I know (and most others do as well) how hard it is to get noticed on here. I been here for 2 years and let me tell you getting a "whale" vote is no easy task.
As you pointed out Bidbots certainly help with getting noticed but they have been frowned upon for some time. I do use them from time to time but its mostly just small $2 upvotes or below. As long as your not abusing them and not upping your post to what some may deem as too high of an amount then those who fight against bidbot use likely won't bother with downvoting you.
If getting noticed is the goal, a great alternative to using a bid bot is to use a service called @steem-bounty. A few on here like to hunt these bounty topics in hopes of earning a share of the bounty put on the topic. It doesn't directly add upvotes or cash value to a topic but it will get eyes on it. This service was created by @knirky.
Commenting on others topics is another way to get noticed. Many newbies overlook this important aspect. After-all if you want others to comment on your topic then doing the same on the topics of others makes sense. I wish you the best with your account here on the Steem blockchain.
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Thanks for your comment! I wasn't aware of @steem-bounty, but I'm going to go check it out now. From what you say about it, maybe I should have put a bounty on this post.
I agree about commenting on others' posts. That was what I was trying to say in my "Option 3" in the main post, and, in all honesty, I haven't been very good about it yet. I'm trying to change that now, by engaging more with other people's content, even if it's not strictly related to the subjects I tend to write about.
I suspect that getting noticed just takes a lot of work and a lot of patience, too. Like most things in life!