This is the same answer as growing a for-profit product. You need to stop spraying random marketing attempts, and look deeper at who uses it today, and why. What problem does it solve for them? Who else has that problem, and where does that audience actually spend time - both IRL and online. Then you craft a message that clearly and concisely show them that you understand their problem and have a solution available, and you share that message in the specific locations that your specific audience knows and trusts.
I never really figured that one out but I never really tried to be honest. Mostly because my motivation has always been to fix my problem, I never really cared who else was using it or not. I've only received a handful of PR's over the years across all my projects. I suspect I'll never get any new ones since I got fed up with github and moved to codeberg, which (to my delight) is like kryptonite for sloppers.
This is the same answer as growing a for-profit product. You need to stop spraying random marketing attempts, and look deeper at who uses it today, and why. What problem does it solve for them? Who else has that problem, and where does that audience actually spend time - both IRL and online. Then you craft a message that clearly and concisely show them that you understand their problem and have a solution available, and you share that message in the specific locations that your specific audience knows and trusts.
I never really figured that one out but I never really tried to be honest. Mostly because my motivation has always been to fix my problem, I never really cared who else was using it or not. I've only received a handful of PR's over the years across all my projects. I suspect I'll never get any new ones since I got fed up with github and moved to codeberg, which (to my delight) is like kryptonite for sloppers.
When you figure this out, please let me know!
:D I guess it's like asking "how to get rich"