How to Become a Freelance Digital Marketer: Your 2024 Guide

Freelance digital marketers help clients create, execute, and measure campaigns that promote their products or services. To begin a career in freelance digital marketing, you’ll need to follow several steps, including building an audience and connecting with brands.

In this article, we'll explore each step and provide insight into what freelance digital marketing is, typical earnings, helpful tech to use, and how to get started.

Ready to become a digital marketer?

If you're ready to explore a career in digital marketing, start by taking Foundations of Digital Marketing and E-commerce. This course can be completed in 18 hours and is part of the Google Digital Marketing & E-commerce Professional Certificate. A subscription to Coursera Plus is free for your first seven days.

What is freelance digital marketing?

Freelance digital marketing refers to a self-employed contractor who assists one or more companies, organizations, or other clients with their marketing needs, usually remotely. 

Clients specify job duties, which can include: 

• Creation of various content like videos, blogs, podcasts, or social media posts

• Social media marketing strategy and planning

• Email marketing campaigns

• Brand marketing

• Maintenance of websites, blogs, and social channels

• Search engine optimization (SEO) strategy and implementation

Gain a solid foundation of digital marketing with Google and build your freelance career:

Definition of freelance

Freelance refers to someone who completes as-needed, specific tasks for a company or client. The time commitment varies and can be as short as a few hours or an ongoing gig. Freelancers are often paid on a per-project or hourly basis and are not considered traditional employees.

Definition of digital marketing

Digital marketing promotes a brand and its products or services to a tailored online audience. Digital marketing aims to elevate brand awareness and engage with customers in hopes of making long-term customer connections through digital channels like blogs, emails, or socially shared videos.  

Read more: What Is Digital Marketing? Types, Skills, and Careers

Salary and job outlook

According to Glassdoor, the average annual salary of a freelance digital marketer in the United States is $51,785 [2]. The field of marketing, advertising, and promotions has an expected 10 percent job growth rate, which is faster than the average 5 percent. An estimated 35,300 job openings are projected each year through 2031.[3].

How to become a freelance digital marketer

Becoming a freelance digital marketer involves several steps, including building your skills, marketing yourself, and finding clients. More specifically, if you're interested in a freelance digital marketing career, here are five steps to follow:

1. Select specialties that align with your skills.

Digital marketing has a lot of different niches within it. To succeed, consider narrowing your freelance services to one or two specific areas that correlate with your strongest skills. If, for example, you enjoy the strategy and creation of ads, you could specialize in social media advertising. Marketing niches could include: 

• Content

• Social media

• Email

• Search engine optimization (SEO)

• Mobile 

• Affiliate marketing

• Pay-per-click (PPC)

• Marketing analytics

• Video

• Virtual reality

Read more: Affiliate Marketing: What It Is and How to Get Started

2. Develop your skill set.

Consider building your skill set through online courses, video tutorials, or local workshops. The Google Digital Marketing & E-Commerce Professional Certificate on Coursera, for example, can help you gain job-ready skills in less than six months.  

Certificates often reassure clients that you have the necessary skills to efficiently complete marketing tasks. Certificates also signal your commitment to continued education and a desire to stay on top of changing trends.    

You could also consider online certifications, bootcamps, or even pursue a degree in the field. If you're interested in a bachelor's degree, you could major in marketing, advertising, marketing management, or business administration with a concentration in digital or social media management. There are also digital marketing degrees that you can earn online with similar concentrations and majors.  

Preview Google's Digital Marketing & E-commerce Professional Certificate and enroll today:

3. Build an online presence with a portfolio.

To become a freelance digital marketer, you need to market yourself. Ideally, you'll create a website that offers a biography, work examples, and a way for potential clients to reach out. 

In your "About Me" section, or biography, include a brief history of your work experience, mention degrees or certifications that are relevant, and describe your personality and hobbies. Keep it short, but make it professional and insightful. 

Freelancers typically display work samples in a portfolio. In your portfolio, highlight the type of work you do so clients know what they can hire you for. Keep it visually pleasing with clear formatting and up-to-date. 

Include a contact page that's visible from your home page. Include both an email and phone number and offer links to your professional social media channels, like LinkedIn. 

4. Set your pricing.

To become a self-employed digital marketer, you'll create a pricing structure, which can either be hourly, project-based, per day, by a retainer, or a mixture of more than one. Many freelancers set hourly rates. To start, name the amount that you'd like to make annually, the number of hours you plan to work in a week, and the number of weeks you plan to work in a year:

1. Let's say you'd like to make $60,000 a year and plan to work 40 hours a week for 49 weeks of the year, giving you three weeks of vacation. 

