If you’re ready to delve into the work-at-home world, consider these job options – some of which require self-employment, others representing positions within firms that allow their workers to telecommute.
1. Author
2. Administrative Associate
The average salary for an administrative associate is $45,000 – and the duties tend to include a wide variety of skills based on the industry. However, most folks filling this position need excellent interpersonal skills, as well as a high level of organization and communication. Companies like Dell allow their administrative associates to work both on campus and remotely.
3. Business Development Executive
Expect to come equipped with a minimum of a bachelor’s degree for this position, with certain firms such as Xerox preferring a master’s level degree for the role that requires developing strategies to sell products and services to others. The average salary range is $80,000 for this role.
4. Virtual Assistant
The role of virtual assistant exploded onto the scene when author Tim Ferriss described how he hired folks from all over the world to perform everyday tasks for him. Whether you find yourself researching the best CD rates for a client in Australia, or scheduling appointments for a business owner in New York, you can find a plethora of virtual assistant jobs on sites like Upwork with a wide range of pay.
5. Travel Counselor
Surprisingly, large firms like American Express offer full-time, work-at-home jobs (see jobs.americanexpress.com) such as that of a travel counselor, which focuses on taking customer calls and helping to create “memorable travel experiences” for cardholders. The salary range for such a position is reportedly anywhere from $35,583 to $51,000 annually.
6. Customer Service Representative
Companies like Enterprise Rent-a-Car have work-from-home positions available starting at $12 per hour, with paid virtual 4 -to 5-week training classes. It makes sense that more firms would seek out professional, detail-oriented workers for jobs like these that may require lots of phone contact with customers, but don’t require the overhead expense of all of their customer service reps needing to be under one corporate roof.
7. YouTube Video Creator
Before you skip down to the next tip, consider the fact that Felix Kjellberg, better known as “PewDiePie” to his almost 30 million YouTube fans, raked in $4 million in 2013 from the ad revenue generated by his viral videos. It’s time to pick up your smartphone and start uploading.
8. Software Developer
The information technology field led the charge when it came to offering work-at-home positions, and these days, firms like IBM offer the potential for certain employees to work from home if necessary. Based on the level of programming language knowledge, software developers can earn anywhere from $55,190 to $138,880 annually.
9. Illustrator
If you have a penchant for drawing, you could get your feet wet by selling your services from home for anywhere from $5 per drawing on sites like Fiverr – all the way up thousands of dollars once you develop a following and reputation to provide artwork to clients willing to pay a lot more for your craft.
10. App Developer
Games like “Make it Rain” have made a pretty penny in the iTunes App Store and via others across the online world, at one point pulling in $50,000 per day. Users might be shocked to learn that you don’t even really need to know how to code in order to open up an app development company from your home. Websites like Udemy offer online courses that not only provide the basic code for various gaming apps, but also teach users how to “re-skin” them to make the code their own prior to submitting it to the app store and hopefully creating a cash cow.
11. Instagram Print-Selling Photographer
These days, photographers like Daniel Arnold can decide to sell his Instagram photos as prints and make $15,000 in one day. He’s not the only one turning IG pics into profit. Ryan Parillo is only 15 years old, but his stunning photos are commanding fame as well.
12. Freelance Writer
Forget the image of the starving artist, waxing in a state of depression all Hemingway-style with a glass of bourbon next to his typewriter. (It should be a mojito next to a MacBook Air.) Writers these days are finding so many clients seeking quality content that “Valerie M.” of Words You Want shows earnings of $427,601 in the last 12 months – and more than $2 million total and counting – as of this writing brought in through her words that clients obviously want.
13. Graphic Designer
The average graphic designer makes approximately $50,450 per year to create a wide array of graphics that may appear as logos on packaging or bucolic scenes on brochures. The job generally requires being creative and adept at softwares like Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator and others – and can involve you setting up shop and hanging out your own shingle, so to speak, in order to make yourself known via word of mouth or on job posting sites like Upwork and oDesk.
14. Healthcare Worker
Choosing the option to “search career opportunities” on the Humana website and then selecting the “virtual/work at home” checkbox beneath their “work environment type” field turns up a bunch of jobs where working from home – at least a portion of the time – is a definite possibility. Certain positions listed include a compliance risk advisor, whose salary is approximately $62,000 per year. Other virtual roles listed, like an applications consultant, may command a salary of $77,400 on average.
15. SEO Specialist
Indeed states that SEO experts can bring in salaries of approximately $100,000 per year, and the great part about being a person who knows their way around the “search-engine optimization” field is that there are many people who are willing to pay them to help increase their website’s rankings and visibility in Google. Being very tech-focused, it’s a job that can be done from home as long as the SEO clients keep pouring in.
16. Google Trusted Photographer
Not all jobs being touted on the web as related to Google are scams. I personally know of one photographer who was accepted as a Google Trusted Photographer, and was able to earn an income by photographing various businesses to be displayed on the search engine’s results. Reports of these certified photographers earning $500 for one photo abound, along with the additional business that can come their way when local businesses want to buy more images and additional services.
17. Actuarial Consultant
Companies like Aetna hire actuarial consultants to work from home, as long as they are exceptionally equipped to handle the high level of strong analytical and in-depth data mining skills required for the job, which can pay from $52,000 to $112,500 per year.
18. Virtual Tutor
Websites like Tutor.com help connect people with a boatload of knowledge to share – such as experts in math, English, science and other subjects – with those who are willing to pay people to tutor them or their children, even on a virtual basis, because Skype has opened up a huge world for online teaching. While some tutors average approximately $16.20 per hour, reports of much higher amounts being paid have gone viral.
20. Telephone Representative
If you’re great on the phone, firms like Nestle still have work at home jobs for those willing to sell Gerber Life Insurance products. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that the media pay of customer service representative jobs akin to these are $30,580 per year, or $14.70 per hour. With so many virtual jobs available and opening up due to the Internet bringing all the tools a person needs right to their home to successfully complete their work from within the walls of their own home, there’s almost no excuse not to begin a journey into working from home. Just change out of those pajamas, okay? Featured photo credit: KaronBT via bigstockphoto.com
