What does a digital marketing consultant do?

A digital marketing consultant assesses your current channels, identifies what's working and what isn't, and builds a strategy to improve results across SEO, paid media, email, and social. Unlike an agency, a consultant works directly with your team and is accountable for the strategy, not just the execution.

How much does a digital marketing consultant charge in Australia?

Digital marketing consulting in Australia typically ranges from $150–300/hour or $2,000–5,000/month for ongoing engagements. The right investment depends on the scope of channels, your team's existing capability, and how hands-on the consultant needs to be.

Do I need a digital marketing consultant or an agency?

A consultant is better suited to businesses that want senior strategic direction and accountability without large agency overheads. Agencies suit businesses that need a full team executing across multiple channels simultaneously. Many businesses start with a consultant to build the strategy, then bring in execution support.

What's the difference between a digital marketing consultant and a digital marketing manager?

A digital marketing manager is typically an employee focused on day-to-day execution within one business. A consultant brings broader cross-industry experience, works across strategy and execution, and can be engaged flexibly without the overhead of a full-time hire.

The Full Enchilada Fractional Marketing Direction

Your digital marketing consultant, in your corner.

Your fractional marketing director - a senior marketing partner embedded in your business without the full-time hire. Think of it as a fractional CMO for Australian businesses, but without the retainer traps. Strategy, planning, training, and daily support across your entire marketing.

$3,000 + GST / month

Flat monthly fee. Starts with a Discovery Month. No lock-in.

Let's talk → How it works

Josh

Teddi

Hilda

Your monthly plan

Strategy sessionMonthly
Channel reviewsWeekly
Slack supportDaily
On-call adviceAlways-on
Strategy refreshQuarterly

Your full marketing team - humans plus AI.

Over 1,000

Teams trained

10 years

In business

$Millions

In ad spend overseen

★★★★★

Rated on Google

For businesses who want someone to guide them through everything

Here's what working with us actually looks like.

No mystery, and no vague retainer. You start with a Discovery Month to get the strategy right - then settle into a simple quarterly rhythm of planning, doing and optimising, with us in your corner the whole way.

Discovery Month · Month 1

A game plan, built around your business.

One month to get under the skin of your business and build the strategy everything else runs on - custom to you, never off a template.

You
start
here

BriefingYour goals, market, numbers and what's worked so far.

Alignment sessionPriorities, budget and what success looks like for you.

AuditEvery active channel - what performs, what leaks budget.

The Strategy 1-1 session Your foundation - and the engine that drives every quarter and the yearly reset.

Short, medium & long-termA staged roadmap - what to do now, next and later.

Channel prioritisationExactly where to focus your effort, and in what order.

Funnel structureHow it all connects - from first touch through to sale.

Then the fun part kicks in - it's on repeat. Every quarter, building on the last.

The Quarterly Program · Every quarter

Always know exactly what to do next.

A simple, repeating loop that turns the strategy into action - and keeps making it sharper, quarter after quarter.

↻ One lap = one quarter

Month 1 · Plan

Plan the quarter

High The highest-impact moves - we start here.
Medium Important work, scheduled across the quarter.
Low Nice-to-haves we pick up when there's room.

Months 2 & 3 · Do

Deliver, report & optimise

Performance & optimisation reporting
Guidance & training through delivery
Continuous tweaks as the results land

…then straight into the next quarter - smarter every lap.

Yearly Strategy Refresh · Every 12 months

Stay a step ahead, every year.

Once a year we zoom right out, rebuild the strategy from scratch and reset the direction - so each new year of quarters is built on fresh thinking, not last year's plan.

Always included

Your always-on toolkit.

The engine room behind the work - the systems, guides and AI that keep everything running between sessions. Set up for you, and yours for as long as we're working together.

Hilda AI

Your 15cm CEO who never sleeps - monitoring your campaigns and doing the heavy lifting around the clock.

Chat to your dataAutopilotAgent infrastructure ↗

Dashboard

All of your marketing data in one simple-to-navigate location.

Toolkits

Clear 1-2 page written guides on how to run each channel yourself.

ROI Tracking

Transparent ROI tracking through a hosted third-party platform.

Ongoing email support And we're only an email away, the whole way through.

What you get

Everything included in your corner.

This isn't a retainer where we send you a report and disappear. You get a marketing department's worth of brain, experience and AI - without any of the overhead.

Strategic planning

Monthly strategy sessions, quarterly deep-dives, annual planning - so you're always three steps ahead.

Hands-on implementation

We don't just plan - we help execute across your channels so the strategy actually lands.

Team training

Your team gets trained in the channels we work on together - so the knowledge stays in-house.

