Been working on an service site that I've seen requested many times from people talking about it, etc. It really is a godsend service, but the problem I'm facing right now is nobody is giving it the time of day, even those same people who had originally requested such a useful service. There is another site similar to my site, but they're targeting a lesser known keyword and have a lot less functionality and feel. I found out their tactics were contacting people through various sites via messaging. The responses I've seen from his messages are, "Hey, thanks for inviting me! I'm so glad to be here." My received responses are, "Naw, thanks" and people outright ignoring. I'll let you know this, I'm not the only one sending messages. There are other people on the site doing it as well, all with different tactics. The people who do give us the time of day think the site is incredible and support us 100%. We've only had success from one site that supported us. The other 20 other relative sites who would benefit from our services and 50 other users we messaged all reacted negatively and we're not using any methods that differ from that other site. Is there some magic trick to getting people to recognize a useful service? Every site starts somewhere, and I'm having the most frustrating time of my life dealing people.
Give away some free review copies, make sure the usabilty and design is good - functionality should matter more but it doesn't. Then spend some money advertising and think up some quirky gimmick that will have people posting images etc on facebook. Most of all, give it time.