This question of calculating customer acquisition costs has always been an interest of mine.

This time, however, I wanted to ask the question differently. If you had an easy button (or a service out there) that would add a guaranteed client to your client base, how much are you ready to pay for each sign-up?

Obviously, prices will vary depending on class of service we are talking about, so please define the parameter when you are responding.

For example, $40 for a shared hosting client, $100 for a dedicated server client.

I am asking this question because the whole psychology of spending changes when you know you receive a paying client versus when you are designing your affiliate system and choose not to go over a certain amount (comes down to difference in risk). The objective is to understand whether the value of each such sign-up is exponentially higher than when you have to earn a client yourself.