What You Need to Get Work at Home Online Jobs

Are you a stay-at-home mom or full-time worker or even a college student that is looking to find a way to work from home? Ive been a freelance writer for four years now, and I have twins also! When I landed my first online job, I knew I didnt want to do anything else. It paid me good money, and over time I picked up more gigs and am able to do this full-time! There is a lot of information about how to find online jobs or how to apply to them. I want to share my experience and help you navigate this path if you want to be a freelance writer. For me, writing is my passion, and I had no idea that you could get paid for your writing! Once I figured that out, the rest is history! My Story of Working From Home My twins were around 15 months old when I decided I need to find a way to contribute to our finances. At first, I looked locally. I made some flyers and went to houses to offer my services as an ABA therapist for children with autism. While I met some great families, the travel alone took most of my day. This meant I was away from my twins and my husband who also works from home couldnt spare the time every day to watching the twins. So, for me to work, I had to have daycare. But, daycare costs would just eat up any money I earned from ABA therapy. So, it didnt make sense for me to do that. I needed to find a way to work from home. I learned from other mom bloggers they were dabbling in online writing. They would write for other blogs or businesses and get paid. Sweet! This could work for me, I thought. Once I decided to do this, I landed my first real online job as a writer within months. I was ecstatic. My first writing project I know I could work from home if I kept landing more work. Over time I increased my rate, picked my writing niche and landed fabulous clients. Now, I help others like you get started as a freelance writer and I also started new projects like more blogs! So, if youre interested, Ill share with you how to get started. Different Types of Online Jobs You Can Do From Home When you visit job sites like Indeed you will quickly see a lot of choices for online work. Things like remote writing jobs, freelance writing jobs, online teaching jobs and more. How can you tell whether all of these are legit? Personally, I would do my due diligence in researching the companies that are hiring and even check Reddit to see if there is some chatter about certain types of online jobs. Since Im a freelance writer, I rely on the job boards that I trust as well as connecting with the business. You might see the income potential for some of these jobs, but make sure to check the reviews for these companies. So transcription work may turn out to be a low paying online job, but if its flexible and you can do this with having a little one running around, its something to consider. Do you enjoy texting? Maybe you can do chat support for businesses. Customer service is a huge online job industry, and you can decide to pick up this micro job while your baby naps. While you cant make a living off of this, it is a quick win and a flexible idea if that is what you want. By far, the most popular online job is teaching and tutoring. Later well explore this gig to see if this is what you want! Where To Look for Online Jobs Traditional job sites are where youll find online jobs. Here are the most popular: Indeed The most popular job site for anyone interested in finding online work or work in general Glassdoor has freelance writing jobs, online jobs, remote jobs, freelance jobs and more. Career Builder This is also a huge job board to find online work LinkedIn LinkedIn is a professional social site, but it is also a job site. You can search companies you are interested in working for, and you can also find certain people to cold pitch to. As well, LinkedIn has its own job board. Monster Another popular and one of the first online job sites available. You can view listings, post your resume and find out about companies to help you figure out which online job would be a good fit Many of these job sites are different than the freelance writing job boards I visited when I first started. If you are interested in strictly content writing or online writing, try checking out these job boards. These sites curate writing jobs from all over and many are good quality, good paying, and can lead you to the path of making a living as a writer. Problogger This is the most popular job site for online writers. Every day there are more content jobs in all types of niches. From pet writing to SEO writing to lifestyle writing and more, you can find an online job easily. Freelance Writing This job board curates writing jobs from several other job sites. I find this cuts my time in half when I can just go to one job board to find several freelance writing jobs. All Freelance Writing What I like about this job site is that the owner tells you if the online job is low pay, semi-pro, or pro. This can help you gauge the quality and pay of the writing gig. Contena This is a job board with high-paying writing jobs. I find this job site to have the best quality gigs and I can choose my niche and rate to find the exact jobs I want. Online Teaching Jobs Okay, so maybe you want to explore online teaching jobs. Online teaching jobs require you to have teaching experience and certification. For example, many online jobs require: TESOL, TEFL, CELTA, ESL certification BA or AA degree You to speak a different language (only teaching jobs) You to work certain hours at night Tech equipment like a webcam, a computer, and headset If you find some online teaching jobs that dont require certification I would be cautious. Make sure to read the reviews if available. Many reviews will let you know that to receive the pay thats advertised you have to work long hours. For example, this online teaching job ticks all the boxes as a good gig to apply to. So, if youre a teacher make sure the online job is legit. Online Tutoring Jobs Another popular online job is tutoring. Again, its important to have teaching certifications or at least a university degree. These types of online jobs are primarily tutoring younger children or high school children. Many of these jobs are tutoring international students. This can open the doors to understanding cultural differences or learn how to provide tutoring using an online platform. This, in turn, can help you as a tutor. Many of these tutoring jobs: Supply you with the curriculum to tutor Supply the resources for your lessons Supply the training What If