named account, click Find email on the CEO's LinkedIn profile with the Emelia Chrome extension. For a file of target accounts, import the CSV.
- 4For a single CEO at no cost, use the newsroom, the investor relations page and the company's email format, then verify before sending.
- 5Plan for the assistant: a short email that is easy to forward gets further than a long pitch.
Which CEO are you actually trying to reach?
The CEO is the top executive, accountable to the board. At 300 people, they still weigh in on large purchases; at 10,000, they set the direction and delegate the buying. Either way, your email has one job: earn a reply, or get forwarded to the person who owns the problem.
Titles vary: "President & CEO" in the US, "Chief Executive" or "Managing Director" in the UK, and a Group CEO above the CEO of each subsidiary. Choose your level first: for a regional offer, the local CEO is usually more relevant, and easier to reach, than the group CEO.
The titles to search for
Job titles to include
Job titles to leave out
"Managing Director" heads a UK company, but it is also a senior rank held by dozens of people at US banks and consulting firms. "President" can be a US CEO, a board role or the head of an association.
Where CEOs show up online
- LinkedIn: most CEOs of mid-sized and large companies have a profile, with the title and company an email finder needs.
- The leadership page of the company website: it confirms the current CEO and the spelling of their name.
- The newsroom: press releases quote the CEO and end with a media contact whose address shows the company's email format.
- Investor relations: annual reports and IR contacts of listed companies. SEC filings name US executive officers; Companies House lists UK directors. Names, never emails.
- Conferences and podcasts: speaker bios confirm the role, and what the CEO said makes a better first line than any template.
Why reaching a CEO is not like reaching a manager
- Someone else reads first. Beyond a few hundred employees, an executive assistant or chief of staff triages the inbox. Your email must be easy to route.
- The public "CEO" address is rarely the CEO. At large consumer brands, ceo@ or "office of the CEO" feeds a customer relations team that handles complaints.
- Groups use several domains. The group CEO may be on the .com while the LinkedIn page belongs to a subsidiary on .co.uk.
- CEOs change faster than profiles. A former CEO can keep the title on LinkedIn for months. Check the leadership page before sending.
- The best-known CEOs are the hardest to reach. Heads of household-name brands keep their address private, and no email finder can promise it. Mid-sized companies are where a CEO still reads their own email.
Which method should you use?
Thirty named accounts or a whole industry: either way, you end up with CEOs and their qualified work email, ready for a campaign.
Build the list in Sales Navigator
Filter CEOs by title, seniority, company size and region, then send the search to Emelia.
Best for: a new list of CEOs across an industry or a region.
See the stepsOne CEO at a time
On the CEO's LinkedIn profile, the Emelia extension finds the email and adds them to a campaign.
Best for: account-based selling on a few named companies.
See the stepsYou already have your accounts
Import a CSV or sync HubSpot or Pipedrive, then find the missing CEO emails in one run.
Best for: a CRM segment, an event list or a list of target companies.
See the stepsMethod 2: find one CEO's email from their LinkedIn profile
In account-based selling, you need the right person at 20 companies, not 2,000 CEOs. The extension finds each email from the profile you are already reading.
- Step 1
Open the CEO's LinkedIn profile
With the Emelia extension installed and connected, a button appears on every profile. Check that CEO is the current position, not a past one.
- Step 2
Click Find email
Emelia reads the name, the company and its website from the profile and looks for the work email. Find phone looks for a number from the same profile.
The Emelia extension on a LinkedIn profile: find the email, then add the contact to a campaign. - Step 3
Add the CEO to a campaign
Choose a campaign in Add to the campaign. The CEO joins it directly, with the email just found.
Without the extension: unitary searches
The Unitary searches button at the top of the Lists page finds one email from a full name, a company and a domain. Always fill in the country, and for a group CEO, enter the domain of the entity they run.
Method 3: you already have a list of target accounts
Most CEO campaigns start from accounts: a CRM segment, an industry event, a ranking of fast-growing companies. Add each CEO's name, import the file, and Emelia finds the missing emails in one run.
| Column | Required | What it is for |
|---|---|---|
| First name + Last name (or Full name) | Yes | Without a name, no email can be searched. Remove Dr., MBA or CPA. |
| Company website or domain | Optional | The best starting point. For a group, use the domain of the entity the CEO runs. |
| Company name | Optional | Used without a website, and as a second chance when the domain finds nothing. You need the website, the domain or the name. |
| LinkedIn profile URL | Optional | Needed for LinkedIn steps and to look for a phone number. |
Required
What it is for
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What it is for
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What it is for
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- Step 1
Import the file
Go to Lists, then New list, and choose CSV File (a .csv, not an .xlsx), or create the list from HubSpot or Pipedrive. Columns are recognized automatically, and you can fix the mapping before importing.
Emelia: create a new list from a CSV file, Sales Navigator, HubSpot or Pipedrive. - Step 2
Launch Find email on the list
Emelia shows the entries without an email, the credits needed and the leads missing a name or company. Point it to the domain or company name column (for a group, the one that matches the entity the CEO runs), choose the country, and launch. The search continues if you close the tab.
