Countless people dream of working remotely and making a living in the comfort of their homes. This is a reality that is achievable and accessible to anyone with the right tools, information, and the right mindset.
With the Covid pandemic looming around and frequent lockdowns, working online can open doors to a successful career or a lucrative side hustle. The list below divides these online opportunities into four categories.
Career: These are proper jobs that require you to prepare a resume and cover letter. Just like any company, there is potential to grow, relocate, and have a fixed salary.
Top Tier: This includes jobs that have unlimited tapped potential. You can make as much money as you want and reach the level of success that you desire. It all boils down to your work ethic.
Mid Tier: These are jobs that require you to register with a platform or are extremely oversaturated and they might not have the same level of earning potential as Top tier jobs.
Low tier: These are low-paying jobs that can be easily considered side hustles. I wouldn’t advise you to make a career or quit your job for low-tier jobs in this article. Please note: I absolutely hate Survey paying websites and any type of job that wastes precious time. Any job that pays unrealistic wages will not be included in this article. (There are too many websites that pay pennies or scam people.)
Become a Shopify Employee (Level-Career)
Shopify has grown to be one of the biggest players in the E-Commerce space. The company is featured as one of Canada’s Top 100 Employers. It currently employs over 7000+ employees who mostly work remotely. In May 2020, Shopify transitioned to operating online permanently with all its employees.
Shopify is one of the best tech companies to work for. Salaries range from $46,000-$210,000 depending on the position. Their lowest position, Customer Service pays around $46,000 which is way above the national average for a similar role. You’ll also receive benefits such as $5000 to put towards your wellness/health account, retirement account, or charitable giving account. Other benefits include maternity and parental leave top-up payments; mental health practitioners benefit up to $2,500; stock options, and many more. This is a real job presenting the opportunity to make a career with a company that cares about its employees. And yes, they hire internationals too. Click the link below to check out their Job postings.
Start a blog (Level - Top tier)
Starting a blog is one of the best ways to make money online. There is no barrier to entry and the potential to make money is practically unlimited. Currently, the world has over 7.6 billion people and 65.6% of them have access to the internet. If you think blogging is a dead-end then you’re in for a surprise. Like any other job, to be successful with blogging requires time and dedication. An updated article will be linked here to guide you on how to start a successful blog. In the meantime, these are ways you can monetize your blog.
- Ads. You can run Google Ads or any other ads platform to showcase ads on your website. When people visit your website, view or click ads, revenue is generated.
- Affiliate Marketing. Is a form of marketing that involves promoting a product and earning a commission when a sale is made. For example, you can join the Amazon Affiliate program, pick a product of interest and write an article about it. Amazon will provide you with a link that you can add to your blog. If a visitor clicks that link and makes a purchase, Amazon will pay you a commission. It’s important to have useful good quality content to drive traffic to your website.
- Sponsorship. A great way of boosting income on your website is to work with sponsors. A sponsored blog post is when a blogger gets paid to talk about a product or brand on their blog. The amount of money you get from sponsors will be determined by traffic and other factors.
- Sell a product or service. You can sell e-books, online courses, merchandise, paid subscription service, or start a podcast.
Game development with Buildbox (Level-Mid Tier)
If you have a passion for making mobile games and you’re lacking in the programming department, Buildbox allows you to make games in a drag and drop user interface. No coding knowledge is required to build amazing games that can take the internet by storm. Some of the best ranking games on Android and iOS were made with Buildbox. The platform is also extremely easy to use, even for beginners. Money can be made by selling games or monetizing with ads in the Appstore. Although game developers can easily make 6 to 7 figures a year, I classified this gig as “Mid-tier” because of oversaturation within the mobile gaming industry. To be successful, you’ll need a good idea, a well-designed game with different levels, and SEO marketing skills
(Note: There is alternative software like Unity, Unreal, Gamemaker, and many more that can be used to make mobile games.)
Amazon Mturk (Level-Low Tier)
Amazon Mechanical Turk is a crowdsourcing website for businesses and individuals to hire remotely located “crowd workers” to perform on-demand tasks. The amount you earn is proportional to how fast you can complete a task. Mturk is a great platform for making extra cash. I easily make $25-40 USD a day in my spare time.
As a new Turker, you might not qualify for high-paying HITs. However, the more HITs you complete, the more work you’ll qualify for. In addition, installing plugins and scripts such as Mturk Suite, Pandacrazy and others will massively boost your income. It’s a must-have feature.
Overall, Mturk doesn’t offer the level of growth and the potential to earn is not up to par with other jobs on this list. Regardless, you can earn some extra cash.
