About Pairaphrase
Pairaphrase is a SaaS company offering an AI-powered translation management system for enterprise teams. Their solution brings global teams on the same page, ensures instant and reliable translation, supports multiple file formats, and allows the processing of large packages of documents simultaneously. The key advantage of Pairaphrase is that it preserves the formatting of the original file.
Their target market covers mid-sized and large US schools serving bilingual students, later expanding to enterprise verticals including manufacturing and financial services. As a startup, Pairaphrase had no sales team and no in-house marketing function when they addressed Belkins.
Impact of our partnership: 375 appointments over 28 months
Between March 2022 and July 2024, Pairaphrase booked 375 appointments with decision-makers at US schools and enterprise companies, about 13 per month. Several prospects with 1,000–5,000 employees became paying clients.
- 375 appointments over a 28-month partnership
- Deals with companies of 1,000–5,000 employees
- 16% average reply rate on cold email, with open rates reaching 84% at their peak
- High-potential opportunities in financial services, a new vertical tested during the campaign
Schools were the core segment, which brought two constraints: complex decision-making that lengthened the sales cycle, and holiday periods that stalled outreach twice a year. Keeping appointments flowing for more than two years depended on planning around both and adding new segments as the campaign matured.
Challenges: Irregular opportunities and no marketing team
Pairaphrase had fewer than 50 employees and no in-house marketing team. Without one, it had no consistent way to promote the product or feed leads to its sales team. New opportunities came in, but irregularly, so the company couldn’t forecast revenue or plan for a steady inflow of clients. It wanted to grow in the US market but lacked the capacity to do it alone.
Partnership objectives
Pairaphrase wanted a predictable flow of qualified appointments so it could forecast revenue and grow in the US. The initial target was 15 appointments per month.
Strategy and implementation
The campaign ran on cold email. It started with a segment where Pairaphrase’s value was easiest to explain, then mapped and tested enterprise verticals to widen the pipeline over the 28 months.
Starting with schools that serve bilingual students
Schools with bilingual students often need to translate documents during admissions, and staff must make sure every student and family receives the same information. That made document translation an immediate, concrete need. The team focused first on mid-sized and large schools in the US.
Writing referral emails adjusted for seasonality
Outreach used Belkins’ referral approach: each email asked whether the prospect was the right contact, or mentioned a colleague who might be, with wording adjusted to the prospect’s role. The team adapted messaging to the education sector and to its calendar.
- Referral approach to outreach. We started with a tried-and-true approach, which delivers consistent results. Still, we take into account the specifics of the industry and adjust our campaigns to seasonality.
- Intent-based campaign, split by industries. Initially, the performance of the campaigns didn’t justify itself, so we switched back to educational institutions. But later on, we came back to testing extra ICPs from the manufacturing and financial industries. The latter brought high-potential opportunities, which received positive feedback from the client.
Mapping enterprise verticals by use case
To widen the pipeline beyond schools, the team mapped 28 industries. For each one, it defined target titles, translation use cases, pain points, and the outcomes Pairaphrase could deliver. Pairaphrase then ranked the verticals by priority. The highest-ranked group included:
- Manufacturing, automotive, and aerospace and defense: HR leaders, environment, health and safety (EHS) heads, communications and marketing, sales, quality, and process leaders. Use cases covered operations, engineering, quality, and HR documents such as employee handbooks and internal procedures, plus coordination across global supply chains. The outcome was more efficient operations and employees who could work in their native language.
- Financial services: CFOs, Finance Managers, and Risk Analysts, who need accurate translation of financial reports and contracts for global reporting and compliance.
- Insurance: claims managers and directors, actuaries, and international operations coordinators, who handle policies and claims documentation across countries.
- Pharmaceuticals and biotechnology: regulatory affairs and clinical research managers, who translate clinical trial documentation and regulatory submissions.
- Public sector, telecommunications, environmental services, marketing agencies, media, and HR and talent management, each with its own titles and use cases.
Testing new verticals and returning to the core
The first industry-specific campaigns didn’t perform well enough, so the team returned its focus to educational institutions. Later, it tested manufacturing and financial services again. Financial services produced high-potential opportunities, and Pairaphrase responded positively to their quality.
Challenges Belkins encountered
Seasonality. Summer and winter holidays brought a wave of out-of-office replies from schools. The team front-loaded outreach and booked more appointments ahead of each holiday period to keep the monthly flow steady.
A long sales cycle in education. Schools make decisions through complex, multi-step processes, which slowed Pairaphrase’s sales. To balance this, the team tested additional industries with different buying processes.
What we learned from this project
- Start where the use case is obvious. Schools with bilingual students needed document translation for admissions, which made the value easy to explain.
- Plan around the buyer’s calendar. Booking ahead of holidays kept appointments flowing through the slow periods.
- Map verticals before testing them. Defining titles, use cases, and pain points for 28 industries gave each test a clear hypothesis, and the client’s ranking set the order.
- Return to the core when a test underperforms, then retest. Financial services failed at first and later produced the strongest new opportunities.
This approach fits lean SaaS companies without a marketing team that sell a product useful across many industries. Companies whose core segment has a long, seasonal buying cycle should plan a second segment early to keep the pipeline balanced over a long partnership.
