For starters, Online work seems to mean writing..
This assumption is miles from the truth.
The thing is: Online work is simply regular work but performed over the internet. For instance, instead of a wedding couple hiring the local video guy to edit their wedding videos for them, they can go to Fiverr and hire a freelancer (who’s a video editor) for this simple task.
They might end up paying cheap for a premium quality job.
And therein lies the popularity of online workspace. Startups and individuals will get their jobs done professionally and affordably.
And the video guy, like many freelancers, also likes selling his services online- there’s a big market for his services and eventually, he may land some big league customers.
It’s a win-win:
So, here are the other popular jobs you can do online- away from writing:
- Web Designing and Development
UpWork says there are over 5000 different online work opportunities on the platform. One of these is web design.
What you’ll be doing: In web development, your work is to creatively design and code a client’s website.
It’s estimated that thousands of websites are published daily. And many of these are done by freelancers.
Skills You Need: You must have the basics of design and web scripting.
Knowledge of HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Dreamweaver etc. will come in handy.
As will some Knowledge of WordPress, Squarespace, and others.
We are living in the internet era friend.
So, do you need to attend classes to learn all these?
- Freelance Writing
Yes. I am sure you’ve heard about this. Well, with the incredible growth of the internet, the demand for content has never been this big.
It’s fairly easy to start off in online freelancing in writing that’s why you’ll find quite a good number starting here.
What you’ll be doing: You will be creating web content for various clients. Bloggers need blog posts to keep their audience hooked, e-Commerce stores need product descriptions, companies need articles that educate their clients and help the sell…the list is endless.
Freelance writing could even be ghostwriting an e-book, press releases, product reviews, news items, and more.
Skills You Need: Basic English writing skills and ability to finish articles within tight deadlines.
If interested, you can join my FREE Online Article Writing Course here.
- Creative Design
Without visuals, the World would be one big boring place. Life would be colorless and very dull.
Cartoons, Memes, GIFs, and emojis make our life tasty and fun.
What you’ll be doing: You will be creating captivating illustrations and bringing ideas to life.
Indeed, creative design is vast and covers imaginative work. For example, even the best PowerPoint presentations will need lots of visuals.
Skills You Need: Creative designing needs more and creativity comes. From there, you can learn how to use Canva, Microsoft PowerPoint, Adobe Photoshop, paint, etc.
The market is full of these software.
If you already have a portfolio, your chances of getting hired for related online work projects increase tremendously.
- Sales and Marketing
Even offline, salespeople are in huge demand. If you can sell offline, then you can also try pushing products offline- only that this time the tactics will change significantly.
You will be hearing a lot about lead magnets, opt-in pages, prospecting, and such.
What you’ll be doing: Here you will be generating leads (prospects) for various clients. You need to combine a mix of strategies to market the target products to the right audience.
You will be doing lots of email marketing (Aweber, MailChimp, etc), search engine marketing (SEM), social media marketing (SMM), Craigslist Ads. etc.
Skills You Need: You need some knowledge in social media (FaceBook, Pinterest, Instagram, and Twitter), Google Adwords, YouTube, and Messaging Apps (WhatsApp, Telegram,WeChat etc).
Some basic web design skills like creating landing pages are also valuable. As is basics in copywriting.
However, you can hire another freelancer to do the technical stuff (optin pages, landing pages, and creating copy).
Many clients are more concerned about lead generation!
- Graphics Design as Online Work
Logos, brochures, banners, posters, business cards, book-covers, flyers, infographics, social media images…we can go on and on here.
If you never knew, it’s all about graphics and for this one, the market is mammoth. In fact, for some, Graphic designing is a big well of unending jobs because their services are required by virtually all businesses.
Coupled with a bit of creativity, you can easily be grossing over $1000 per month.
What you’ll be doing: You will be creating a mix of graphics for both printed and online media including infographics, brochures, etc
Skills You Need: You must be able to work competitively with a variety of graphical applications including Adobe Photoshop, Canva, Corel Draw, and Adobe Illustrator.
And ooh. You must be creative!
