Do you have to have a big launch?

The truth is that as an indie hacker, you keep launching and re-launching your product, just the same way as you keep iterating over development & deployment of your product. You'll soon find out that "carried water doesn't stay in the well", so even if you have a semi successful launch through a third-party, the traffic will soon wane if you don't have something that really solves the right problem for your audience. So when that happens, you have to ask yourself if you are targeting the right segment and if your product is solving the right problem, then find a new segment and/or build more product and do it again. There's a such a thing as a critical mass though. Even for relatively successful small companies, it's all about visibility - while you might have created a customer base, most people in the world still have never, ever heard of your product or your company. But once your name/product is known in a segment, the increased visibility will start working for you. Most people are not adventurous enough and are too busy to try out new things, but they'd be happy to use something that's proven useful. But rather than asking whether you should do a big launch, the right question is whether you should market your product, and the answer is yes, you must. Launching is one way of marketing your product, but since your reach is typically small in the beginning, it's totally fine to "launch" your product multiple times . You can always launch new features, the same product to new segments, to different countries etc.

Used product hunt and it didn't do well in my case, waste of time. Betalist provided a nice bit of traffic and still ranks well. The marketing and launch part is the hard part (for a Developer of course).

I would appreciate any feedback from makers and marketers. Even if you don't think you're qualified, I want to hear your thoughts!