Hire a Fractional Digital Marketing Manager · Fractional Digital Marketing Jobs UK
Hire a Fractional Digital Marketing Manager · Fractional Digital Marketing Jobs UK
Hire a fractional digital marketing manager to own search, paid media, email, CRM and analytics for the days a week the work needs — senior hands on the channels without a full-time salary. Browse live fractional digital marketing jobs across the UK, or brief us to hire yours.
How a brief runswhat we undertake
- 01Brief30-MINUTE SCOPING CALLDay 0
- 02Shortlist of 3–5VETTED · RATE BENCHMARK · IR35After the brief
- 03InterviewsYOU MEET THE SHORTLISTYour diary
- 04Scoped startFIRST-MONTH OUTCOMES AGREEDYou set the date
- 05Fractional, interim and permanentIR35 POSITION SET OUTOn every brief
Shortlist3–5
15 minutes · video or phone
Book 15 minutes to hire a fractional digital marketing manager
Tell us the scope and the days a week. We come back with Digital Marketing Manager candidates, their day rates and availability.
- 0115 minutes, video or phone
- 02We scope the role and the days a week
- 03A shortlist of 3–5 after the call
- 04Fractional, interim and permanent briefs
Pick a day that suits · live availability
Live roles · last 3 months
Live Digital marketing jobs
- FractionalSyndicated
Fractional Digital Marketing Manager
Biscuiteers · Wimbledon
est £550/day3 d/wk - FractionalSyndicated
Fractional Marketing Manager
Great State · Bristol
Rate n/a2 d/wk - FractionalSyndicated
Commercial Marketing Manager (Fractional)
aqueris (formerly NovNat Tech) · Brierley Hill
£481–£625/day3 d/wk
Current fractional digital marketing opportunities
Fractional recruitment works differently from a permanent search — shorter, scoped by days a week, and priced on the engagement. Send a Digital Marketing Manager brief and we come back with a shortlist of three to five vetted candidates.
01/ the role
Hire a Fractional Digital Marketing Manager — what the role is
A fractional digital marketing manager runs a company's digital channels — organic and paid search, paid social, email and CRM, the website and the analytics behind them — for a set number of days a week rather than as a full-time employee. Companies hire a fractional digital marketing manager when the channels need senior, hands-on ownership but not five days of it, or when agency spend has outgrown anyone's ability to judge it.
The role sits below the marketing leader and above the specialists. A fractional CMO or fractional marketing director sets positioning, budget and the plan; the digital marketing manager turns that plan into campaigns, briefs and measures the agencies and freelancers, and reports what the spend returned. In a smaller business with no marketing leader, the same person often covers both.
The case for owning digital properly keeps growing. ONS retail data put internet sales at 27.4% of total retail sales in Great Britain in 2025, against 19.2% in 2019 (ONS).
How to hire a Digital Marketing Manager on a fractional basis
To hire a Digital Marketing Manager for part of the week, write down which channels they will own, the monthly media and agency budget they will control, the tools they must already know, and the number of days. Then brief us: a shortlist of 3–5 candidates, each with day rate, availability and IR35 position set out.
02/ scope
What fractional digital marketing jobs involve
Channel ownership: search, paid media, email and CRM
Fractional digital marketing jobs are hands-on. Expect to run paid search and paid social accounts, or the agencies that do; own organic search and content performance; and manage email and CRM programmes end to end — segmentation, automation, deliverability and reporting. Google's own SEO Starter Guide is a fair baseline for what a manager should be able to explain to a board without jargon.
Measurement and consent
Analytics set-up, conversion tracking and attribution sit with the role, and so does the consent that makes tracking lawful. Under PECR, non-essential cookies need consent that is actively and clearly given — see the ICO's guidance on cookies and similar technologies.
Agencies, freelancers and budget
Most fractional digital marketing managers direct other people: writing briefs, setting targets, checking invoices against results, and deciding when a channel should come in-house. Qualifications show breadth — the IDM Professional Diploma in Digital Marketing is aimed at digital and marketing managers — but results at a business like yours matter more.
03/ comparison
Digital marketing manager vs head of digital — which seat to brief
Permanent salary medians are from Robert Half's 2026 UK salary guide; the other rows are general guidance.
04/ timing
When to hire a fractional digital marketing manager
Three situations where part-week digital ownership tends to fit.
Scenario 01
Agency spend that no one owns
Several agencies bill every month and no one in-house can judge the work. A fractional manager sets targets, reads the reports and decides what stays.
Scenario 02
Tracking you cannot trust
Conversions do not reconcile, the consent banner was bolted on and every report is argued over. The first job is measurement, before any more spend.
Scenario 03
Before the first full-time hire
You know digital needs an owner but not what the permanent job looks like. A few months part-week shows the real workload and the skills it needs.
05/ vetting
How we vet fractional digital marketing managers
What we undertake on every brief, before a candidate reaches you.
- 01
Qualification screen
Verify Digital Marketing Manager tenure, sector context and stage fit.
SOURCING - 02
Mandate fit
Match to your situation — stage, board dynamics, timing.
MATCHING - 03
Reference deep-dive
We take references ourselves, from recent past clients — real outcomes, not titles.
VERIFY - 04
Shortlist
Three to five candidates with day rate, availability and IR35 position set out.
SHORTLIST OF 3–5
06/ the director seat
Fractional digital marketing director — when the brief needs more than a manager
A fractional digital marketing director owns digital as a function rather than running its channels day to day. The director sets the digital strategy and the budget split between channels, decides what to scale and what to cut, hires and manages the team and the agencies, and reports digital performance to the board. A manager executes that plan; a director writes it and answers for it.
Choose the director seat when digital is most of your marketing — an e-commerce or subscription business, say — and no one is senior enough to decide between channels. Choose the manager seat when a marketing leader already sets direction and the gap is hands-on ownership. If the brief is wider than digital (brand, product marketing, pricing, sales alignment), you want a fractional marketing director or a fractional CMO instead.
No authoritative source publishes a UK fractional day rate for either seat, so we don't quote one. For the permanent comparison, Robert Half's 2026 marketing salary guide puts the Head of Digital median at £85,500 and the Digital Marketing Manager median at £51,500. Whichever seat you brief, test candidates on the budgets they controlled and the results they were accountable for.
07/ head of digital
Fractional head of digital — channels, data and compliance in one seat
A fractional head of digital is the title many businesses give their senior digital owner: broader than a channel manager, usually covering the website, e-commerce or lead generation, marketing technology and data as well as paid and organic media. Some candidates sell the same work as a fractional digital marketing consultant. The label matters less than the remit — a consultant advises, a head of digital is accountable for delivery — so write down which one you are buying.
The seat carries compliance too. Email and text campaigns must follow the ICO's direct marketing and PECR guidance on consent. Ads and promotional claims fall under the CAP Code that the ASA enforces, and the ASA's influencers' guide sets out how paid content must be labelled. Ask candidates how they have handled each.
Where the remit spans product, technology and operations as well as marketing, the role is closer to a fractional chief digital officer. Where it centres on experiments and acquisition, look at a fractional head of growth.
08/ questions
Fractional digital marketing FAQ
The questions people ask before bringing in a fractional digital marketing manager.
Book 15 minutes · shortlist of 3–5
Bring the brief. We architect the team.
A shortlist of 3–5 with day rate, availability and IR35 position set out, after five-stage vetting.