- Mobile App Development
Apps. How many do you have on your phone? Well, the developer earns passively from each and every download.
And if fortune smiles on you, you could be the next Jan Koum (The Guy who sold WhatsApp to Facebook for a cool $19 billion).
Even if you won’t reach such heights, more companies are now requiring Apps to help in customer service and sales. And they’re willing to pay top dollar for this.
What you’ll be doing: You will be coding Apps. for mobile platforms -mainly Apple iOS, Android, and to an extent, Windows for your clients.
Skills You Need: Programming knowledge is key. If you can crack programming languages such as Swift, Java, C#, Objective-C, PHP, C++ , JavaScript, and HTML5, you will be good to go.
- Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Online, the battle for visibility is vicious and full of mysteries.
Every website owner is willing to break the bank for you- if you can guarantee him/her that his site will occupy a top ten position on Google, Bing, Yahoo search and in every other search engine.
Because a top ranking means one thing: Money. And Lots of it!
Now, the freelancer who knows how to pull a website from the wilderness to a Top position is called an SEO specialist (And that could be you!)
What you’ll be doing: An SEO Specialist analyzes and implements various changes to a website to make it rank in Google.
You typically employ a host of strategies so as to bring in organic traffic in droves.
Skills You Need: Link-building skills, guest posting, web 2.0s, PBNs (private blog networks), keyword research, and social media marketing will be your daily tasks.
You will be fairly knowledgeable in things like SiteMaps, MetaData, 301redirects and more.
And while at it, ensure your client’s website will not be penalized by search engines (because of violating SEO rules)
- Branding and Public Relations
Celebrities, CEOs, politicians, and sportsmen know that positive online presence can be priceless.
But they don’t have time to generate a following and to respond to the unending Facebook inboxes, e-mails, chat messages and everything digital.
Brands such as Guiness, Coca-cola, Colgate and others need to build a reputable online following.
That is where you come in.
You establish and manage their online profiles. Other times, you run specific online campaigns.
In essence, you are like their unofficial online image managers/spokesperson.
What you’ll be doing: Managing social media accounts, and pages including running targeted internet campaigns.
Skills You Need: You have to know how to skillfully present a specific image and to market a product.
Public Relations and communication skills are also critical.
- Virtual Assistant (VA)
I occasionally land VA gigs and I find them lots of fun.
As a VA, you are many things in one.
An administrative clerk, personal assistant, marketing officer, financial clerk, IT officer, and an operational go-to-go guy.
You return emails, answer calls, Type documents, take notes, respond to customer questions remotely, schedule meetings, manage calendars, reserve accommodation, and book air tickets.
That’s not all:
You will also be managing blogs, transcribing videos, moderating social media accounts, creating presentations, and helping to manage other team members including writers, designers, and graphic artists.
There’s more:
Your online employer may want assistance in preparing his payroll and related accounting tasks such as billing.
I recently had a client who once wanted advice on how to drive traffic to his Shopify store.
In the past, I have been hired to upload products to eCommerce shops, provide product descriptions, write product reviews, make a budget on Ms Excel, translate blog post from English to Kiswahili,…that’s the life of a VA.
Simply, you will be a jack of all trades and also a master of ALL.
What you’ll be doing: As a VA, you will be delivering support or assistance in all the tasks I have mentioned above (expect other weird requirements)
Skills You Need: If you want to make it here, familiarize yourself with a plethora of tools- some already well known to you such as Facebook and other newer services.
I’m talking about platforms such as Trello, Hootsuite, Buffer, WordPress, shopify, Google suite, Aweber, MailChimp, LinkedIn, aHrefs, etc
You can start with the jobs related to skills you have- for instance typing- then build your expertise in the other areas bit by bit.
- 3D Modelling & CAD
If you have a background in architecture and certain engineering disciplines, then you could freelance as a 3D modeling/CAD expert.
Because it’s relatively unknown, not many freelancers offer it so the competition is mild- as compared with areas such as social media management.
What you’ll be doing: You will be helping clients come up with high-resolution floor plans, 2D/3D renderings, sections, elevations, roof plans, and working drawings.
