You're right, having bounty program will really help in promoting the project and very effective to do. But if not, there are other way to promote it, such as by sharing information to others and through the use of multimedia and online shares.
yeah, if they have no money for advertising .. then organising a bounty campaign in bitcointalk is the cheapest and effective way to advertise your ICO
Even on bitcointalk this day if you want effective bounty program, you need to make one in service section and paid in bitcoin or ethereum, in bounties section, there are lost of bounties every hour and it becomes hard to get participators.