How to Get Started with Freelance Digital Marketing in 9 Easy Steps (2023)

In the current days of growing technology, majority of the programs are being digitalized. The service and business sectors are one of them.

Now a days, when the internet has a billion of daily active users, almost 86% of the world population has the access of smartphones, so why don’t use the internet for business and services?

Are you also thinking to be a part of the freelance digital marketing where you will be your own boss and can earn as much as you want? In this post, you will get the ultimate end-to-end guide on how to get started with the freelance digital marketing.

Here we will be discussing a number of important topics related to digital marketing. So without wasting any time, let’s get right into it.

What is Freelancing Digital Marketer?

The freelancer digital marketer means a professional who works with full freedom and no boss above him/her. They have to work as per the client’s demands.

Freelance digital marketers are assigned many important tasks of a company and they are meant to promote the company’s products/services throughout the internet to increase the sales.

Freelancers have the choices to pick the ways to promote the products/services of a company.

Now, you may ask that, what is digital marketing actually? Well it’s a system/program which is used by several employee and freelancers to promote and reach a brand to the every corner of the world. Isn’t is simple?

Most of the digital marketers prefer to use social medias [Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn], emails, websites, SEO techniques to promote their client’s/company’s products/services. With the help of these tools, it becomes very easy for a brand/company to widen their customer base.

Also, there are no such large barriers and expenses to reach to more audiences.

Not only to handle the social medias, emails, websites but also to create effective plans, strategies, design ads templates, creating quality contents are some important tasks of a digital marketing freelancer.

We will learn more about the freelance digital marketing and freelance digital marketer as we will move forward.

Types of Digital Marketing:

The digital marketing is a large field in itself. It can be broadly divided into many categories. But in this post, we are going to discuss about 4 most important digital marketing categories.

Also, these categories also have a great amount of potential into it. So, let’s have a look at all the categories of digital marketing and then you can choose which one is suitable for you.

1. Affiliate Marketing:

In the era of modern technology, when the internet is at almost every house, the affiliate marketing works as a bridge for the company and large audiences. With the help of affiliate marketing, the company gets its customers and the customers get their required prodcuts/services.

At first, let’s discuss the work process of affiliate marketing. Every company wants to sell their products/services to mass audiences, right? Here comes the role of affiliate marketing.

In case of affiliate marketing, the company approach and collaborate with a content creator/social media influencer. And these third party creators/influencers promote the products of the company to their followers, subscribers and audiences.

Whenever the followers buy the product from the creator’s link, the company will get sales and the creator gets a certain percentage of commission.

These creators/influencers may be a blogger/YouTuber/Tiktoker anything. With the arrival of Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, the trend and potential of affiliate marketing has increased a lot.

In last year, it has the industry valuation of $12B. Some websites where you can also start your affiliate marketing journey are given below-

1. Hostinger

2. Amazon

3. Flipkart

4. Fiverr

5. Tubebuddy

6. Bluehost

2. Email Marketing:

The email marketing strategy is still one of the most effective ways to promote a brand/service or anything even though the social media has grabbed the internet. The email marketing allows you to send personalized messages and information to right audiences.

This allows you to spread your business to the targeted audiences. In case of the email marketing, you get different tools and software to measure your reach, impression, clicks etc.

Among these, the two tools are of most uses. These are-

• 1. Open rate:- The percentage of recipients who opened and read the email.
• 2. The Click through:- The percentage of recipients who read the email and clicked the service/products link on that email.

3. Content Marketing:

In simple language, the meaning of content marketing is to aware and let other people know about your products via a content. This content can be a blogpost, video, podcast, image anything.

In this case, the customer get an in-depth knowledge about your products/services through your contents. The main motive of a content marketer is to create a content which triggers the reader to be a customer of the products/services.

Also, content marketing needs a proper strategy, plan, set a targeted audiences, create original and valuable contents etc. Generally, a content marketer targets mass audiences to drive them into the client’s business.

4. Social Media Marketing:

The social media has become a great tool for a company/freelancer to find his/her audience, customer/clients. Just because social medias have approximately 5B daily active users, digital marketers pay a great attention into it.

A company shares everything on social media which is related to their businesses. This allows a company to reach to every corner of the world.

