Free Portfolio kit · Indian School of Skills
Digital Marketing Portfolio Kit
Recruiters hiring junior marketers want evidence that you can plan, execute and measure, not just a list of certificates. You can create that evidence without an agency job: run small real projects, document them honestly, and show what you learned from the numbers.
1. Six practice projects
Project 1 — SEO audit and content plan
What to do: pick a small local business site (or a friend's). Audit technical basics (indexing, page speed, mobile, titles/meta, internal links), do keyword research, and write a 3-month content plan with 6–8 target topics.
Show: audit findings ranked by impact, a keyword map (topic → keyword → intent → page), and one optimised page draft.
Project 2 — Paid search campaign plan (and a small live test if possible)
What to do: build a Google Ads search campaign structure for a local service: campaigns, ad groups, keywords with match types, negative keywords, 3 ad variations, and a budget and bidding plan.
Show: the account structure, ad copy, landing-page recommendations and how you'd judge success (CPC, CTR, conversion rate, cost per lead). If you ran a small live test, report real numbers only.
Project 3 — Meta (Facebook/Instagram) ads creative test
What to do: for a real or mock brand, define audiences, plan a creative test (e.g. 3 hooks × 2 formats), and set up tracking. With a small budget, run it for a week.
Show: the hypothesis, creatives, targeting, results table and what you'd scale or kill.
Project 4 — Email welcome sequence
What to do: write a 4–5 email welcome or nurture sequence for a course, D2C brand or newsletter; build it in an email tool with segmentation and a clear goal per email.
Show: the sequence map, subject-line variants, the metric for each email (open, click, reply, purchase) and an A/B test plan.
Project 5 — Content and social growth experiment
What to do: run a 30-day LinkedIn or Instagram content experiment on a topic you know. Plan pillars, post consistently, and change one variable at a time (format, hook, posting time).
Show: the content calendar, top and bottom posts with reasons, and follower/engagement trends. Small numbers are fine if the thinking is clear.
Project 6 — Analytics and reporting dashboard
What to do: use the Google Merchandise Store GA4 demo account (Google's public demo property) or your own site's data. Build a Looker Studio dashboard for traffic sources, conversions and landing pages.
Show: the dashboard, three insights and the recommendation each one leads to. Explain UTM tagging and how you'd attribute conversions.
2. One-page case-study template
- Context: brand/business, audience, and your role (solo, team, real client or practice).
- Goal: one primary metric and a target (e.g. "get 30 leads at under ₹X each" — use your real target).
- Strategy: channels chosen and why; what you deliberately didn't do.
- Execution: key assets (ads, pages, emails, posts) with screenshots.
- Results: a small table of actual numbers with the date range. Say clearly if the budget was tiny.
- What I learned / would do next: the most useful part for interviewers.
Honesty matters: never inflate results or present a practice project as a paid client engagement. Interviewers will ask follow-up questions.
3. Metrics you should be able to explain
- CTR = clicks ÷ impressions. CPC = spend ÷ clicks. CPM = spend ÷ impressions × 1,000.
- Conversion rate = conversions ÷ clicks (or sessions — say which).
- CPL / CPA = spend ÷ leads (or acquisitions).
- ROAS = revenue from ads ÷ ad spend.
- CAC = total sales and marketing cost ÷ new customers; compare with customer lifetime value (LTV).
- Bounce/engagement rate in GA4: GA4 reports engagement rate; bounce rate is its inverse.
4. Interview questions freshers get asked
- What is the difference between SEO and SEM / performance marketing?
- How does Google decide where a page ranks? Name on-page, off-page and technical factors.
- What are keyword match types in Google Ads?
- What is Quality Score and how can you improve it?
- How would you spend ₹50,000 to generate leads for a local coaching institute?
- Our cost per lead doubled this month. How would you investigate?
- What is a funnel? Give an example of top, middle and bottom-of-funnel content.
- What is retargeting, and what are its privacy limits?
- What are UTM parameters and why do they matter?
- Explain the difference between ROAS and ROI.
- How would you decide between Meta ads and Google Search ads for a new product?
- What makes a good landing page?
- Walk me through a campaign you ran. What would you change?
- Which marketing campaign did you admire recently and why?
- How do you stay updated on platform changes?
Want structured feedback on this?
The ISS Marketing & Growth program is a live online cohort where mentors critique the projects you build. Talk to an advisor to see whether it fits your goals, or explore the curriculum first.