How do solo founders get their first pilot users for a complex B2B product?

I’m a solo founder building an internal knowledge and HR automation engine. I’ve built everything myself so far, including multi-connector document ingestion, vector search, workflow automation, and policy generation logic.

The technical side has been hard but doable. What I’m struggling with now is getting real users to test the product. It’s a B2B tool, so the usual “launch on Product Hunt and hope” advice doesn’t apply. Cold outreach to founders is mostly ignored, and most companies want something that is already proven before they try it.

For founders who have been through this:

How did you get your first pilot users?

What actually worked beyond theory and generic advice?

Did you offer long free trials, custom work, discounts, or just persistence?

How did you convince someone to take a chance on something early?

Any lessons from the trenches would help.

My goal is to learn from people who’ve navigated the early stage where the tech exists but the user feedback loop is not forming yet.