Simply launching a website is a success in itself, but how do you know if it’s hitting the mark with your audience? It’s a crucial question to ask so you know that the time, effort and money you put into your investment is paying off.

The key is to set goals before you even begin on your website project, and then break those goals into measures of success. For instance, your goal may be to transmit your message to more teens. Ways you can measure the success of that goal might be:

• More registrations from people aged 13-18
• More website referrals from teen-centric partners or resources
• More repeat visits from people in the 13-18 age range.

It’s a good idea to quantify each of those bullets to match your audience share.

Just as each of your goals will be unique to you and your organization, so will the measurements of success. Generally speaking, though, here are some other ways you can tell if your website is doing what it should:

Increased traffic.

Sign up with an analytics account (I like Clicky and Google Analytics) and see if your traffic goes up.

Repeat visits.

Increased traffic isn’t the same as repeat traffic. You want people to find your site and keep coming back.

Increased sales or donation ratio.

Start counting how many visitors you need to make one sale or donation. If 1 in 100 visitors makes a purchase, your sales ratio is 1 percent. If you’re successful, this so-called conversion rate will increase.

Free Web stuff has never been more available nor more overwhelming. It’s easy for a budget-conscious non-profit or other small organization to glom on to any of the thousands of freebie apps out there and out of eventual frustration, opt for a paid service.

On the flip side, it’s easy to be deluded into thinking free services can do anything a paid service can do. That’s one mistake that can get expensive. It’s important to pull out the cash when it’s worth it. Even if you save a bit, it helps.

I’m always scouting around for free services and use a litany every day. I can’t name them all here, but here are five of my faves that I turn to regularly.

Free Apps

1. Netvibes is a personal Web browser start page that corrals RSS feeds, news updates, to-do lists and more.

2. Clicky is streamlined and easy-to-use Web analytics software.

3. Remember the Milk is a cute, simple and effective way of managing tasks. Nice for keeping track of web projects.

4. “Google Notebook helps you collect notes and information from the web for anything you might be doing—researching a trip, planning a purchase, or putting together a dinner party.” Useful when bookmarking won’t do.

5. Fax Zero lets you upload and send faxes for free.

Want more?

Monique Cuvelier will be sitting on a panel about free and cheap online tools at the eBiz Symposium in Arlington, MA, on Friday, Oct., 23, 8:00am – 4:30pm. Hope to see you there!