The Problem

Blabla.ai, an early-stage French startup, was riding strong inbound momentum. Content, referrals, and early adopters kept leads flowing — but the deals were too small to fund the next stage of growth.

Helena, the founder, carried the entire sales motion herself:

• Building lists

• Sending cold emails

• Running discovery calls

• Closing contracts

• Managing customers

Outbound was clearly the missing piece — larger accounts, strategic logos, repeatable pipeline. But in practice, it was impossible to sustain.

“I’d start a campaign on Monday, but by Wednesday I was pulled into demos and product work. Outbound needs rhythm and consistency — and I just couldn’t keep it up alone.”

The cracks widened:

• No sales team meant zero bandwidth to run repeatable outreach.

• Five disconnected tools for scraping, enrichment, sequencing, and CRM — burning more time than they saved.

• High opportunity cost: every hour spent in spreadsheets was an hour stolen from product or fundraising.

Outbound wasn’t just difficult — it was blocking growth at the exact moment scale depended on it.

The Solution

Helena turned to Topo, installing an AI-powered outbound engine that acted like a ready-made SDR team — without the overhead.

1. Automating the Sales Stack

• Trained on Blabla.ai’s ICP and messaging.

• Took over sourcing, enrichment, sequencing, and CRM sync automatically.

• Removed the need for juggling multiple tools or rebuilding workflows.

“Topo let me stay in my founder role. I finally focused on who to target and what to say, instead of clicking around spreadsheets.”

2. Targeting with Buying Signals

Instead of generic filters, campaigns were triggered by concrete intent signals:

• Companies hiring community managers or social media managers — a reliable sign they’d soon need Blabla.ai.

• Startups with headcount spikes in marketing or community.

• Teams already using complementary tools that Blabla.ai integrates with.

This ensured outreach felt timely and relevant, not random.

3. Multichannel and Multi-Threaded Campaigns

• Email + LinkedIn touchpoints tailored to each channel.

• Snippets highlighted specific pain points tied to hiring signals.

• Multi-threaded sequencing engaged multiple decision-makers in parallel, shortening cycles and boosting credibility.

The Results

Within weeks, outbound went from an abandoned experiment to a repeatable growth engine.

• 30+ qualified meetings booked with ICP-fit companies.

• Outbound produced larger deals than inbound ever delivered.

• Bigger logos entered the pipeline, aligning with the company’s growth ambitions.

• Helena personally reclaimed 10–15 hours per week to focus on product, fundraising, and closing key conversations.

“Outbound used to feel like this massive burden. Now it feels like we have a whole SDR team running in the background — and I can finally play the founder role again.”