2. Now, multiply the number of hours you plan to work by the number of weeks.

• 40 hours x 49 weeks = 1,960 working hours.

3. Next, divide your target income by the number of working hours to get your hourly rate.

• $60,000 / 1,960 hours  = $30.61/hour

Keep in mind that not every hour is billable though. About 60 to 85 percent [1] of your time is billable, the rest goes towards non-billable tasks like answering emails, marketing yourself, and invoicing. To make up for that loss, you have to adjust your hourly rate:

4. Remove 40 percent of your hours spent, which accounts for non-billable chores. 

• 1,960 hours x .40 = 784 non-billable hours

• 1,960 hours - 784 nonbillable hours = 1,176 billable hours

5. When you remove 40 percent of your hours spent, it brings your hours down to 1,176. Now, divide your target revenue by the new number of hours to get a more accurate hourly rate.

• $60,000 / 1,176 billable hours = $51.02/hour

5. Find clients.

To find new clients, consider looking on popular freelance websites like FlexJobs and Upwork. On these sites, you can apply for specific jobs and use these experiences to build your portfolio. 

Consider reaching out to local businesses, or even businesses run by family or friends, and discuss their marketing needs. 

Add a lead magnet to your website too, like offering an ebook in exchange for an email address. As you collect contacts, reach out with a personalized email and start a conversation about marketing and your services. 

Research from Statista [3] also provides sources freelancers often use to find work: 

• Previous clients

• Friends and family

• Social media

• Professional contacts

• Online ads

• Online job boards

• Previous employers 

• Sharing economy (peer-to-peer) websites or apps

• Local newspapers

• Employment agencies

Read more: Social Media Jobs: 6 Roles to Explore

Understand marketing channels and how to execute campaigns with Unilever:

Examples of clients that hire freelance marketers

Just about every company uses digital marketing to reach customers, but some of the most common industries that hire freelance digital marketers are: 

• Consulting 

• Finance 

• Insurance 

• Education 

• Advertising and Public Relations

What skills or knowledge are needed to get into freelance digital marketing?

You don't need an official degree to become a freelance digital marketer, but certain skills will help you succeed. Digital marketing encompasses a lot of different niches and usually involves juggling a handful of clients. With that in mind, here are the skills or knowledge you typically need:

• Organization

• Time management

• Communication

• Copywriting

• SEO

• Teamwork

• Willingness to learn new tools and platforms

Digital certifications

Along with increasing your skill set through Google Digital Marketing & E-Commerce Professional Certificate on Coursera, you can also consider certifications to elevate your knowledge on the subject matter. Options could include: 

• Meta Certified Digital Marketing Associate offered by Meta

• Professional Diploma in Digital Marketing offered by Digital Marketing Institute

• Digital Marketing Pro offered by American Marketing Association

What tools or technology does an aspiring freelance digital marketer need?

Throughout your digital marketing career, you'll likely use a variety of tools. Clients may request that you use tools the company has in place, or you might deploy your own set of tools to manage your freelance business. Here's a look at some of the tools you'll likely come across:

• Communication tools: Google Workspace, Slack

• Scheduling tools: Calendly, MeetFox

• Project management tools: Trello, Asana, Airtable

• Finance software: Quickbooks, Wave

• Time management software: Toggl, Clockify

• Customer relationship management (CRM) platforms: Hubspot, Salesforce, Zoho

• Writing tools: Grammarly, Hemingway App, Evernote

• SEO tools: Semrush, Ubersuggest

Tasks and responsibilities of a freelancer marketing professional

Freelancers pursuing this profession will have tasks and responsibilities that correspond to various marketing goals. Here's a look at some of the daily tasks you'll likely do: 

• Communicate with clients and set up a plan for each project

• Plan or expand promotional campaigns

• Develop content for the company website, blog, and social channels

• Set up content calendars

• Create and manage social media ads

• Create and send email marketing campaigns

• Grow brand awareness through planned events

• Watch and report campaign metrics

• Stay up-to-date on marketing trends

• Suggest marketing improvements 

Start your freelance career by learning essential skills

If you're ready to pursue a career as a freelance digital marketer, consider enrolling in the Google Digital Marketing & E-Commerce Professional Certificate. You'll discover marketing fundamentals, how to execute and measure campaigns, and how to build an e-commerce store in less than six months.