You know what's one of the hardest things about becoming an online marketer?

You really don't know where to start.

Like formal education, there's no sequential and well-defined learning path.

Which is why most of the successful marketers became experts through trial and error.

But this approach doesn't work for everyone.

In fact, one of the reasons why people give up on internet Marketing is because they're never really sure if they know enough.

Thankfully, Google, Facebook, HubSpot, and several other leading online companies decided to do something about this.

They've put together digital marketing courses of the highest quality that anyone, even a complete newbie, can take for FREE.

Yup! you need to pay NOTHING.

They're designed for complete newbies and take them to different levels of expertise in online marketing methodologies like content marketing, eCommerce, copywriting, social media, email marketing etc.

Many of them even certify you on course completion.

Now imagine "Google Certified" or "Certified by Facebook" written with your name.

Quite a credibility boost, isn't it?

Will these courses make you an expert?

Most of them won't.

But they'll give you a solid understanding of the core internet marketing concepts with a bird's eye view and prepare you for more advanced marketing techniques and strategies that you can apply to your niche marketing business.

They won't teach you step-by-step niche marketing techniques or give you marketing tools like NicheHacks Insiders, but they'll still give you an overall understanding of all the major online marketing concepts.

Let me describe each course for you.

1. Google Digital Garage

• Target Audience: Newbies and Intermediate marketers
• Course Instructors: Multiple Google marketing experts
• Course Format: Videos, workbooks, practical activities, and additional reading material
• Certification: Yes

If you don't do any other course in this list, just do this one.

Seriously, Google Digital Garage Certification course is a goldmine for newbies.

It starts with the very basics of online marketing and gradually takes you to more advanced topics like SEO, advertising and retargeting.

Source: Google Digital Garage

The course contains 26 "Badges" which are essentially 26 different modules with 106 short video lessons.

It covers all aspects of digital marketing and teaches you how to market any product or service using different online marketing tools.

Source: Google Digital Garage

Trust me, it's a lot of content.

Each topic has anywhere between 2 to 7 short video lessons that make it easy to digest the information

To help you practice what you learn, all topics come with their own set of practical exercises and quizzes.

Source: Google Digital Garage

If you've been into online marketing for some time, the starting lessons might look a bit too basic to you.

You can choose to skip them and go to the more advanced lessons.

But I'd still recommend taking the whole course in its defined sequence because it shares some really good case studies and examples with every lesson.

At the end of every topic, you'll need to pass a short multiple-choice exam to earn the badge for that topic.

And once you've earned all the 26 badges, you can attempt the final certification exam to earn the right to call yourself a Google certified digital marketer.

• Google Academy for Ads

Google Academy for Ads is a platform where you can learn everything about Google's most popular tools and services like YouTube, Google Analytics and Google Ads (previously Adwords) and earn certifications by completing the coursework and passing the exam for each course.

Source: Google Academy for Ads

Google has moved all its certification courses and learning programs related to marketing advertising and sales to the Ads Academy.

Every course takes you from the very basics of the topic to the most advanced levels

And here's the best part

All courses and certifications are absolutely free (which was not the case a few years ago)

But not all of them are meant for marketers.

So I've shortlisted the ones that you should worry about.

• Google Ads Certification Course
• Google Analytics Individual Certification
• YouTube Certification Course
• Digital Sales Certification Course

Let's have a quick look at each of them.

2. Google Ads Certification Course

• Target Audience: Intermediate marketers
• Course Instructors: Multiple Google marketing experts
• Course Format: Videos, workbooks, practical activities, and additional reading material
• Certification: Yes

Google Ads Certification (previously Google Adwords) is one of Google's most popular and in-demand certification courses. If you're looking to enhance your knowledge of paid advertising, audience targeting, and retargeting, this course is for you.

It can be accessed in Google's Academy for Ads.

In case you didn't know, Google Ads is Google's advertising platform that anyone can use to market their product and services by using different kinds of ads (search, display, mobile, video etc.)

The famous"Google Keyword Planner (GKP)", which most marketers use for keyword research, is a part of Google Ads platform and is primarily used for targeting keywords for advertising.