In case of social media marketing, a company has to keep posting consistently about their posts, businesses, services, facilities on the social media accounts. Also, some companies run paid ads campaigns, which allow them to boost their impressions [reach to people].

Some popular social media websites are- Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, LinkedIn, Twitter etc.

Read more– Social Media Management

Is Digital Marketing Freelancing Profitable?

Obviously! If you pay attention to your tasks, set your pricing properly, negotiate with the clients and passionate about your work, then you can earn up to lakhs.

Digital marketers who are doing freelancing in this field, earn as much as they want. And their earning potential is increasing every year.

According to a study of Upwork, in 2022 39% of the freelancers told that they are making much more money from online which they can’t do by working as a professional employee.

The digital marketing freelancing is exciting, enjoyable and you will be successful only if you can catch its tricks. Initially, it’s not easy to create or find a client base. Although, expertise and skill will definitely lead you to the success end of the digital marketing.

How to be a Freelance Digital Marketer? The End -to-End Guide

As a newbie, it may be a little tricky and challenging for you to start your carrier as a freelance digital marketer. Also, it’s a little bit daunting for the freshers.

But not to worry, you will get a detailed information below. To achieve success in the field of digital marketing, you need to study its algorithm, work process and understand the digital marketing till its root.

Getting a dab hand on the fields, such as- social media marketing, content creation, SEO, ads campaign will definitely help you to be an expert in this industry. A tip for newbies, if you have your own follower base, it will be more beneficial for you to showcase the client’s businesses.

Follow the step-by-step guide to be a digital marketing freelancer below. So, let’s bring it on-

1. Choose the Suitable Niche:

As we talked earlier, the digital marketing is a very large industry and it has a number of categories/niches into it. As a beginner in this field, it is recommended to choose 2/at most 3 niches at one time and become an expert in it.

Now the question may come in your mind that which niche to choose and how will yo choose that niche? Well, to select your niches properly, you can follow the expert method to study all the niches one-by-one and then choose the best one.

Not only that, but also you can specialize yourself in the sub-categories.

For instance– if you decide to get specialized in content creation, then it will be relevant and beneficial for you to also study on the SEO [search engine optimization]. Because without SEO, your content can’t reach to sufficient audiences.

Another example is that- if you decide to be an expert in the social media marketing, then it will be good for you to also get a dab hand on the paid ads run campaign. It’s because, if you don’t know properly how to run and manage an ad, then your ads campaign won’t be successful anymore.

2. Get Trained Properly:

It’s important to have proper training and knowledge about an industry, right? Same for digital marketing freelancing also.

You can explore video tutorials, courses about digital marketing on the internet. There are a lot of quality contents available about this on internet. If you need an one-to-one online class, you can get enrolled in a paid online course [most of the paid courses have the feature of one-to-one classes]. But make sure to verify the company and class before getiing enrolled there.

Along with one-to-one class, another benefit of the paid courses is that, it gives you a valuable certificate after the completion of the course.

Having a certificate will definitely increase your preference to the clients. Now, if you see your future in the digital marketing carrier, then you can pursue you diploma/degree course from any reputed institute.

Also remember, only degree, course and certificates are not enough. You must need to work on your skills, improve it and keep learning in order to survive in the competition.

3. Build your Audience and Client Base:

Currently, in the era of growing internet, you are nothing if don’t have your own audience, follower and brand. In this digital world, your network is everything that you need to grow and reach to clients.

If you already know somebody since before or you get anybody by a trusted reference, you will feel comfortable to work with them, right? Similarly, a client also trust and prefer to work with the freelancer about whom he/she [the client] came to know via any reference.

Your mass audiences will help you in this case to reach more clients as well as they will be your reference. You can create and grow your follower base by being consistent on the internet and social media platforms.

4. Legalyze your Brand:

After making a good audience base and creating a brand now it’s time for legalizing your business. Arrange the tax ID [only if it is available on your state] as soon as possible.

There are some advantages behind legalizing your brand. People will recognize your brand name, logo at a glance. Also, you will get the benefits of better credibility and funding opportunities.

5. Create your own Website:

Having your own website is very very important. It works as your own portfolio. Nothing can be better than having your own website to showcase your works and samples.

But make sure to display your best works on the web page. It will also help your clients to verify your works and your quality.