Emelia: find the missing emails of a whole list in one run. - Step 3
Review the results
Leads that already had an email are skipped and not charged. Keep the addresses qualified as valid, and for your most important accounts, run a second check with the email verifier (0.25 credit per check).
Why the company name column matters for CEOs
The domain in a CRM is often wrong for a CEO: an old brand, a product website, a subsidiary instead of the group. When the domain returns nothing and the lead has a company name, Emelia automatically searches again with the name. Keep both columns. Shortened links (bit.ly, lnkd.in) are ignored as websites.
Doing it by API
Send POST /tools/find/email with your API key in the Authorization header, and fullname, companyName and country (required), plus companyWebsite if you have it, then call GET /tools/find/email/{jobId} until the status is done. Each email found costs 1 credit. See the API documentation.
POST https://api.emelia.io/tools/find/email
Authorization: <API_KEY>
{
"fullname": "Rachel Whitmore",
"companyName": "Corvane Freight",
"country": "US",
"companyWebsite": "corvanefreight.com"
}
→ { "success": true, "jobId": "…" }
GET https://api.emelia.io/tools/find/email/{jobId}The free ways to find one CEO's email
For one or two CEOs, public sources are often enough, as long as you verify the result.
1.The media contact in press releases
Press releases end with a media contact. If that address is firstname.lastname@, the CEO almost certainly uses the same format on the same domain.
2.Investor relations and filings
Annual reports, IR contacts and, in the US, SEC filings name the executive officers. Companies House lists UK directors for free. You confirm the name, sometimes the format.
3.Google search operators
Search "@company-domain.com" with the CEO's name, or site:company-domain.com "chief executive". Event pages sometimes show a real address.
4.The executive assistant
Ask the switchboard who manages the CEO's diary, or search LinkedIn for "Executive Assistant to the CEO". Their address confirms the format, and a courteous email to them is a legitimate way in.
5.Guess, then verify
Apply the format to the CEO's name and check it with the email verifier. An unverified guess that bounces hurts every email that follows.
CEO email formats at mid-sized and large companies
A CEO nearly always follows the company's standard format. What varies is the domain, and the role addresses in front of them.
| Pattern | Example | Where you see it |
|---|---|---|
| firstname.lastname@ | rachel.whitmore@corvanefreight.com | The most common format at large companies. |
| flastname@ / f.lastname@ | lbennett@oakhollowhealth.com | Frequent in older corporate email systems. |
| firstname@ | sofia@larkspan.io | Founder-led scale-ups, where the CEO was the first employee. |
| firstname.lastname@ on the group domain | james.okafor@hartwellpryce.com | The group CEO uses the group domain; the UK subsidiary keeps hartwellpryce.co.uk. |
| ceo@ / office.ceo@ / chairman@ | ceo@tamberlineretail.com | A role address, read by an assistant or customer relations. |
Example
Where you see it
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Where you see it
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Then write to them: the CEO campaign in Emelia
A CEO campaign is short and multichannel: a profile visit, a brief email, one or two follow-ups, all run from Emelia.
- Step 1
Create the campaign
In Campaigns, click create, name it, and start from scratch or from a template. LinkedIn then Email suits CEOs: it opens with a LinkedIn invitation, so your name is familiar when the email arrives.
- Step 2
Write the sequence
In the Campaign tab, add three or four touches and their delays. Personalize with
{{firstName}},{{companyName}}or a column of your own such as{{recent_news}}, or let an AI column draft an icebreaker per CEO (1 credit per action).
The Emelia sequence builder: emails and LinkedIn steps in the same campaign. - Step 3
Attach the list of CEOs
In Settings, choose the sending accounts, tick your CEO list in Lead list, and save. The assistants list gets its own campaign.
Emelia: attach one or more lead lists to the campaign, then launch it. - Step 4
Launch or schedule
Launch now or schedule the start. Large companies filter email hard: warm up your mailboxes with email warmup first.
A CEO email that is easy to forward
A CEO decides in seconds whether to reply, forward or delete. Make forwarding to the right person the easy option.
Subject: {{companyName}} and [topic]
Hi {{firstName}},
I saw [recent news: acquisition, new market, results]. At that stage, companies like {{companyName}} often run into [specific problem] in [department].
We helped [similar company] [measurable result] in [time frame].
If this is on your radar, who on your team should I talk to?
The last line is deliberate: a CEO who forwards your email gives you the best introduction there is. When the delegate replies, mention who sent you. Replace each bracket with a fact you can prove.
Mistakes to avoid
Pitching the CEO on a department problem
If IT or finance buys your offer, the CEO will forward it at best. Talk business outcome and ask for the right person.
Treating the assistant as a wall
The assistant decides what reaches the CEO. A clear, polite email explaining why it matters often beats a fourth follow-up.
Writing to ceo@ at a household-name brand
It usually reaches customer relations. Target mid-sized companies, or the relevant executive at the big brand.
Mixing a 300-person company and a 20,000-person group
The first CEO may buy; the second delegates. Split your lists by Company headcount, with one message each.
Emailing last year's CEO
Check the leadership page or the latest press release before launching, and drop former CEOs who still show the title on LinkedIn.