Google's Academy for Ads offers separate courses for each advertising type.

• Google Ads Fundamentals (mandatory)
• Google Ads Display Certification
• Google Ads Search Certification
• Google Ads Mobile Certification
• Google Ads Video Certification
• Google Ads Shopping Certification

To become certified, you'll need to pass the Google Ads Fundamentals exam plus any other certification of your choice from this list.

Which means, if you want to earn Google Ads Search Certification, you'll first need to pass the Google Ads Fundamentals exam.

The same applies to all other certifications in this list.

Once you complete a certification, you'll get a nice presentable certificate that you can add to your LinkedIn profile or resume.

Source: Google Academy for Ads

Should you really bother about this course?

I definitely think you should.

Earning a Google Ads certification will open up new opportunities for you, help you promote your business, and get high paying freelance advertising clients.

But even if you're not interested in the certification, the knowledge shared in this course will help you IMMENSELY and show you ways you can double or triple your sales by using targeted and optimized ads.

Remember, most of the top marketers use paid advertising and don't rely solely on SEO for traffic and lead generation.

3. Google Analytics Individual Qualification Course

• Target Audience: Intermediate-Advanced Marketers
• Course Instructors: Justin Cutroni and Krista Seiden
• Course Format: Videos, workbooks, practical activities, and additional reading material
• Certification: Yes

Anyone who has a website usually has a Google Analytics account as well.

It's the world's most widely used web analytics application.

But did you know there's a LOT you can do with Google Analytics beyond the standard reporting on Pageviews, Bounce Rate, and Top Content?

When I took this course a few months ago, I was literally blown away by the power of Google Analytics

There's SO MUCH you can do with it.

If you use to its potential, it will not only become your number one audience research tool but also give you data from so many different angles that you'll be able to make much more informed and data-backed marketing decisions.

Source: Google Academy for Ads

Google Analytics Individual Qualification course is comprised of two parts.

• Google Analytics for Beginners
• Advanced Google Analytics

You'll get certificates of acknowledgment for just completing the two parts.

But to become Google Analytics Qualified, you need to complete both the parts AND pass the comprehensive certification exam.

Here's the prize waiting for you.

Even if you complete the first part "Google Analytics for Beginners" you'll have more practical knowledge of the tool than most people.

The course is really well designed and delivered by a couple of analytics advocates at Google, Justin and Krista.

Both the courses are divided into several modules that are further broken down into 5-10 min lessons.

Plus, you can access additional resources like hour-long Q&A sessions with Krista that she recorded to respond to the most common user questions.

Overall, the course will add a LOT of value to your skill set and enable you to look at web analytics in a completely different way from the past.

4. YouTube Certification Course

• Target Audience: Newbies-Intermediate marketers
• Course Format: Text content, supporting videos, additional reading material, exercises
• Certification: Yes

If you've ever wondered how to successfully start, grow, and monetize a YouTube channel, this course is for you.

Google Academy for Ads actually has 4 YouTube certification courses.

• YouTube Channel Growth
• YouTube Creative Essentials
• YouTube Asset Monetization
• YouTube Content Ownership

Source: YouTube Certified

However, only the first two are about growing a YouTube channel and creating the right content. The other two are focused on legal matters, such as content rights, and technical matters like reporting and analytics.

Unlike the courses on Google Ads and Analytics, the YouTube certification course mostly has text content with occasional video lessons.

However, the additional reading material and quizzes make it a comprehensive course for anyone looking to enhance their understanding of YouTube.

Once you complete a course, you'll need to pass the certification exam and score at least 75% to become a YouTube Certified professional.

5. Digital Sales Certification Course

• Target Audience: Newbies-Intermediate marketers
• Course Format: Text content, supporting videos, additional reading material, exercises
• Certification: Yes

This is a pretty unique course from Google.

Its main purpose is to help digital marketers sell advertising services more confidently, which might not sound relevant to you as an affiliate or niche marketer.

However, this course offers a LOT more

It covers some of the key sales and marketing principles that any marketer should keep in mind while selling their products or services.

