Overall, I found it a good marketing tool for my side project and a way to not get into trouble with other mods. You can see it here: https://www.reddit.com/r/Watchbands/
This makes sense most-naturally when a user asks for "what's good software to organize videos?" So I answer honestly: "I created this app, this is what it does, I think it may fit your requirements".
I'm an independent developer and have never spent money promoting the app. Today my GA shows 70 visitors coming from Reddit this week. Usual number of visitors from all sources is 70 per day.
But you're right, a big subreddit gives you about the same amount of traffic than HN.
Really depends on your app and where you promote it. About 5% of my visitors buy my app, and that's probably because they come from targeted Reddit comments (or organic searches for the specific thing my app offers).
If your post is in the top of the month/year/all time it will bring you visitors on the long term. (I guess they're also better on Google search. Not sure tho)
Aldi had great success posting "hauls" until they were caught astroturfing. They likely are still doing similar but smarter with their accounts.
Is there a decent rundown of this anywhere? I tried a couple of google searches but didn't find much.
(I often get the feeling this is being done by various companies, especially on Reddit, but I find it hard to distinguish between astroturfing and sincere consumerism. Especially when they are probably working in combination: astroturfing to set the tone, then genuine community members jumping on the bandwagon and acting as unwitting accomplices. So I'm interested to read case studies wherever it has provably happened.)
The author also mentions getting 400 visitors as an example of success. 400 visitors is nice, but given that people have reached the top of Hacker News or Product Hunt, gotten massive traffic spikes but then saw little to no conversions, it doesn’t strike me as particularly noteworthy.