I've written a whole freaking series of articles that tout all the wonderful free tools and services available to the adult webmaster. That series (entitled Zero Down) showed newbie webmasters that one can get started in this business without spending a nickel. While this is true, I won't lie. Most of this free stuff is pretty useless if you want to make money.
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"When it comes to free stuff, you get what you pay for. Free stuff is useful but it's benefits are limited. Paid stuff is better but only when you know how to use it." |
For example, take free hosting. At one time the free adult hosting arrangement was a damned good thing for webmasters. I and countless others were actually able to create sites on free-hosted servers and we made money.
Unfortunately, free hosting wasn't very beneficial to the hosts. After a point, free hosting became a nuisance because the webmasters would cheat and the free hosts started to pull nasty tricks, like forcing downloads upon the unwary surfer. Pretty soon, webmasters using free hosting found their sites banned on TGPs and Top Lists. Free hosting became a joke and a pariah. No self-respecting webmaster would be caught dead with a site on a free-hosted account. The good thing evolved into the bad thing.
While free hosting still exists, one cannot realistically use it as a replacement for paid hosting. Free-hosted accounts are for practice or for sponsor promotion. Using a free host will teach you how to upload to an FTP server. It will give you a platform to envision your page on the Internet. Sites you have on free-hosted accounts can be great spoke links for your hub webpage. However, your hub page should always be on a pay-hosted account.
Filler. Remember that word because when it comes to free stuff, most of it is exactly that.
Need content? Of course you do. Content is King. Adult sponsors provide gigs and gigs of free content to their webmaster affiliates. The drawback is that you must use that content only for the purposes of promoting the providing sponsor. Another drawback is that thousands of other webmasters are using that very same content. You cannot expect that gallery you made -with the free content- to get listed on a TGP. You can't submit a free-hosted gallery to an MGP, no matter how good the clips are. You can't build a free site, containing only sponsor content, and expect it will be placed on a Top List.
If you want to be listed on a TGP, MGP or Top List, you're going to have to invest in paid content.
I could go on and on citing the failings of free software, free scripts and free counter services but I would hope by now, you understand what I'm trying to tell you. When it comes to free stuff, you get what you pay for.
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I would rather spend the rest of this article telling you how just a little bit of cash goes a very long way in this business.
Let's go back to hosting. Did you know that you can register a domain name and open a paid hosting account for less than $20.00? You can register and lease a domain name (one year) for ten dollars or less. You can lease that domain in two-year, three-year and even ten-year increments for far less than it costs to stay in a hotel for a weekend.
As for hosting, you can open a virtual account that will provide you with 500 Megs of storage and 20 gigs of transfer for the price of a ticket to the movies. Most of these starter virtual packages come with CGI enabled and will even let you install a database. Paid hosting in our business is an incredible bargain. Paid hosting does much more than give you a venue and your own email address. Paid hosting gives your site legitimacy and legitimacy is priceless.
As for content, it's cheaper than it's ever been. You can buy a set of 50 pics for as little a five dollars. You can take those images and use them as content for TGP galleries or you can build an entire free site around them. If that free site or gallery converts into just one sale, you can get as much as five times the return on your investment of five, measly dollars. Granted, content prices vary with providers and exclusivity but you get the idea.
Paid content is better content, and better content equals better productivity.
Your task is to decide how much is too much when it comes to spending money. If you're a newbie webmaster, just figuring things out, there's no need for you to pay for managed hosting or exclusive content. The reality is, you probably won't know how to use such things to your advantage.
The trick is to spend only what you need on what you know. If you're not experienced in paysite operations, then for goodness sakes, don't invest in exclusive content, shared servers and a merchant account. Take this business one step at a time and one dollar at a time.
Free stuff is useful but it's benefits are limited. Paid stuff is better but only when you know how to use it. Be careful. Be smart. Be an adult webmaster!