I know there are many guides on how to launch on ProductHunt. I am not writing another one but here is small timeline on how it went throughout the day and a few things I have done to keep trending on Top#5.

Launched Micro SaaS Ideas on Thursday. Usually I do my launches on Thursdays as Wednesdays are too heavy with big players.

Couple of days priory to the launch, I made 2-3 Tweets like this to let everyone know I am launching on PH.
https://twitter.com/upen946/status/1551627101387849730

Casual timeline:

• Scheduled launch for 12:01 AM PST. Most of the images are created from Canva.
• Changed my Twitter profile to this to get more upvotes. Looks like this has some impact though it's tough to measure direct impact.
• Made Twitter post about the launch here
• DMed 20 people who I know from Twitter (in the first 20minutes)
• After 1 hour, I was hanging between #4, #5, #6 places.
• 3 hours after launch, Took the screenshots of the stats and posted thrice on my Twitter just to show that the product is trending. This drove a few more votes.
• Made a post on IH here
• 8 hours after the launch, Added the PH launch link in my weekly newsletter (Earlier, I used to send explicit email that its a launch day but now I just added a link at the top of the newsletter as a casual link)
• 12 hours after the launch, made one more Twitter post with stats like this
• 13 hours after the launch, pinged another 20 people from my Twitter and notified about the launch. Just to be on safe side to be in Top#5.
• 14 hours after the launch, I stayed at #4 and was confident that it will land in Top#5.
• 2 hours before the close, I moved to #5.

Some pointers:

• Every vote counts.
• Early votes will improve your chances to keep you in top.
• Have atleast 10-15 people you can count on to upvote/comment.
• Ask more questions (I haven't done that much though) in the comments to drive more conversations.

Here is the ProductHunt launch page
You can follow me here on Twitter