Doing this course would definitely improve your communication skills, teach you to think from the customer's perspective, and give you a much better understanding of how to position your product or services for maximum impact.

Instead of plain text articles, the course is comprised of interactive quizzes, videos and a lot of additional reading material.

Lessons are broken down into small and easily digestible chunks presented in slides with illustrations, images, and diagrams.

Here's an example.

Source: Google Ads Academy

I personally found this a very useful course and would recommend anyone involved in online selling to enroll in it.

That's all as far as the courses on Google Ads Academy are concerned.

All of these courses offer great value and award you globally recognized certifications.

If you're just starting your journey as an online marketer, this is the best place to start learning.

Let's have a look at some of the other free courses on the web.

6. Facebook Blueprint

• Target Audience: Newbie to Advanced marketers
• Course Format: Text content, supporting videos, additional reading material, exercises
• Certification: Yes

You must've seen marketers brag about their Facebook marketing skills and how they treat Facebook as an ATM machine where they simply run a Facebook ad campaign and start making money with product sales.

Well, you can start doing the same in just a few weeks with Facebook Blueprint.

Facebook Blueprint is THE most comprehensive collection of Facebook advertising and marketing courses on the web created by Facebook itself.

It's a complete academy of Facebook courses where you can learn everything starting from the most basic things like creating a Facebook Page to the more advanced techniques such as advertising and retargeting.

You can choose courses matching your business goals

Or choose a learning track based on your role

The courses are designed using a combination of interactive reading material, videos, and quizzes.

I especially like the frequent use of case studies and interviews of successful marketers that are included in most of the courses.

You can attend all the courses for free.

But if you want to go a step further and become a certified Facebook marketer, you'll need to pay the certification fee (which varies by certifications). You'll be awarded your unique certification number and badge once you pass the final comprehensive exams.

Source: Facebook Blueprint

In my opinion, the certifications are not that important (unless you're planning to work for an agency or offer freelance Facebook marketing services)

What's important is that you make use of this amazing resource that is available for free and learn as much about Facebook marketing as possible so that you can use that knowledge to grow your niche marketing business.

• HubSpot Training Academy

I'm a huge HubSpot fan because they've built this multi-million dollar company purely on the back of some outstanding content. Really, it's a great case study of what content marketing can do for businesses.

With HubSpot Academy, HubSpot has shared their years of experience, learnings, and experiences on one platform.

Source: HubSpot Academy

I have personally completed all of their marketing courses and can vouch not only for their value but also for their outstanding production quality.

For a free resource, HubSpot academy massively over delivers.

Here's a quick look at some of their courses relevant to online marketers.

7. Inbound Certification Course

• Target Audience: Newbies
• Course Format: Videos, additional reading material
• Course Instructor: Lindsay Thibeault
• Certification: Yes

Inbound certification is the flagship course of HubSpot Academy. Till date, over 130K marketers have successfully completed the course and passed the certification exam to become Inbound certified.

But what exactly is Inbound?

Inbound is a customer-centric marketing strategy in which the focus of all the marketing activities is on building and nurturing the relationship with your prospects, instead of bombarding them with direct sales pitches.

The whole methodology is divided into 4 stages

Source: HubSpot Academy

As a niche marketer, you should pay special attention to this course because it outlines exactly the kind of thought process you should have while selling or promoting your products.

Instead of making the most common newbie mistake of trying to sell to strangers from day 1, understand the inbound approach and focus on turning strangers into visitors, visitors into leads, leads into customers, and finally customers into promoters and word of mouth marketers of your brand.

This course will tell you exactly how to do that with over 2 hours of high-quality video lessons.

Source: HubSpot Academy

At the end of the training, you can become a certified Inbound professional by passing the certification exam.

Here's the prize waiting for you.

Source: HubSpot Academy

Once you understand the fundamentals of the inbound methodology with this course, you can apply it to other marketing forms such as content, email, and social media marketing.

8. Content Marketing Certification

• Target Audience: Newbies-Intermediate marketers
• Course Format: Videos, additional reading material
• Course Instructor: Multiple HubSpot marketing experts and guest lecturers
• Certification: Yes

This is the best training course at HubSpot Academy, in my opinion, and probably one of the most comprehensive courses on content marketing fundamentals anywhere on the web.