Finally, don’t forget to make the website and posts SEO friendly and user friendly. It will satisfy your visitors after reading the articles.

6. Post relevant Blogs:

Now a days, the marketing blogs[contents] are the key to success behind a successful digital marketer. You can post your blogs/articles not only on the webpage but also on your social media pages. Writing a SEO-friendly post will help users to reach your post and then your website.   

It is an efficient way to get new clients for your freelancing work. Not only that, but also the people who want to know about ‘Digital Marketing’ will get valuable information from your posts. 

7. Make a Proper Set of Templates:

In the high competition, it is too difficult to survive as a freelance digital marketer. But unique ideas and original contents, ideas can never restrict you to beat others. 

One good example of it’s to create a set of different templates for different types of clients. Include your pitch and logistical information there. 

Now you may think that what is the pitch and what is the logistical information also? Well, let’s get discussed below-

1. The pitch are the statements where where you will describe the clients that why should you get hired.

2. In the section of logistical information, you will tell the clients about your work process, problem solving approach, timings etc.

What Skills should a Digital Marketing Freelancer have?

The task list of a digital marketing freelancer is not fixed at all. He/she has to handle a number of tasks at a time. It depends upon the number of clients, their demands. 

Sometimes, he has to create an ads template within next 10 mins, write a blogpost, catch up the client in next 15 mins virtually. This teaches us that, the time management skill is essential everywhere. 

Although your task list may vary depending upon your niche, so does your workload also. 

Since there are a lot of varieties of skills needed for a digital marketer depending upon the niche, so we are now going to talk about some common and key skills which are needed to become a successful freelance digital marketer. 

1. Proper Research Skill:

The proper research skill is very necessary for a freelance digital marketer. A proper research about your competitors, about the market allows you to understand those properly. 

So, you can understand the people demand in a better way. Also, having a well idea about the market will help you to run proper ads at proper places and times. 

Although, it takes times to research about the local market properly, it’s important to deliver the proper product/service to the proper audiences. 

2. Content Creation and Presentation:

The content creation is an important part of the digital marketing. In this digital world, a quality content is everything. A well-written content helps the people to understand about the brand/company easily. 

Some company may hire a freelancer content writer separately, but you must have an well idea what is content, how to write and present it property? It will greatly help you and your company at emergency situation. 

In addition, it will also boost your confidence at other sectors [email marketing, social media managing].

3. Negotiating properly:

Negotiating with a client properly will not only help you to get your best prices, but also you won’t loose the client. It is seen that, freelancers work with their faorite clients without any negotiation. 

Although, most of the freelancers do negotiation while accepting an offer. At this point of time, if you don’t negotiate with the client in a proper way, you will loose them. 

That’s why you have to understand the client’s demand and the market value of the task at first. After that negotiate with the client. 

In this was, you will gain you will gain your best rate along with not loosing a single client. Additionally, keep in mind about your skills and experience while negotiating,  

4. Creativity:

Having a creative mind may take your client’s business to a next level. A creative content not only attracts the users, but also reflects your quality. 

A touch of creativeness makes a boring and lazy content so amazing, that it satisfies a reader successfully.  

5. Search Engine Optimization [SEO] techniques:

There’s a massive importance of content in the digital marketing and there will be no discussion about the SEO? Impossible! 

Without proper SEO, it’s next to impossible for a user to find your content on the search engines [Google, Bing etc.]. Search engine optimization, as the name suggests, it is ‘optimizing your content’ for the search engine, so that everybody can find your content on the search engines. 

The SEO has become very much important not only for blogposts but also for social media posts, ads run, YouTube videos, products description etc. 

Basically, a content with proper SEO helps the content to reach to its proper audiences. That’s why a basic and decent knowledge about the SEO is necessary for an freelance digital marketer.

6. Good Technical Knowledges:

In the modern era of growing technology, the one who has better skills in the technical fields, will be preferred. Now a days, there are a lot of software available for digital marketers.

Tools like- Google Analytics, Tableau[data analyzing], Brevo, HubSpot[email automation] are some important tools and software used by freelance digital marketers on a frequent basis.

Having a dab hand on those tools will increase your productivity rate, as well as increase your chances to get hired by a client. 

Sometimes, freelance digital marketers are needed to use software for creating unique and amazing templates and infographics. For this requirement, Canva will be the best option for them.

