How to Become a Freelance Digital Analyst in 2024

Learn how to become a freelance Digital Analyst. Working freelance means you work for yourself rather than for another company or organization. Freelancing allows you the flexibility to set your own hours and can often be done remotely and from home. Freelance Digital Analysts find their own clients, set their own rates, work on a contract-to-contract basis, and can work either part-time or full-time. You can take classes to learn the skills necessary to become a freelance Digital Analyst or to upskill and add to your current knowledge and experience with digital marketing and data analytics. 

What is a Digital Analyst?

A Digital Analyst collects and analyzes digital marketing data to aid a business in optimizing their digital performance and sales. Digital Analysts, also sometimes called Digital Marketing Analysts, are tasked with gathering and analyzing all manner of data from an organization’s various channels across websites, social media, applications, emails, and advertisements as it relates to who uses what digital asset and how, along with information about market saturation, trends, performance, and sales. Digital Analysts must analyze and make sense of this data to write reports, create dashboards, and generate presentations that communicate vital insights about an organization’s current digital performance and effectiveness, make predictions about future outcomes, and build strategies for more effective and competitive performance.

Many companies employ full-time and part-time Digital Analysts and it is also a career that one can do as a freelancer. Whether working singularly or with other Digital Analysts, this job has a unique role in analyzing a company’s data and preparing easy-to-understand reports for stakeholders and those from other departments and will need to communicate and work well with others in marketing, sales, and finance departments. Often, Digital Analysts will need to prepare reports daily, weekly, and/or monthly to communicate key insights into the customer’s digital experience and the effectiveness of the business’s current and future digital marketing strategies. As such, Digital Analysts need to have excellent communication and presentation skills, along with their ability to analyze detailed datasets and make predictions based on this information. 

What is Digital Analyst Freelancing Like?

As a freelance Digital Analyst, you will be largely responsible for finding clients. To do this, a good first step will be setting yourself up on websites for freelancers and independent contractors, like Upwork. Sites for freelancers will often allow you to create a profile for yourself so that potential employers can learn more about you, your skills, and your rates, and these sites operate as places where you can find freelance job postings. 

As a freelancer, you will need to be upfront and explicit about the cost of your services as well as what those services will be. Many freelance Digital Analysts find work for between $25-$35 an hour and senior Digital Analysts with proven success can charge upwards of $100+ per hour for their services. You want the price you are charging to reflect your skillset and the proven outcomes you have generated for past clients. You should also state what special skills and specializations you have that might set you apart from other Digital Analysts. Are you an SEO expert? Do you have more experience with TikTok marketing campaigns than others? Make it clear what you have to offer potential clients and what kinds of work you are willing to take on. 

Networking is key for a freelance Digital Analyst. You should build up your online presence and portfolio, which will allow you to market yourself and your skills to potential clients. You should consider not only doing this through a networking-focused platform like LinkedIn but also by creating your own website or blog to help you communicate your skills to a wider public. It does not take much experience to start building relationships with potential clients and once you have completed work for one client, not only are they more likely to consider hiring you in the future but they can recommend you to others looking for similar services. 

As a freelancer, the types of jobs you will find might look different than those a Digital Analyst will perform working for a large company or organization. Freelancers will often work remotely and many work on a smaller segment of marketing or analytics for a company, for example, SEO optimization for a WordPress site, pre-launch work for a specific company’s marketing campaign, or digital advertising on Facebook and Instagram. As a Digital Analyst, you will still need to use your knowledge of data visualization and analytics to communicate key insights to your client and potentially those in other departments of a company, but you might be working on a smaller chunk of the digital marketing campaign, remotely, and need to, instead, spend more time keeping your client updated about the progress you are making and how you are working to achieve the goals and outcomes they are looking for. 

Is Digital Analyst Freelancing Right for Me?

Similar to entrepreneurs or small business owners, freelancers often want the freedom to chart their own path and create their own successes. This means that freelancers need to be self-motivated. Indeed, one of the main benefits of becoming a freelance Digital Analyst is the ability to set your own work hours and work from home. Freelancing is a good option for any self-motivated individual who wants more control over where they work and when they work. Freelancing means you can choose to work as little or as often as you would like, so, it is also a good choice if you only want to work part-time or you’re pursuing becoming a Digital Analyst in addition to another full- or part-time job. 

While greater flexibility is one of the main benefits of freelance work, this can also be a challenge for those who need a more structured work environment. If you are looking for more structure, that does not mean you should avoid freelance work. Instead, you should look for ways to bring structure to your work environment, which can include setting aside specific hours to do your digital marketing work and finding a workspace that will be conducive to productivity, like a home office, a local coffee shop, or even space at a WeWork location. 

Another challenge for a freelance Digital Analyst will be finding clients. There are many websites and digital resources to help you establish yourself as a freelancer and connect with potential clients as well as other freelancers who can also offer you a network of support. Once you start to get work as a freelancer, you can continue to build upon your successes and existing client base. Many freelancers find it rewarding to know that they created their business from scratch and were able to build these relationships and connections through their own effort and hard work. 