It covers all the important aspects of content marketing like,

• The purpose and the process of content marketing
• Becoming an effective writer
• telling great stories
• Generating content ideas
• Promoting your content
• Writing long-form content
• Creating a writing framework
• Optimizing content for maximum search and user engagement

Some of the lessons are taught by accomplished content marketers like Sujan Patel which would cost you hundreds of dollars outside HubSpot Academy

Source: HubSpot Academy

There's a complete module dedicated to SEO and internal linking strategy as well which makes this course even more valuable.

I strongly recommend watching all the lessons one by one.

But if you think you already know enough about content marketing, you can skip directly to the certification exam to become a certified content marketer.

9. Email Marketing Certification Course

• Target Audience: Newbies-Intermediate marketers
• Course Format: Videos, additional reading material
• Course Instructor: Courtney Sembler
• Certification: Yes

If you're a regular NicheHacks reader, I'm sure you know we're huge fans of email marketing.

No matter what business model you have, an engaged, vibrant, and responsive email list is one of your biggest assets.

So it's no surprise that I've included the Email Marketing Certification course in this post.

By the end of this course, you'll have a pretty good understanding of why email marketing is so important and how you can make it work for your business.

It covers almost all important email marketing topics like

• How to write subject lines for maximum engagement
• Writing email content that drives action
• Getting your emails delivered and opened
• Collecting contacts and building an email list
• Audience segmentation and advanced targeting

And several other important topics, as evident from the course curriculum

What makes this course unique is that it's designed around the inbound methodology that I previously discussed.

This means that the whole focus of the course is actually on creating campaigns tailored to the needs of your audience and building a loyal subscriber base that trusts you.

It's very different from the usual affiliate email marketing courses where the only objective is to sell products immediately and bombard subscribers with promotional messages.

The course also has an optional module which teaches you how to use HubSpot for email marketing.

10. Social Media Marketing Certification Course

• Target Audience: Newbies-Intermediate marketers
• Course Format: Videos, additional reading material
• Course Instructor: Multiple HubSpot instructors
• Certification: Yes

If you're having trouble engaging with people on social media, building meaningful relationships, and growing your followers, this course is for you.

It discusses some very important concepts like influencer marketing, outreach, audience research and social listening in a lot of detail.

Source: HubSpot Academy

Like the email marketing course, this course also applies the inbound methodology to social media marketing and shares practical advice for growing your influence with Twitter, Facebook, and other leading social networks.

So if you've been wondering how the most successful social media marketers build influence online, enroll in this course.

11. HubSpot High Impact Writing Course

• Target Audience: Newbies-Intermediate marketers
• Course Format: Videos, additional reading material
• Course Instructor: Daniel Pink
• Certification: No

As a writer, I loved watching this course.

But even if you're not a professional writer, writing is a skill you must learn to become an effective and persuasive marketer.

Because you'll need it whether you're creating landing pages, email sequences, headlines, blog posts, social media content or any other form of online marketing.

So what's exactly in this course?

It's an interview style video course where you'll get advice on pre-writing, drafting, and post writing techniques by NewYork Times best-selling author, Daniel Pink.

Source: HubSpot Academy

Daniel goes into the details of how you can

• Develop a habit of writing
• Improve your mindset
• Write clutter free copy
• Create content that makes people remember you
• Research the most authentic sources for your content
• Overcome the writer's block
• Edit your content like a pro

This course does not offer a certification, but it's still a valuable resource for anyone looking to improve their writing skills.

• SEMRush Academy

If you're an online marketer, SEMRush shouldn't be a new name for you since it's one of the most popular keyword research and SEO tools on the web.

SEMRush Academy, however, is a newcomer on the block and is still in its early days.

However, from the courses available so far, it shaping up to be another valuable learning platform.

Most of the courses on SEMRush Academy right now are focused on the tool itself.

Here are a couple of courses worth your time for now.

