[waldopat]

Another way to think about it is it is very, very hard to break into an industry as an outsider. Impossible? No, but you'll need to be very savvy on the marketing front and really do the homework. So not having much of a network is likely going to be the riskiest part of the OP's startup.

[yumlogic]

I am facing somewhat similar problem. I do know a couple of folks who are kind of guiding our product development. But, we need experts and it is indeed very hard to break in as an outsider.

Have you found any solutions or hacks that worked for you?

[waldopat]

Sure thing. TL:DR; If your market won't even respond to a friendly email or outreach for you to learn from them (not sell), how will you market to them later? That's your first test. Can you talk to 20 people who you think are your ICP?

Here are some pearls of wisdom from over a decade building B2B SaaS aka there are no hacks:

1) It's definitely easier to build a product than to build a business. VCs invest in businesses.

2) Sales & Marketing need to be a step or two ahead of product development (as a product person, I hate to say this but it's true) so that you build the thing the market wants, not just what the founder wants

3) It's a grind. All the break out successes are either outliers or took 7 years of hard knocks to get there or are well capitalized and the founders have diluted themselves away. Either way, it's a grind

4) Do not skip customer discovery. Feel free to pick up a heavy book by Steve Blank to learn more, but this is probably the most important step. I see so, so, so many startups in GSD mode and realize they don't actually know their market

5) Your founding team needs to lead marketing, sales and product, not hired guns, fractionals or advisors. You'll spend a lot of money going nowhere if you're not careful.