Crossed $1.2K MRR with two customers. The whole "growth strategy" was one underpriced pilot.

Quick background: I'm building BasinCheck, a safety audit and compliance tool for US oil & gas contractors and industrial teams. Solo technical founder, based in Wroclaw, Poland, selling to Texas.

Yes, that combination is as weird as it sounds.

Customer 1 signed about a month after launch. I gave them a six-month pilot at $299/month and then worked like hell: shipped every change they needed, and a bunch they didn't ask for, to make using the app seamless. Over those six months it became something they use so often they can't imagine working without it anymore.

When the pilot ended, they renewed at almost 3x, around $860/month.

There was some back and forth first (typical business negotiation), but the renewal got approved recently, and that's what pushed MRR past the $1K mark I'd been chasing.

The part I didn't plan for:

their Safety Manager was happy enough with the tool to offer to act as a customer reference. That reference helped me land customer 2, who came in after a week of internal review and that reference call.

Demo bookings also tripled last week. In absolute terms that means going from 1 a week to 3, so let's not get carried away.

But things are starting to move.

Still early, and I'm not claiming this always works. But the loop of cheap pilot -> heavy iteration -> deep daily usage -> 3x renewal -> reference -> next customer is the first thing I've done that actually compounded.

Happy to answer anything: pilot terms, how the renewal negotiation went, or what it's like selling compliance software to the American oilfield from Poland.