I’m collecting quite the stash of domains, unattended websites and online subscriptions. I’d like to say that I invest time in most of them but that would be dishonest. Mostly, the stuff just sits around, waiting for me to pay for the privilege of ignoring it. I won’t tell you how much I shell out monthly but I will tell you that the day has come to cut loose the slack.

"It's true, you have to spend money to make money. Just keep in mind that you have to spend money to lose money too."

My biggest weakness is domain names. Then again, I can imagine all sorts of extraneous expenditures I would accumulate if I made more money. Expenditures like ads and paid listings. If I were a big dog, I would shower the web with my ads. I would buy as many as I could and probably forget which ads went where. I would lease server after server and plugin content from all comers. I’d go a little crazy but eventually I would take hold of my senses and inventory of my expenses. I would sit down and weigh the outflow versus the profits. Then I would throw a tantrum. Then I would let the bill cutting begin.

Despite everything you’ve been told about spending money, the Internet is the most cost-effective business venue in existence. Yes, you have to spend money to make money but you spend way less on the net than you do would in the real world.

For example, if you wanted your television commercial to reach the entire United States during prime viewing hours, you’re looking at millions of dollars for any kind of effective exposure. You’ll have to pay money to at least three, major networks, not to mention cable and satellite stations. If you wanted to advertise your business in a large city like New York or Los Angeles, you would have to cough up tens of thousands of dollars just for newspaper ads alone. Radio? Huge bucks. Magazines? Also huge bucks. Let’s not even talk about the cost to lease or buy a physical location for your shop. On top of rent and/or building purchase, there’s the cost of utilities, interior design and furnishings. Don’t forget that product stock.

Whereas, on the Internet -especially the adult Internet- you can build, upload and open a small, site for fifty dollars. Pay a $250.00 a month to rent a location or pay $20.00 to register a domain and one month’s hosting on the net. Pay untold thousands for sixty-second network spots or pay way less than a thousand a month for 24/7 targeted advertising on a World Wide Web page. Build one site. Build ten. Register domain names in bunches. Put that designer on retainer. Subscribe to that auto-updating application. Lease streams and feeds and content, content, content. Add it all up and you still haven’t spent a tenth of what it costs to take out a full-page ad in Rolling Stone or Playboy. The net, the adult Internet, is cheap by any comparison.

It’s true, you have to spend money to make money. Just keep in mind that you have to spend money to lose money too.

If you’ve been merely subtracting costs from sales to arrive at a profit calculation, you’re missing a very important factor in the equation. There’s another cost that most smart business owners take into account: LOSS.

For example, a restaurateur keeps track of how many glasses are broken per month. The learned restaurant owner knows he will always have to pay a certain amount to replace those glasses because that’s the cost of operating his particular kind of business. However, if there are more missing/broken glasses in one month than the average, he knows he has another kind of problem. He has a loss and he will need to stop that loss. Having enough glasses keeps his customers satisfied and makes him money. If someone is stealing glasses or dropping too many, he’s losing money.

You’re spending money but are those payments making you money? How long are you (okay, me) going to hang on to those dormant domains? How about that designer that made you wait three extra months for your paysite? How much money did you lose during that three months? What about that banner ad on that top list you’re still paying for after two years? Are you still getting traffic from that banner? Is that traffic good traffic?

We’re not advising you to cut loose your obligations or bail on any contracts. You need to pay your bills. We’re suggesting you take a deeper look at what your costs are costing you. If you stop paying for nothing, you’re going to get something: Profits!