Skills You Need: Proficiency in modeling and CAD applications such as Maya and AutoCAD will serve you well.
Basic education in engineering and animation may also come in handy.
- Game Development
Game development is very close to apps development but for the fact that this time you are creating computer games.
What you’ll be doing: here you code computer and mobile games –both for the online and offline market using the right tools.
Skills You Need: You must be very good in developer’s platforms such as C++, Java, JavaScript, C#, HTML 5, and CSS3
Understanding various gaming SDKs will also put you ahead of the competition.
- Translation
In translation, you translate specific works from the current language to another. Medical and legal translation Gigs are quite common. Indeed, demand for translation services has grown exponentially in the last few years.
What you’ll be doing: As we said, you will be tasked with converting jobs – for example, articles and game scripts- to a new language.
Skills You Need: Masterly of popular world languages is mandatory. French, German, Mandarin, and English job are teeming.
But you will occasionally receive unique jobs- for example Kazakh to Danish.
- Web Research
Just knowing how to surf the internet can earn you handsome dollars as a web researcher. For many, this is one of the easiest online jobs.
What you’ll be doing: Here are assigned different duties like completing surveys, filling in online forms, taking part in internet polls etc. In short, you will be doing very basic research work!
Skills You Need: You must be a passionate ‘Googler’ (web researcher). You have to know how to mine rich information hidden deep on Web servers.
Then, be willing to spend long hours online.
- Legal Services
Law graduates and law students can also have a piece of the internet pie by offering advisory services in criminal, family, corporate, and property cases.
Or practicing as an online paralegal.
What you’ll be doing: Legal services are for law graduates or students of law. Clients seek various services like corporate cases, criminal, property, family, paralegal etc.
Skills You Need: A legal mind is obviously a must-have. Experience handling high stakes cases is also desirable.
- Transcription
You may have heard about online transcription jobs.
Transcription is converting video to audios. Because videos with text narration have a better viewership, clients always hire transcribers for their YouTube (and other) videos.
Legal and medical transcription jobs are especially very popular.
What you’ll be doing: You might be listening to and transcribing videos from various niches. You could be working on a church sermon this hour, then a TED talks presentation 5 hours later. Next up could be a court proceeding video. and so on and so forth.
Skills You Need: The most essential skills here are listening and typing skills.
- Online Photography
Clients are looking for people to help them edit their photos, post them on Instagram and on blogs. And perhaps put them up for sale on sites like shutterstock.
A good freelance photographer is a huge asset for real estate business, showbiz, modeling companies and various brands.
For this reason, freelance photography is a hot niche and you can earn millions in a few years’ time.
What you’ll be doing: Shooting or sourcing photos and images, editing pictures, posting and sharing them on specified platforms and stuff like that.
Skills You Need: You must be deep in photography, you can edit and retouch pictures using Adobe Photoshop (or any other quality application), and if possible have some experience from offline photography projects.
And it pays to have an impressive portfolio.
- Voice-over artist
If you have sleek vocals and can read out a script, then you are primed for big money.
Voice over artists narrates client’s scripts to specifications and pocket good money.
You will be hired to narrate news for online radio stations and voice podcasts, online videos, audiobooks, and blogs.
Work also extends to voicing biographies, documentaries, educational films, plus much more.
What you’ll be doing: you will be expected to narrate provided scripts.
Skills You Need: Impeccable articulation skills, ability to play out various voices- including straight voices, Character voices, etc. – , conversational speaking, cold reading skills…name them. Employers are looking for artists who can deliver clean and captivating voice for their content.
Employers also appreciate an ability to use voice-over editing software.
- Social Media Coordinator /Marketer/ Manager
A Social media coordinator manages various social media platforms for brands.
These include LinkedIn, Google Plus, Instagram, Pinterest, Facebook among others.
What you’ll be doing: You will be creating, updating, or moderating existing social media profiles for your clients focusing on targeted audiences and by using special hashtags
Skills You Need: Expertise on use of social media for business is key. You should know how to use Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, , Linkedin, Google+ and others for marketing and communication.
