I'm about to release a game on Steam, should I use giveaways to promote it ?

What you want is someone to play the game and leave a review. Unfortunately, you're not going to get that with a general mass giveaway.

Your best bet would be to give the game away in a group dedicated to playing games - such as Playing Appreciated or Playing Matters - and ask for the winner to write a review.

Most copies you give away will never even be installed, so don't do that.
I'd go with what DocJ said, and just price it low enough that people will buy it.

Personally speaking, I tend to trust reviews more from people who purchase a game and don't get it for free.

Hi, I'm an indie too, I've made a few educational apps and mobile games and have been working on my first steam game for a while now. On your question, I'll have to disagree with most answers so far, most of my steam wishlist consists of games I saw here which I pick up during sales. I am not sure about the best strategy to use, massive giveaways bring lots of visibility at a bigger cost but then die out. They also kind of cheapen the perceived value of the game. Small giveaways are most cost-effective but are buried under a huge list of games until the final hours of the giveaway. Still, I'd go with the small giveaways route.

Well I'm new here so I tell you this:

Before joining here I had 150 games in my wishlist and after seing some great indie games here in GA and some other games I never knew existed I now have 202 games in my wishlist plus I got 4 new games from this site I never know existed and already played one and the other 3 are waiting on my desktop for their turn.

Will I speak about these games with friends? Hell yes if they are good :)

And I review all the games I play. Sometimes just a sentence sometimes more depends on how inspired I feel after the game :)

Reddit has some very good places for this. If I was you, I wouldn't make typical giveaways with raffling winners, but ask who is interested and will play the game soon. It's likely that many people will answer.

https://www.reddit.com/r/incremental_games/ - this subreddit focuses on clicker games, many might be interested
https://www.reddit.com/r/lowendgaming/ - I can see that your game has pretty low hardware requirements, there might be some interest here
https://www.reddit.com/r/IndieGaming/ - pretty self explanatory
https://www.reddit.com/r/playmygame/ - you can also try this one, although it's less lively

don't. Also, if you just trying to make money from some assetflip instead creating a real game then please don't release anything on steam:-D Nooone going to buy it.

On other hands, if you create something fun perhaps the best longterm solution to point it out from the start that the game will never be bundled and never be on sale and stick to it, works really well for Factorio.

For advertisement, I think I would recommend sites like woovit or keymailer where creators located, they need to deliver youtube videos on claimed games within a few days (and they likely will deliver a steam review too) or well-selected steam curators. You need to select those curators carefully because some are full troll, some followed by masses while likely their followers have zero buyer potential or willingness. Others might be followed only by a few hundred but those are hardcore gamers and purchasing a lot of games. Best perhaps to check similar category games and check what curators highlighted the game and then check if the highlight linked to another source like a review, site, youtube vids etc or check the group of the curator, check the admins and their steam profile. If they play the games only for a very short time then probably just a fake curator who just trying to get extra games for free with minimal work.

All these not matter if your game is no effort crap because then the reviews and all advertisement effort is pointless.

There was once a developer here with the same question. He made a giveaway and also tracked the impact like "number of new wishlistings" etc. It should be a thread somewhere here with his results.

Does it happen that you buy a game you saw on SteamGifts after checking it?

It happened that I white-listed them a few times. As for buying them, I only buy in bundles or big sales.

cool mate you can do itttt

I think you could do a few copies GA in Playing Appreciated or some other groups that require the game to be played. There is a higher chance to get reviews l, talking or recommendations of your game if it ends up with people who will actually play it.
And for the love of god, don't even think in hundreds-thousands of copies giveaway. It devalues the game in the eye of many, and it's like a scattershot, likely it won't result in real visibility or playtime.

Not relevant to GAs, but something to think on from another dev: https://twitter.com/RaveofRavendale/status/1103656799528464385

First of all: GG ! I wanted to release a game too, but uhm... a lot of stuff happened and I changed my plans, so... maybe in the future.

Now, the only correct answer to your question:

YES FFS !

Marketing is important ! I don't want to scare you, but you are already late, having a dev-blog, teasing gaming communities with gifs and stuff while you are still developing your game is a very good practice.

Do some "strategic giveaways" here, on reddit or wherever you think is a good idea (not massive)
Send some keys to youtubers\streamers\bloggers (be careful you'll find begger\scammer impersonating them)
Don't spam, post something (a gif would be perfect) that's interesting\funny on reddit\imgur\wherever you can
Open a facebook\twitter\whatever page

Besides the already good suggestions (giveaway events like NB264 organizes, groups like Playing Appreciated etc): why didn't you hold a closed beta phase (or if, why not announced it at Steam?)? Though not everyone who gets a key might find the time or provide good feedback, some do and at the end of the beta you can revoke all keys or reward those who provided good feedback with a "real" key.
Another option I have already experienced: make a limited giveaway with a pre-requisite that players have to reach certain levels or scores in a demo.

Mass giveaways are basically white noise, and I don't think they'll do you any good. However, as you'll notice from the thoughtful responses so far, a decent number of people on the forums are more inclined to actually engage with what you're posting.

If you did a small giveaway event through the forum - for example, an "it's too hard" quiz for which all the answers can be found on the steam page for your game - it would probably be a much more effective way to get people to do a little research and actually find out more about your game.

You have on your profile your were the community manager over at Arenanet, Piranha Games, and Daedelic.. I'm surprised you aren't talking to any of your past co workers for advice.

Would NOT suggest a mass giveaway - just from our own point of view it will only get limited exposure, but an occasional giveaway with a link to the game and some information in the giveaway text box - which is allowable under the rules - stating that you hope they win, but if you don't win then the game can be purchased here (insert appropriate link) etc....
probably would be the better way to go - by the way I actually like the look of the graphics on it and the colours sort of remind me of the old sim tower type of games I played many many years ago
anyway - good luck :)

I'm about to release my first game

Please don't.

good luck with your gam!e =) great advices here!

If it's worth paying money for, don't give it away for free.

doing a few could help as winners friend may see them playing it and check it out. i know steams store page sucks for smaller games, it hides them deep in a dark corner you have to jump through 50 hoops to find.
if its a multiplayer game and the player count is to low then a giveaway really would help

Join groups like PlayingAppriciated and aks nicely for reviews after they played the game.
There you can give away as much copys as you want since people will have to redeem and play it (or get kicked) and the people are usually already somewhat filtered.

Nope. but do make certain you have trading cards. That seems to be a bigger draw.

just give some copies to youtubers who make great content. they will increase the publicity of the game. i dont know the quality of your game but be also aware if the game is bad it will not sell well.

I don't usually even glance at the mass giveaways, though I've seen some in the past I knew had at least 1000 copies given out and only gained like 10 reviews from it...I wouldn't do it. Unless it isn't selling at all I wouldn't personally do bundles either, you'll lose a lot of purchases to gray market resellers

The most successful advertising with a mass giveaway I've seen on SteamGifts was for the game I am not a monster, they did some smaller 100 copy giveaways with a description telling you how to find the much larger invite only giveaway, where you had to download the demo on Steam and play the game until eventually a pop-up came up with the invite only link.