7. Social Media Marketing:

You want to reach mass audiences, right? Then you can’t ignore the social media. A website gets approximately 5% of its traffic from the social media pages. 

And this 5% is not a small number! Suppose your monthly traffic is 50,000. So, you will get 2500 users from the social media. That’s why you can’t ignore the power of social media. 

You can easily increase this number from 5% to 15% by just paying a little attention there. Social media is not complicated at all.

But you have to find proper audiences, serve them your content properly and interact with them. That’s it.

8. Run and Mange Ads Campaign:

There are a lot of paid ads campaigns available on the internet. Google runs ads in different manner, social medias [Facebook, Instagram etc.] run the ads according to their own algorithm, even Amazon runs products based ads.

A successful freelance digital marketer must have the clear cut idea that which ads to run where and how much to invest in that. 

Knowing all the differences between the platforms will help you to do so. 

What is the Salary of a Freelance Digital Marketer?

This is one of the most popular and most asked questions in case of digital marketing. And the answer is ‘it depends’. Yes!

The salary of a freelance digital marketer depends on many parameters, such as your skills, years of experience, location, niche etc. 

Also, it is freelancing, right? Thus there is no fixed rate, your earning will vary and you can earn as much as you want. 

It is seen that, an office working digital marketer earns between a range of $44,000-$90,000/year. 

Sometimes, a client may offer you a maximum hourly rate, you can accept that otherwise he/she will reject you. In this way, you are bounded to the client’s offer until you are a fresher. 

Once you grab the skills at a high level and get much more experiences, you can set a better price for yourself by negotiating with the client. 

In the most of the cases of freelance digital marketing in USA, most of the freelancers charge between $51-$200/hour. 

So, now you also got the idea that, the more you will work, the more you will earn in this field.

For instance, according to a study of Peak freelance, almost 50% of the freelancers earn less than $30,000/year. Peak freelance also showed that, 27% of the freelancer writers earn more than $50,000/year. 

In addition, the freelance writers have 2 years+ experiences who are making $1,00,000+/year. This teaches us that, experience plays a significant role in case of salary.   

What do a Digital Marketing Freelancer do Everyday?

Like an office job, the schedule of a digital marketing freelancer is not fixed at all. A digital marketing freelancer has a number of tasks to do depending upon number of clients, niche, location etc. 

A digital marketer has the variety of tasks from graphic designing to running ads campaign. Sometimes you may see a digital marketer who is doing coding for building a website.

It completely depend on person-to-person, his/her capability and interest. So, now without wasting any more time, let’s have a look on ‘how a day of a freelance digital marketer look like?’ 

1. Make a full day schedule with the goals and to-do lists.
2. Send report to the clients about all the tasks.
3. Set up the key performance indicator [KPI] to increase proficiency.
4. Research and write blogposts.
5. Handle social media activities.
6. Get ready with all PDFs and slides.
7. Host the webinars.
8. Develop all the ads materials.
9. Manage and handle other online activities. 
10. Increase the appearance of your website in the important search engines.
11. Create the newsletters.
12. Build a marketing funnel.
13. Research and study the market.
14. Working on CTA and conversion.
15. Post/schedule contents for social media and website.
16. Keep an eye on the important online communities.
17. Set a client meeting.
18. Participate on in-house affiliate marketing programs.
19. Generate QR code.
20. Run and manage ads.
21. Maintain proper web health and speed.
22. Creating high quality backlinks for increasing website authority.

Tips to Success for Freelance Digital Marketing:

The universe of digital marketing is dynamic. It keeps moving changing year by year. The field of digital marketing is so massive that a fresher freelancer can easily enter here.

A client/company can get a high return of investment [ROI] by getting involved in the digital marketing field. There are a variety of niches and options to work with international clients.

This makes the digital marketing a profitable and interesting business. Now, let’s get discussed about some important tips to become successful as a freelance digital marketer.

1. Don’t Stop to Learn:–

As we told earlier that, digital marketing is too vast and if you think that one day you will learn it completely, then you are wrong my friend.

Constant learning will help you to know more about the industry. The more you learn about the industry, the more you get the clear cut idea about this and so does your salary, skills and experiences increases. 

