6 months building, 0 users I don't know personally (i will not promote)

we have 3 teams using what we built. all 3 came through our network. and that's basically worthless as validation. not because they're lying. they're genuinely using it and saying good things. but there's no world where someone who knows you tells you your product is bad. they soften everything. they assume you know the obvious problems. they don't churn because churning feels rude (I've lost lots of individual users that I knew them, but I got zero login from strangers). the real signal only comes from str