JOB SPECIAL ........9 online jobs that you can do from home

9 online jobs that you can do from home





If you don't want to take up a standard office job, there are plenty of alternative ways to earn.

Whether you're looking for a respite from your 9 to 5, are unable to commute to work, are a stay-at-home parent, or have some other constraint that prevents you from finding a full-time job, there's no need to waste your earning potential. There are plenty of opportunities available online that let you work from home. Here are a few options you can consider.

1 VIRTUAL ASSISTANTSHIP

Entrepreneurs, professionals and small teams often need assistance with various administrative tasks. These could include scheduling meetings, getting in touch with clients and investors, following up on orders, creating business documents like PowerPoint presentations and Excel sheets, managing blogs and websites, etc. Virtual assistants (VAs) work remotely with such clients, managing the aspects of their business or practice that they are too busy to handle themselves. Becoming a VA can entail some degree of training or briefing, depending on your qualifications. However, if you have good communication skills and are capable of using applications like MS Office, you can just sign up on sites such as Elance.com and Zirtual.com and start looking for work as a VA.

POTENTIAL EARNINGS

Rs 500Rs4,000 per hour.

2 TRANSLATING

If you are bilingual or trilingual, this might be the opportunity for you. While being fluent in English and one or two Indian languages might serve you well enough, taking a language course can add significantly to your earning potential. Plenty of international businesses, scholars and authors would be willing to enlist your services for their translation needs if you can prove your proficiency.To start earning, enlist on a popular freelancing site like Fiverr.com or Upwork.com, listing the languages you are proficient in.

POTENTIAL EARNINGS

Rs 1- Rs 5 per word. It can go up to Rs 10 for some languages.

3 BLOGGING
Over the past decade, blog monetisation has gained momentum. To monetise your blog, you can sign up for Google Adsense, which will allot you ads to place on your blog. After this, it's a waiting game to see if your account is approved. If it is, you can continue to receive ad placements and earn a steady, if not large, income from it. Adsense pays on the basis of clicks and views the ads receive.

Alternatively, you can take up affiliate marketing (promoting another seller's products on your blog) or product sales through your blog to turn it into a moneymaking venture. If your blog already attracts a significant amount of traffic, you could choose to enlist blog sponsors, which includes selling ad space on your blog to merchants, which offers a more stable source of income over time.

POTENTIAL EARNINGS

Ads can pay Rs 2,000 - 15,000 a month for a 2“x2“ space, depending on your niche and readership.

Adsense earnings vary widely depending on the blogger's reach and popularity.

4 SELLING YOUR PRODUCTS ONLINE

Whether you have a penchant for crafts or are particularly good at choosing fabrics and creating ensembles, there is probably a market for you products. Once you decide on what you want to sell, create an inventory by buying the products wholesale, or producing a good number of them to keep up with orders, and then set the prices you want to sell them at.

To sell these items, you can register on the website of any popular online seller, from Amazon and eBay to smaller portals like indiebazaar.com. These portals charge a small fee for hosting your products. Once you receive an order, package your products and keep it ready for the logistics partner of the chosen portal to pick it up and deliver it. You will receive the payment in five to seven days after a given order is completed.

POTENTIAL EARNINGS

Earnings vary according to products and pricing. After the portal's small fee is deducted, the rest of the revenue is yours.

5 MAKING YOUTUBE VIDEOS

YouTube is both popular and easily accessible. If you're not camera shy or are good with a video camera, it might be the right platform for you. Choose a category or subject that you want to make videos on and get started, but make sure it's a topic that'll interest a lot of people. Everything from cooking shows to political debates can find many takers on YouTube. You don't even need to have professional equipment or a proper set-up to record videos--a mid-range smartphone will suffice. You have to create a YouTube channel, which works on a similar model as a blog--as you make your channel popular and the number of subscribers grows, so will your earning potential. From brand endorsements to event coverage, YouTube offers many earning opportunities once you gain popularity.

POTENTIAL EARNINGS

Rs 200-300 per 1,000 views. Ads pay according to engagement and clicks.

6 WEB DEVELOPMENT

Do you have some understanding of coding and web design? Then you can easily work from home as a web developer. Even if you are a novice who is interested in the job, you can find dozens of easy online tutorials that can help you get started. Web development is usually outsourced by companies, and is therefore an area where finding work should be easy. However, keep in mind that there are plenty of freelance web developers out there who can give you a run for your money. It's important to find your niche, build a good reputation and keep your pricing reasonable.

POTENTIAL EARNINGS

Depending on the client and job, a single project can fetch you anywhere between Rs 20,000 and Rs 1 lakh.

7 CONTENT WRITING

One of the most popular avenues when it comes to freelance work is that of content writing. There is always an enormous demand for well-researched and wellwritten web content, and recruiters are constantly on the lookout for professionals who can create fresh content that attracts attention and traffic. If you have a good grasp of grammar, an engaging writing style and are interested in researching diverse topics and writing about them, this is the job for you.

Set up a Paypal account before you start working, since most clients would prefer to make payments through it. Once you have an account, you can sign up on freelance work websites like Fiverr.com, Upwork.com, Freelancer.com, Elance.com and Worknhire.com.

POTENTIAL EARNINGS

Beginners earn Rs 8,000 Rs 10,000 per month. Experienced content writers can earn Rs 20,000 Rs 25,000.

8 DATA ENTRY

Although this line of work is seriously threatened by automation, there are still plenty of data entry jobs available in India. It is one the simplest jobs you can do online, and requires no special skills. You just have to have a computer, and Internet connection, fast typing skills, and the ability to pay attention to details. Most freelancing websites list these jobs, and you can sign up on any of them to start working. The client provides printed or scanned sheets of data that needs to be entered into a digital format. This simple task can fetch you a steady income while working from home on a flexible schedule.

POTENTIAL EARNINGS

Rs 300 to Rs 1,500 per hour.

9 ONLINE TUTORING

If you already have some tutoring experience or are an expert in a particular subject, you can earn by tutoring people online. Sign up on websites like MyPrivateTutor.com, BharatTutors.com, tutorindia.net as an online tutor, create a profile listing the subjects or classes you want to teach, how much experience you have, what your qualifications are, etc. Once your details are checked and approved, you will have to take an online test or give a telephonic interview in order to be selected. If academic tutoring is not your cup of tea, portals like Udemy let you have your own virtual classroom for anything that can be taught, from cooking to yoga.

POTENTIAL EARNINGS

Beginners can make around Rs 200 per hour, which can increase to Rs 500 as you gain experience and expertise.

NILANJANA CHAKRABORTY

Jun 19 2017 : The Economic Times (Mumbai)