2. Make your rates dynamic:-

You can’t always keep your rates fixed, right? If you do so, you can’t make profit from that in future. 

So, keep an eye on the ongoing market trend and keep changing your prices on a frequent basis [after every 4/6 months]. 

Always try to keep relevant pricing depending upon your skills, expertise and knowledge.

3. It’s a Business:-

Always remember, you are not only a digital marketing freelancer but also a business holder. Always think and treat it like a business and there’s no space for negligecy. 

You must create separate bank accounts, promote your business to social media and collaborate with others. It will help you to grow on your digital marketing journey. 

4. Make Schedules:-

Creating a proper schedule for your tasks will not only help you to work proficiently but also to make times for other activities.

Create a schedule for your work hour [10-6] and inside that, set objectives and their corresponding time durations.

This method will save your lots of times.

5. Let yourself Rest:-

A human is a human, not a robot, right? Don’t involve yourself in the work all the time, all the day. 

Try to do some extracurricular activities every day, and follow your hobbies. And finally, chill on the weekends. 

This will not only give you rest but also increase your efficiency and let you focus more on your work.

Can you be a Part of the Freelance Digital Marketing?

Since the covid-19 pandemic, the freelancing industry has got a significant boost. And the trend of joining freelancing is still getting increased.

Between the year 2020-2021, almost 59M people left their full time job to join the freelancing industry. 

But remember, which is fit for others, may not be fit for you. Just like a double-edged sword, digital marketing freelancing is also full with its own pros and cons. 

And here comes our next part where you can find whether the freelancing digital marketing is fit for you or not.

Pros and Cons of Freelance Digital Marketing:

Every job, carrier is like a catch-22. They are not perfect al all. Same goes for freelance digital marketing too.

It has some noticeable advantages and disadvantages. So, let’s dive in the detailed discussion about it-

Pros

At first have a look at all its advantages.

1. You are your own Boss:-

Look, freelancing is all about flexibility and own comfort. While doing freelancing in an industry, there is no boss above you.

Unlike the 9-5 or 6-10 jobs, here you can choose everything according to your own comfort. From the work schedule to work load, from the client choice to salary, everything is under your control.

You become your own boss and even can work from your comfort place. This allows you to go to a vacation anytime, anywhere. All you need is an internet connection and your laptop. 

That’s it!

2. You have the Control on your Workload:-

As a digital marketing freelancer, you have the full control that how much task you will accept in a day, although this may affect your salary.

This feature is best for students or other job professionals. Because this allows them to pursue other activities without any barrier.

3. Different types of Projects:-

As we talked earlier, the digital marketing field is too vast. As a result, you get the opportunity to work with a variety of clients. 

Also, in this vast field, you work on different projects. Unlike teaching, IT, finance jobs, you won’t feel bored while working as a freelance digital marketer. 

4. Almost zero Expenses:-

In a business/office job, you have to travel there, get clothings, have meals there and many more, right? In the case of freelancing, there are no such expenses.

It saves your much more expenses which you can further use to buy any tool/software for your digital marketing. 

5. Limitless Earning:-

Actually, this is half ture. As a freelancer, you have the chance to earn unlimited, as much as you want. Although it demands a great amount of efforts and energy.

But if you are doing freelancing along with other part-time/full-time jobs then also you can increase your earnings. 

Freelancing allows you to choose your work hour and negotiate with the client. This eventually lead to an increment in your total earning.

Cons

Along with advantages, it comes with some disadvantages also. The freelancing digital marketing is not suitable for everybody.

So after discussing all the advantages now it’s time to look forward on its all disadvantages-

1. Work with Large Companies:-

There is a lot of varieties of clients/companies available on the freelancing platforms. So there will be many large and small companies also.

When you will be working with a large company, it may be a little bit challenging for you. A large company demand high level of tasks, supports and much more.

If you don’t handle those, the client may give you a bad feedback and a poor rating on your freelancing profile. This may create a bad image of you Infront of the other clients.

2. Getting Isolated:-

The life of a freelance digital is not like an office job. He has to work alone all the time, sitting in front of the pc/laptop.

Neither there’s anybody to talk, nor anybody to discuss strategy or something else. To get rid of that, you can make your one friend your co-worker and do all the tasks together.

