There are pro factors too. For example, the subscription culture pushed by those big platforms has trained user to pay to get. This is a vast improvement compare to decades ago where most user will just download, trial, expire and pirate.

> But Google have done everything they can to raise bid prices and generally enshittify Adwords, so they can grab more and more of the value in every transaction.

Now days, a software that work as claimed and reasonably priced is already rated above-than-average quality.

The real problem here, is discovery.

The old tricks such as SEO and forum signature link etc are dead. If you need user, you need to stay with your user group, listen to what they want and make them happy. Then your user will talk about it elsewhere and that could generate traffic for you.

Online ADs on targeted platforms may also help. But all and all, it's no longer free and automatic.