Ask HN: Where can you (pay to) promote your web business? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Where can you (pay to) promote your web business?

3 pointsturblety3 comments

But without corporation advert companies like Google Adwords, Facebook Ads, Twitter Ads, etc.

I'm thining of how to promote a SaaS product specifically, but rather than sink money into temporary advert social media, going a bit more direct.

Can you pay someone to post on their blog? Is that still a thing?

Are web directories still worth it anymore?

If you reply/comment on relevant blog posts, it's spam, right, so how can you talk about your product (paid solutions are fine).

Or are we stuck with the only real way to promote, is sign up to FAANG and give them money?

View on HN

1) LinkedIn is not at all a different bucket then FAANG but it allows advertisers to put together and target a filtered and relevant audience for such offerings (people tend to lie less on LinkedIn profiles so the jobs titles/experience /industry are quite accurate plus nowadays LinkedIn is quite a lot like FB, people spend more time browsing that feed - even when they are not looking to change jobs).

2) Tech forums / communities are generally less judging against talking about your own offering, especially when relevant for the discussions happening there naturally.

3) yes, paid blog posts and advertorials as well as paid insertions (short articles, banners) in relevant newsletter are still a thing but you must really find matching partners that address the audience you are looking to hit with your tech.

Good luck!

Unrelated, I'm sorry, but it sparked a memory from back in the days (1998-ish) when there was a banner-ad-system that cost no money, but it only advertised web sites, not products.

Basically, it meant that you created a banner for your web site, somehow (I don't remember how) included in your web page, and the banner system would advertise your web site on other web sites using the same "technology", and vice versa.

Thanks for triggering that memory! :)

Why not use Google, Facebook, etc.?

Ideology?

If so, there's nothing wrong with that.

But time invested in avoiding the normal channels is not an investment in your business.

Also it is not an action that benefits users.

And at worst it is an invented problem to excuse failure (not that there's anything wrong with failing).

Good luck.

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