3. Dynamic Earning:-

Remember, we have talked that, there’s no fixed income for a freelancer. It’s like a coin, which comes with both pros and cons.

Now having a fixed income means a decrement in salary too. Let’s suppose, you earned $1000 in the first month. And in the second month, you earned $300 [for any reason]. 

It will not only affect your lifestyle but also demotivate you a little bit.

4. Build Trust:-

Do you understand that, you are going to enter into a field where a number of others had already occupied the place? 

It may take a lot of time and struggle for you to reach at the same level. Also, getting the trust of a client is not an easy task.

5. No Break:-

While working as a digital marketing freelancer, you may find yourself doing constant hustling for hours. 

A half-designed template is remaining, 10 mins later a client meeting is scheduled, paid ads campaign is inactive for 2 days, lots of DMs are in queue.

Yes! You read these right! Your situation can be worse at this level. Although, having a good time management skill will help you to overcome these problems. 

Another good solution is that, you can create a schedule and to-do list for your tasks.

Tips to Avoid Scammers

It is very unfortunate that the online industry is not only filled with real people, it has some places for scammers also. The freelancing platforms are one of them.

In most of the cases, the newbie freelancers become the target of the scammers. Now have a look at some basic tips to get rid of the scammers. 

1. Get Advanced Payment:-

Getting a new client as a fresher freelancer is exciting, right? Ok, now you got an offer and how will you identify whether it’s a scam or not?

Simply ask the client to deposit at least 50% of the payment. If he/she gets agreed then well and good. Otherwise be sure that it’s a scam. It will be better to say them goodbye!

2. Don’t get Involved on the Testings:-

You may sometimes see that a client asks you to show them your sample works. And this is his/her right. But never write a fresh and new article to show them, I repeat never.

There’s a high chance that a scam may occur to you and the client may run away with the article and publish that. Then you will have nothing to do.

Then, what’s the solution? You can send them your blogpost link or a PDF of your previous sample work. 

That’s it, no need to do anything more.

3. Never accept Deal outside the Platform:-

It’s a common scam that a client may contact you at the freelancing platform, offer you a task and you accept that. 

Now comes the main point. In the middle of your task, if the client try to contact you outside the platform and offer you any more tasks, don’t accept that. 

It’s a sure sign of scam. Now what happen is, you worked for the client outside the platform but the client will deny you to pay. Because there’s no proof on the freelancing platform that you accepted the client’s offer.

And now if you go to the platform to contact for help, they may ban your account due to policy violation.   

So, stay away from those people.

Where to get Jobs as a Freelance Digital Marketer?

This is the start of your carrier, right? Start with the little steps and after working with many clients, you will reach to an expert level. Then you can make your portfolio so big.

So, some best freelancing platforms are given below. They will not only allow you to provide suitable clients but also to stay away from most of the scammers.

• Fiverr
• Upwork
• Freelancer.com
• LinkedIn
• Kool Kanya

Tips to find the First Client

As a freelancer, it is the most challenging task to find the first client. Although, there’s a lot of freelancing platforms but it takes a little bit of time for freshers to get hired by a client.

But don’t worry, we’re here with some effective tips to get your first client easily. 

1. Contact at LinkedIn:-

Create your profile on LinkedIn, then optimize the title, bio and description with your keyword. Try to search people with your keywords and you will definitely get a result.

The website LinkedIn is a great platform for jobs and freelancing.

2. Email Strategy:-

You can use the tools like Dux Soup to automate your emails. All you have to do is, search the relevant people on LinkedIn and automate the profile viewing, connecting and sending personalized emails [write it by ChatGPT/Hunter.io].

3. Interact with the Facebook Groups:-

The Facebook groups may be a good place where you can find a lots of clients. From the past year, Facebook has been a large community of billion of people. 

Simply you can join the Facebook groups according to your niche and engage with various people.

Final thoughts

In conclusion, freelance digital marketing is an exciting field where people can work independently to help businesses grow online.

Freelancers use their creative and technical skills to create effective marketing campaigns for different audiences. Businesses need a strong online presence, and freelance digital marketers play a big role in making that happen.

But freelancers also face challenges, like keeping up with changes in the digital world. Although this may be solved as they will gain more experiences and skills.

Among all the skills which one do you think to be the most important? Let me know in the comment section below. And have a nice day!