Steps to Become a Freelance Digital Analyst

A Digital Analyst needs to know digital marketing strategies and data analytics. A useful first step to becoming a Digital Analyst is learning more about these topics so you can figure out if this is the right career for you and plan accordingly. Most Digital Analysts have a bachelor’s degree in marketing, business, statistics, economics, or a related field along with 1-2 years of experience working on digital marketing and data analytics. Without a college or university degree, an employer will want to see more of your experience to make sure that you can handle being a Digital Analyst. You can gain experience in digital marketing by volunteering to help a friend, family member, or local small business grow its digital audience and increase its performance on different platforms online. An employer wants to see that you know about standard digital marketing strategies and that you have a track record of helping a person, business, or organization optimize their online performance. 

Use any volunteering, interning, or other experience working for a marketing firm or company as the beginning of your work portfolio. Your experience will help you to transition into freelance work and find clients who will pay for your services. This can also be the start of your networking work. Networking and building relationships with current and future clients is key. Networking can help you to find clients looking to add a Digital Analyst to their teams and it will be especially appealing if you come recommended from past clients who can speak to your abilities and work ethic. 

Once you have some experience with digital marketing, you will want to also gain experience with data analytics. A necessary-to-use service like Google Analytics is free and you can find tutorials and bootcamps dedicated to teaching how to best utilize Google Analytics. Additionally, many data visualization services used by Digital Analysts, like Tableau and Power BI, do offer free trial periods. Once you are helping businesses or individuals with their digital marketing campaigns, consider signing up for a free trial of one of these services and seeing how to integrate data analysis and visualization into your volunteer or paid digital marketing services. Being able to explain to future employers how you have experience using key programs and services will indicate to them that can do the work of a Digital Analyst even without a college degree. 

Without a college or university degree to teach you the requirements of marketing and data analytics, it can be overwhelming to teach yourself the necessary skillsets and information to become a Digital Analyst. Because of this, you should consider not only utilizing free online resources but also taking a certificate program or bootcamp from a reliable educational provider. Noble Desktop offers both a Digital Marketing Certificate and a Data Analytics Certificate, programs that are quicker and less expensive than a full four-year college or university degree program. Additionally, Noble Desktop offers many shorter skills-based bootcamps, from ones that teach the basics of marketing on different social media platforms to those that will teach you how to use Google Analytics, SEO, SQL, Tableau, and other programs and services that you will need to become a Digital Analyst. 

In addition to all the skills of a regular Digital Analyst, freelance Digital Analysts will need to learn basic business skills for running and marketing their business. It will be important to know how to create a budget, track your hours, draw up a contract, or even engage in some light web design to create your own website or run your own blog. Even freelance Digital Analysts who plan to contract consultants to help run their small business should have a basic understanding of these areas to understand what kind of outsourcing they need to support their freelance work.

Learn the Skills to Become a Digital Analyst at Noble Desktop

Noble Desktop offers a variety of certificate programs and shorter, skills-based bootcamps to get you started on the pathway to becoming a Digital Analyst. To learn comprehensive digital marketing skills over a short period of time, consider pursuing Noble’s Digital Marketing Certificate program which can be taken in person in New York City or live online. During this program, you will learn the basic tenets of digital marketing across different platforms, including all major social media platforms, blogs, and email, as well as what you need to know about search engine optimization (SEO), how to track and analyze key performance data utilizing data analytics, and how to implement paid advertising. During this program, you will receive expert one-on-one mentoring as you work on real projects to improve your digital marketing skills. 

Additionally, Noble Desktop offers a complete Data Analytics Certificate program, which can be taken part-time or full-time, either live in New York City or remotely online from any location. This comprehensive, project-based certificate program teaches how to analyze and visualize data and includes units covering Excel, SQL, Python, and Tableau. The Data Analytics Certificate is a great option for someone who either needs training on how to interpret data as a Digital Analyst or someone looking to transition into more data analysis work. Similar to the Digital Marketing Certificate, you will receive expert instruction and mentoring during this course. 

If you are looking to learn specific skill sets quickly, consider taking a bootcamp. Bootcamps are a great option for those needing to upskill or quickly learn about a more specialized topic. Consider taking any of Noble’s marketing-related bootcamps, like those offered for individual social media platforms (TikTok Marketing, Instagram Marketing, Facebook Marketing, LinkedIn Marketing, and Social Media Marketing: Blogs and Twitter) and skills such as Content Marketing, Email Marketing, and Search Engine Optimization. 

Noble also offers a bootcamp to learn the basics of three important tools you will need for data analytics as a Digital Analyst, Microsoft Excel, SQL, and Tableau, in their Data Analytics Technologies Bootcamp. If you need to learn how to utilize just one or two of these tools, you can also take a bootcamp for each individually: Excel for Data Analytics, SQL Bookcamp, and Tableau Bootcamp.