21. Making Explainer and other videos
This is one of the biggest and is expected to continue growing at breathtaking speed.
The internet has insatiable demand for excellent videos. Marketers, online tutors, product promoters, blog owners…all these need videos at some point.
For example, thousands of explainer videos are made every day. They are short videos that highlight crucial details about products and services. Almost any online seller has one or is planning to have in the near future.
It’s the same case with YouTube videos. In a nutshell, Video is big money!
What you’ll be doing: You will be creating videos to help push Products and to build trust with clients.
2D animated videos and cartoon style animations also have significant demand.
Skills You Need: You must be able to competently record, edit, and deliver high-quality videos.
Clients seek freelancer who can use their creativity to deliver engaging, funny, and professional videos.
Obviously, you have to be able to work with explainer video producing software. Popular examples include VideoRobot, PowToon amongst others.
- Data Entry Jobs
Data entry jobs have been there for many years. Though their popularity has gradually decreased, we still have some established freelancers making good money typing in Microsoft Word and Excel.
You have to complete a certain number of pages daily.
What you’ll be doing: Here you will be typing, sorting, formatting, filtering, and applying various effects on data.
Skills You Need: A fast typing speed is very important. Anything from 45 WPM(Words per minute) will do.
- WordPress Mr. Fix-It.
WordPress is used in millions of websites. But not all Website owners are geeks. So, once in a while, they will need someone to help them troubleshoot their WordPress websites and optimize their performance.
If you’re good at wordpress, that could be you.
What you’ll be doing: Troubleshooting wordpress plugins, templates, backend, and such.
Skills You Need: At least proficiency in WordPress customization, HTML, and CSS
- Copywriting
Copywriters are among the highest-paid writers. Is it the same with writing articles? Nay!
Here, we write persuasive copy targeted at pushing sales of appointed products over the hill.
Technically, it is tactfully delivering words that prompt readers to take intended action. For example to click order now button.
If you learn how to do it right, copywriting is a very lucrative niche.
What you’ll be doing: You will be crafting highly engaging and compelling copy for employers.
Skills You Need: Now, how do I put this? Well, you must be extremely good at drafting influential emails, blogposts, homepage articles, landing page content and such.
- Editing and Proof-reading
If you are a veteran and have a knack for spotting errors in spelling, grammar, syntax, and punctuation, then you can be hiring out your services as a proofreader and editor on platforms such as Fiverr and UpWork.
What you’ll be doing: ProofReading and removing errors in articles, blogposts, video scripts and more
Skills You Need: You must be super knowledgeable in grammar, spelling rules, punctuation, and of course excellence in language.
HELP, I DON’T HAVE THE SKILLS FOR ONLINE WORK!
I know you’re screaming “BUT I don’t have these skills!”.
Here is the good news:
You can learn all these for FREE or at with little as $20!
And it’s not going to take you 4 years to be good.
If you’re dedicated, you can be through and earning in 2 weeks!
Where to get the skills
Udemy, Khan Academy, Lynda.com, w3schools, and a plethora of online schools are there to help!
Even better, some of the mentioned schools offer training for absolutely free!
Final Word
Online work is much more than writing.
And if you open your eyes wider, there are hundreds of niches with opportunities worth hundreds of millions of dollars online.
What you need to do is just identify your niche , get the skills, and start earning.
Speaking of which, you can learn for free from YouTube or online schools or at a very negligible fee.
So, why not start today and grab a piece of the online cake?
PS:
ENROLL FOR MY FREE FREELANCE ARTICLE WRITING COURSE
Now, if writing is your thing, then you can start off into a lucrative career as an online articles writer by registering for my 7-days FREE article writing mini course here.
You’ll learn the basics of how to make money online (full-time or part-time) writing blog posts, informational articles, eBooks, scripts, product reviews, and more.
ALREADY FAMILIAR WITH THE BASICS?
Join my full freelance online articles writing course here and learn how you can start making as much as $1000 per month by just playing with words.
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