Hilda AI access

Automated reports, anomaly alerts, always-on support - your tireless teammate in the background.

Reporting & analytics

Monthly performance reports tailored to your business goals - no vanity metrics, just what matters.

Priority access

Direct line to Josh and Teddi. Response within 24 hours - often much faster.

Meet your AI sidekick

Hilda AI - your 15cm CEO who never sleeps.

Look, I'm not going to sugarcoat it. I'm a hedgehog. I'm 15 centimetres tall. But I will outwork every marketing manager you've ever hired. I monitor your campaigns 24/7, flag problems before they cost you money, and handle the stuff that would take your team hours. You're welcome.

Automated monthly and weekly reporting across all channels
Anomaly detection - I'll ping you when something looks off before it becomes expensive
Campaign management and optimisation recommendations
Creative briefs, content drafts, and ad copy when you need them
Data analysis that would take a human three days, done in three minutes

You know what, why don't you say hi?
Ask Hilda what she can do - she'll give you a live taste.

Is this for you?

Who this is for.

This product isn't for everyone - and that's by design. It's built for businesses that want the smarts of a senior marketing leader without the $150K salary.

Businesses that want marketing leadership without the full-time hire. You need strategic direction, not just someone pressing buttons. We become your outsourced marketing brain - planning, prioritising, and guiding your growth.
Companies with a marketing manager who needs strategic guidance. Your marketer is great at execution but needs a senior partner to help with direction, planning, and knowing what to focus on next. We work alongside them, not above them.
Growing businesses marketing across multiple channels. When you're running Google Ads, Meta, email, SEO, and content all at once, things fall through the cracks. We make sure nothing does - and everything works together.
Founders who are tired of doing marketing on top of everything else. You started this business to do what you love, not to learn the difference between broad match and phrase match. Hand the strategic thinking to us so you can get back to running your company.

Meet your team

The humans behind the hedgehog.

When you become a consulting client, you work directly with the people who built Hedgehog Marketing. Not juniors. Not account managers reading from a script.

Josh Berg

Founder · Head of Strategy

15+ years in digital marketing. Started his career at Google, then spent a decade in agencies before founding Hedgehog in 2016. Josh leads all strategy, quarterly planning, and client relationships. He's the one in your corner.

Teddi Russell

Head of Implementation & Training

Email marketing and data specialist. Teddi handles the implementation side - building automations, setting up tracking, creating reports, and making sure the strategy actually gets done. If Josh is the brain, Teddi is the hands.

What clients say

Words from the corner.

We don't do case studies full of vanity metrics. Here's what real clients say about working with us.

★★★★★

"Hedgehog's coaching and support has been vital in GluteGuard's growth."

Cass Green

Product Manager, GluteGuard

★★★★★

"There's so many digital marketing companies out there, but from the outset Hedgehog stood apart."

Pat Amey

Owner, Visions Fitness Centre

FAQ

Questions you probably have.

What does the Discovery Month involve?

The Discovery Month is your onboarding. We start with a marketing audit across every channel you're active on - Google Ads, Meta, SEO, email, whatever you're running. Then we build a full marketing strategy based on what we find. This gives us the foundation for all quarterly planning that follows. Audit pricing is $1,000 per channel or $2,500 for unlimited channels. Strategy is $3,500. After the Discovery Month, quarterly billing begins at $3,000 + GST.

How is this different from hiring a marketing manager?

A marketing manager costs $100K–$150K per year including super and on-costs, and they typically have expertise in one or two channels. With our Consulting service, you get senior-level strategic guidance across all channels for $12K/year, plus access to the entire Hedgehog team and Hilda AI. You get broader expertise, lower cost, and no recruitment headaches. The trade-off is we're not sitting in your office full-time - but for most businesses, that's not what they actually need.

Can I add training channels later?

Absolutely. If you want to launch on a new channel - say you're doing Google Ads and SEO but want to add Meta Ads or email marketing - we'll scope a training program for that channel and add it to your quarterly plan. The training cost is separate from your consulting retainer, but the strategic guidance for the new channel is included from day one.

What does daily support actually look like?

It means you can reach us via Slack, email, or a quick call whenever you need us during business hours. Got a question about whether to increase your Google Ads budget? Want a second opinion on an email subject line? Need help interpreting a sudden traffic drop? That's what daily support is for. It's not unlimited agency hours - it's having a senior marketing brain on speed dial for the decisions that matter.

Ready?

Let's talk.

Book a 30-minute intro call with Josh. No pitch decks, no pressure. Just a conversation about whether Consulting is the right fit for your business.

Book your intro call Send a message