Experiment and Focus: Try various channels (blogs, social media, SEO, referrals) and double down on the top 20% that perform best every three months.
Content: Write blog posts and other content to improve search engine visibility. Discuss competitors, alternatives, your customers' challenges, industry advice, collect resource links, etc.
Directories: Most software directories aren't worth it, but some do. For example Zapier (if you have an API), can help. Publish your own integration there, it'll get a dedicated page for your product.
Community: Engage in relevant online communities, answer questions, and participate in discussions. be an expert or be shameless, but you have to exist where your customers are. For example, here in HN, search for relevant posts and reply and add "Shameless plug: I own a Saas Cat Service that sends you meows to your mail..., and this is what I think about AI and Mail" You had the opportunity to share a link here :D
These methods are primarily free but require effort. Be cautious with paid promotions and focus on organic growth. It’s a cycle of trying, waiting, adjusting, and trying again. Start now, be patient, and you’ll see results. Then, when you are sure what works, start exploring paying for traffic.
Lots of the advice here is very general, but it's important to know what your product is before being able to supply advice.
Are there natural networks that would spread your product better than others? Tough to know without knowing what the product is.
As far as blogs, etc. That only works if your customers are reading blogs. Need to know what the product is.
Just because it's a "web product" doesn't make it b2b, so we need more info.
But I think the biggest thing I'm seeing from that you didn't write about what you've built is, to always be telling people about your product, always be learning.
I know it can come of as being a shill sometimes, and I've been accused of that, but if you have a mission of the way you want the world to work, so what if some people don't like that you told them about what you do.
Of course, the best way to do that is to make them curious, not just dump on them every chance you get.
You'll see a very common (though also somewhat annoying) process many people here on HN use, which I'm assuming is recommended to YC companies, it's very formulaic.
"Hey HN, I'm X and I have Y credentials. I had this problem, someone I know had this problem, have you ever had this, my co-founder Z , met when we were doing K (maybe not the drug), and we'd love to ..."
you get the point.
So don't be shy to get some testimonials from them. You can be pretty blunt;
"As you know xxx is a new product and I'm trying to spread the word. I'm looking for customer quotes for my web site, so if you have anything nice yo say I can publish there, please let me know."
Write blogs, make videos, and of course - solve problems for people.
If there was a magic pill to pop that would take care of all this on our behalf, we would all be taking it.
(nicely done)
If your product safe a ton of pain, or resolving something which is a pain in some eyes, then it will spread by itself.
You can also act like a 'customer' and wherever possible just write a short sentence about it. Think of how a customer would talk about it. It's not meant like presenting the top features while you're writing how it helped you. Think of changing the roles with a customer.. what would the customer write/say.
So, by that you can do 'adverts' without actually doing it.
Search for communities, forums, groups.. that are on topic. Who would use your product? Go there, where such are gathering.
For example, doing grill accessories, you would tend to place your message into grill forums, not into football group. Except you see that someone is having a problem or asking for an advice for something... You could answer 'im using xxx. That helps me. Bye.'
Something in this sort of.
It can take time, and consistency, but persistence in a good way) builds up trust.
Equally it acts as a view into you. Are uou generally helpful when interacting, or just pushing you product. I became an "industry expert" - helping whoever and however I can. Regardless of whether it pushed my product or not. Equally where I had a product that solved an issue I didn't hesitate to mention that as a solution.