12. SEO Fundamentals Certification Course

• Target Audience: Newbies
• Course Format: Videos, additional reading material
• Course Instructor: Greg Gifford
• Certification: Yes

If you don't know anything about SEO and are looking for a course that'll quickly give you a basic understanding of the core SEO concepts, this course is for you.

Source: SEMRush Academy

The instructor, Greg Gifford, is well-known in the SEO industry and he does a pretty good job of explaining the fundamentals of SEO in a newbie-friendly manner.

But there's more to this course than just the basics.

It is comprised of 8 modules with 31 lessons that span over 4 hours.

Source: SEMRush Academy

Here's what each module is about

• Search engine basics
• Technical SEO
• Link Signals
• On-Page Signals
• Mobile SEO
• Other Ranking Signals
• International SEO
• Local SEO

Once you complete the course (which I recommend you should) you can attempt the certification exam which is pretty simple for anyone with basic SEO knowledge.

But hey, it makes your profile look good so there's no harm in doing it.

13. SEMRush SEO Toolkit Course

• Target Audience: Intermediate-Advanced marketers
• Course Format: Videos, case studies, additional reading material
• Course Instructor: Multiple SEMRush experts and guest lecturers
• Certification: Yes

This course teaches you how to use SEMRush for keyword research, generating new content ideas, identifying new niches, and growing your online exposure.

It's more like a tutorial of the tool.

I wouldn't have included it in this list if it wasn't for the additional guest lectures and case studies included in the course.

Source: SEMRush Academy

Every lecture in the course offers additional reading material and case studies in which experts from outside SEMRUsh share how they used the tool to achieve success for their sites.

In my opinion, these additional resources make it a pretty solid SEO course.

• Content Marketing Institute (CMI)

As the name suggests, CMI is one of the pioneer content marketing publications that has grown into a multi-million dollar training company.

Most of their courses are paid (VERY expensive) and targeted towards large organizations.

But I found a couple of free sessions that are really useful for marketers of all shapes and forms.

Here's a quick look at them.

14. Developing Audience Personas

• Target Audience: Intermediate-Advanced marketers
• Course Format: Webinar, additional reading material
• Course Instructor: Ardath Albee
• Certification: No

I talk a lot about audience personas in my posts because they help you visualize and understand your target audience better and as a result allow you to create more targeted content.

In this course, Ardath Albee, a leading B2B content marketer, will talk you through the process of creating audience personas.

Source: Content Marketing Institute

It's a short 35-40 minute webinar and not everything in it is directly applicable to most online marketers.

However, most of the advice on researching your audience, gathering information, and then structuring it into a persona is spot on.

So I'd definitely encourage you to watch it.

15. Integration of Paid, Earned and Owned Media

• Target Audience: Intermediate-Advanced marketers
• Course Format: Webinar, additional reading material
• Course Instructor: Andrew Davis
• Certification: No

This is a very interesting 40-minute webinar session that teaches you the basics of how paid, earned and owned media can be integrated to create a winning marketing strategy.

Sounds technical?

Not really.

• Paid media is any marketing activity that you pay for, for example, Ads
• Earned media is the natural coverage your site or brand earns through outreach, networking, and other unpaid promotional activities
• Owned media is the content you create on your own platforms, for example, blog

The webinar shares examples and case studies of how different brands used a combination of all three types of media to achieve their desired results.

Pretty useful information for any online marketer.

• Coursera

Coursera is a leading online education platform with full-degree programs of the highest quality from some of the world's top universities.

Most of the courses on the platform require you to pay a fee.

But I found a couple of relevant courses that you can attend for free.

To get certified, however, you'll need to pay, which is optional of course.

16. Viral Marketing and How To Craft Contagious Content

• Target Audience: Newbie-Intermediate Marketers
• Course Format: Videos, additional reading material
• Course Instructor: Jonah Berger
• Certification: No

I seriously loved this course

It's a high-quality course designed and delivered by Jonah Berger, Associate Professor at The Wharton School, which dives deep into the science of viral content and what makes content stick to people's minds.

Source: Coursera

Jonah shares some great examples of sticky content and how advertisers have been using it in different ways for years to stand out in some of the most competitive markets.

