We offer a web solution for a niche to do some ERP and CRM. We got our first customer by checking the websites of potential customers to find one that could ha

We offer a web solution for a niche to do some ERP and CRM. We got our first customer by checking the websites of potential customers to find one that could have our mindset. Although the setup is meant to be done by the customer himself, we did all the required setup-work to match the customers design and populated some first data from open sources. (about 30 minutes of work..) Then we did the cold call and approached him more or less like this: 'Hi! We have this new thing and are searching for someone who would like to test it out with us. You wont have to pay us until you see the benefit for yourself and your customers, but we require a strong involvement and somebody who gets stuff done as our test customer. And then we thought of you. :)' One thing to mention about the cold call. We have to get past a front desk. It is not that easy, but I would say it helps to provide information about how long you would like to talk to the owner/ceo. We asked for 5-10 minutes and an available internet connection. First we explain what we do. When the customer gets the idea, we say: 'We hoped you would be interested, so we already setup a version for you. Go check it out at $sitename. Btw: there is an email in your inbox right now, that contains the link.' This is how we do it. Disclaimer: We are just starting and have only a few test customers by now. But once we were able to talk to the owners, all of them opened up, when they saw their own logo and design on our product.