Youre a College Student? Many of the jobs mentioned are great online jobs for college students. Since many of these jobs are flexible or have unconventional work times, this fits a college students schedule great. And for many high school and college students, tutoring is a natural fit. However, many of these online jobs require certification, and if you dont have that, you may want to find other jobs that dont specify this requirement. But, as I mentioned previously, be cautious of those types of online jobs. Personally, if you opt for freelance writing, you dont need any experience. You can get started without a degree or without having online work. For example, for this freelance writing job as an automotive writer, the only big requirement is that they want a US-based writer. Requirements for a freelance writing job So as a college student, you can still land some great online jobs, but maybe a content writing job might be a better fit overall. Best Online Job I think the best online job is freelance writing! Its a sustainable way to make money. And, if you land some great clients you can make a living off of this. A lot of my students found great success early on. But, to be a freelance writer, you need a presence online. While finding online jobs dont require you to have a website or social media profiles, a freelance writer does. Why? Because to make this a viable option to work from home indefinitely, you need an online presence. Its much easier to create a writer website and have the writing jobs come to you! Leads in my inbox So, thats why Im a tad biased on freelance writing. 🙂 What You Need to Get Started For jobs you can do from home, many require education, experience and time commitment to get started. While they promote a flexible work option, to me, this isnt freedom. As a freelance writer, I can pick and choose my writing jobs. I can do this month after month, year after year and flex my writing muscles. Teachers and college students can be freelance writers. If you love writing and love researching, you can be a freelance writer. Make sure you have a business PayPal account before you begin looking for any online job. To get started, here are the basics: 1. A Website To make this a real thing its best to have a website that shows potential clients you are a legit writer. Here is my writer website: My writer website Innovative Ink My website speaks to my ideal client native digital brands. If a digital brand is seeking an online writer and happens to find my website, my copy shows them that I can be the writer for them. If you need help starting your website, check out my simple tutorial. 2. A Writing Niche Ideally, having a freelance writing niche can help you find work quickly. Definitively knowing that you want to be a pet writer or a food writer or a parenting writer makes it easier to find the right type of online job you want, right? How do you find your niche? I would look at your hobbies, your previous work experience or your passions and find some topics you might be interested in writing about. Next, search on Google or on job boards, your topic to see if its a viable option. For example, a lot of my subscribers mention the arts is a topic they want to write about. Since my niche is small business, you can try to find art exhibitions or companies that supply the paint or art supplies to see if they have an online presence, a blog or a newsletter. Or, you can write for magazines. This one Visual Arts News offers up to $150 per article. 3. Samples Look Youre not going to land an online job or remote writing job with no proof. While you dont need experience to be a freelance writer, you do need proof you can write for an online audience. Writing a blog post for your client is completely different than writing a blog post on your personal blog. The blog posts on my blog Elna Cain are written as close to how I would write for my clients. The biggest difference is that my client pieces wouldnt have I or a lot of my personal background story in them. Instead, I would use facts and statistics in my writing. If you need help with creating samples, make sure to check out this post on two unique ways you can quickly create samples. Can I use fiction writing? Many writers have short stories or books that theyve written. You might be wondering if you can use these pieces of content for landing an online writing job. Personally, I work with small businesses providing business type content. So, I know for my ideal client, they wouldnt hire you if you provided a fictional story. If you decide to be a ghostwriter for authors or businesses that want a ghostwriter for their book, then maybe showing your stories would help seal the deal. Can I use writing from my current job? Do you do some writing for your current job? Maybe you create reports or instructional manuals for your job. You might be able to use these types of samples if your freelance writing niche is more tech-based writing. I would also get approval from your current job asking if you can use those as samples. 4. A Social Media Presence Yes Another thing you need to start online writing is a social media presence. Again, you want to make writing a sustainable way to live, and to do this, you need to be everywhere online. Simply having a Twitter profile and a LinkedIn profile is sufficient, though. 5. Know Where to Find Writing Jobs I mentioned some job boards for freelance writers in this post. This is a great start. For more ideas, check out this post on 20 different ways to find a freelance writing job. It is filled with the best, most up-to-date information regarding how to find a freelance job easily. You can also check out my free course. I show you the correct steps and give you tips and resources for finding your first client. Get My Free Course on Getting Paid to Write Online Online Jobs So You Can Work From Home Whether you apply to online jobs, or you pitch a freelance writing job, the goal is the same to be able to work from home for good. I started this journey over four years ago, and I was able to take care of my twin toddlers during the day and work at night. My twins are in school now, and Im doing this full-time. Im sure youve been looking on the internet for jobs and have come across countless ways you can make money online. These online teaching and tutoring jobs can be a good fit, but they may not be sustainable over time. Instead, why not try freelance writing? You dont need a degree or experience 🙂 Over to you tell me your experience with online jobs and freelance writing jobs.