This should be on every marketer's watch list.

17. An Introduction To Neuromarketing

• Target Audience: Intermediate-Advanced Marketers
• Course Format: Videos, additional reading material
• Course Instructor: Thomas Zoëga Ramsøy
• Certification: No

Neuromarketing is a fascinating subject.

The more you learn about the more it excites you because it shows you ways to play with the minds of your audience and use their habits and tendencies to your advantage.

Both Stuart and I love this topic which is why I even wrote a detailed post about it.

This short course, presented by neuroscience expert Dr. Thomas Zoëga Ramsøy of Copenhagen Business School barely scratches the surface of this broad topic.

Source: Coursera

The course consists of a couple of books and 5 video lectures with a total watch time of around 40 minutes.

But it still has a LOT of actionable lessons that'll help you create more persuasive content and marketing campaigns, and will also change the way you perceive the actions of your audience.

18. Marketing With Ahrefs

• Target Audience: Intermediate-Advanced Marketers
• Course Format: Videos
• Course Instructor: Sam Oh
• Certification: No

Ahrefs is probably the most popular SEO, content marketing, and keyword research tool. It has every feature that an internet marketer needs.

Ahrefs Academy, however, is still a fairly new project but it has a couple of high-quality courses for marketers. One of them, "Blogging for Business", is a paid course so that's out of the scope of this article.

The other one, Marketing with Ahrefs, is available for free and has some really useful tutorials on topics that include

• Keyword research
• Making data-backed decisions in keyword research
• Link Building
• Finding new linking opportunities
• SEO Audit Techniques
• Guest Blogging Strategies
• Finding profitable content ideas

Source: Ahrefs Academy

The course goes beyond the basic SEO concepts and offers some really actionable techniques that you can start applying to your business right away.

Most of the advice is based around different Ahrefs features, but even if you're using a different tool, you can still benefit from it.

19. Constant Contact Summer Series

• Target Audience: Intermediate-Advanced Marketers
• Course Format: Webinars, worksheets
• Course Instructor: Multiple instructors
• Certification: No

Constant Contact Summer School is a series of webinars on different email marketing topics.

The sessions have been categorized under 5 broad headers

• Email Planning
• Email Design
• Email Content
• Performance Measurement
• Growing Your Email Marketing Campaigns

Source: Constant Contact

Every lesson has its own set of worksheets and quizzes to help you practice and understand it better.

It's a pretty useful email marketing course irrespective of your level of expertise.

20. Social Marketing Training With Hootsuite

• Target Audience: Newbies-Intermediate Marketers
• Course Format: Videos
• Course Instructor: Multiple instructors
• Certification: No

Hootsuite Academy has several high-quality courses on social media marketing. But unfortunately, all of them are paid courses, except for one - "Social Media Marketing Course"

It's a seriously detailed and high-quality course that covers everything from the fundamentals of social media to the more advanced topics like influencer marketing, advertising, and advocacy

Source: Hootsuite Academy

The course is divided into 6 modules, each having multiple text resources and video lectures.

At the end of the course, you also have the option to attempt Hootsuite social media certification exam by paying a fee.

21. Social Media Advertising With Buffer

• Target Audience: Intermediate-Advanced Marketers
• Course Format: Videos
• Course Instructor: Brian Peters
• Certification: No

Here's another value-packed course that you should not miss no matter what.

the Social Media Advertising course by Buffer is focused on just one thing, generating higher ROI on social media advertising campaigns.

It's a free course available on Skillshare that teaches you the ins and outs of paid social media advertising and how Buffer used it to amplify their content and generate more leads for their business app.

Source: Skillshare

The course is comprised of 10 video lectures with a total watch time of around 1 hour. It goes deep into different advertising goals, targeting types, content creation techniques for different levels of the sales funnel, and scaling your advertising campaigns.

This one should definitely be on your watch list.

22. The Unbounce Landing Page Course

• Target Audience: Intermediate-Advanced Marketers
• Course Format: Videos, additional reading material
• Course Instructor: 
• Certification: No

Landing pages are a key part of any marketing or sales campaign.

But creat