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Youtube (Level-Top Tier)
Youtube is one of those jobs that seem bizarre and unattainable. Similar to blogging, Youtube requires a lot of hard work, consistency, and dedication. However, the potential to earn is limitless.
A lot of people fail with Youtube because they don’t respect it as a job. Other people overcomplicate it and they fail to start. If you love creating content and you have a niche of interest, use your phone and just start.
You can monetize your Youtube channel with ads, sponsored content, and affiliate marketing. Additionally, you can recycle articles if you have a blog and turn them into youtube videos. It’s like feeding two birds with one scone.
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Appen "Search Engine Evaluator" (Mid-tier)
Apply as a search engine evaluator at Appen. The job pays around $13/hr. A Search Engine Evaluator analyzes search results to ensure they are accurate and relevant. The job is fairly straightforward. (Note: Positions for this job might be full, so try to check out for any other open positions.)
Lionsbridge "Social Media Evaluator" (Level - Mid Tier)
Similar to Appen, Lionsbridge is a company that provides translations and localization solutions. A Social Media Evaluator’s job is to ensure that a social network’s newsfeed is relevant and accurate based on a given assignment. Wages range from $12-$15/hr. Lionsbridge also has other job openings that might be of interest.
Open an online business (Level-Top tier)
Many advantages come with running an online business. Depending on the nature of the business, there is more control, and operating costs will be lower than a conventional brick-and-mortar business. Check out these cool ideas on how to open an online business.
Dropshipping
Is a clever way of selling products that you don’t own at a higher price. You won’t have to store inventory or any products in physical form because when a customer buys from your store, their payment will automatically buy the product from a third-party store. Entrepreneurs usually pick and add products from Alibaba.com or any wholesaler of choice to their website. The next step is to set a reasonable price and drive traffic to your site. When a customer eventually buys a product from you, they’re technically buying it from Alibaba or any wholesaler that you’re working with.
Countless people have made fortunes with this method, however, the market is extremely saturated now. Shipping costs, quality control, and low-profit margins are also factors to consider when launching a dropshipping website. The most important thing is to research a product that is in high demand but has low competition. That is the formula for dropshipping.
E-commerce website
Start an e-commerce business and sell practically anything. From clothes to furniture, anything can be sold online. You can also sell digital products such as software, music beats, or even services. There are many tools out there that you can use such as Shopify, WordPress Woocommerce, Squarespace, and many more.
Choosing a niche is the most important step when building an E-commerce site. Your website will look professional and tailored to specific products. You don’t want your website to compete with the likes of Amazon and eBay. Customers will rather use those instead. Specialize in something!
Affiliate marketing
Although this form of business is already mentioned, it deserves a segment of its own. Affiliate Marketing is the process by which an affiliate earns commission when they market a company’s product.
There are many affiliate networks that you can join with the most famous being Amazon Affiliates. Bluehost also has a great affiliate program that pays $65USD per sale. Shopify’s affiliate program pays $58-$2000 per sale and Fiver pays up to $150 per new customer. This is just the tip of the iceberg as there are many affiliate programs that you can join. (Note: You don’t need to have a website or a Youtube channel to drive traffic to your links, however, I would advise against that)
Amazon Arbitrage
Also known as retail arbitrage, is a method of buying items from different retailers and selling them on Amazon at a higher price. You can also buy items from Amazon and list them on eBay at a higher price. This Business method requires research and a good understanding of the product demand.
Start an agency.
You can start a social media marketing agency where you help clients grow their businesses and reach more people.Â
If you know how to build websites or mobile apps, you can easily start an agency that provides those services to other businesses.
A travel agency can also be lucrative, especially if you know how to use social media effectively.
Fiverr
Is one of the best freelance marketplaces. The potential to earn is limitless. If you have any skills that can offer a service, customers will connect with you directly and pay you accordingly. Fiver also has a robust user interface that is easy to navigate and understand. It’s definitely a great way to utilize your skills.
Amazon to FBA
This simply stands for Fulfillment by Amazon. If you have a product of interest, specifically if this product is sourced from Alibaba; you can send the products to Amazon fulfillment warehouses. Products sent to Amazon will be fulfilled by Amazon when a customer makes an order. You don’t have to store the product or worry about shipping and returns. The advantages of FBA are your products will be eligible for Prime fast shipping, 24/7 customer service, and access to a huge market. This itself is a business model and a lot of people are making money choosing the right products.
Sell on Etsy or eBay
Sell handmade items, craft supplies, vintage items, art, and old electronics. eBay has a great bidding system if you’re not sure how you want to price an item. I recently sold my used 15 inch 2015 Macbook pro for $1200. Etsy is also great for selling art wallpapers, decorations, and vintage items. If you know your way around a camera or have an iPad pro with an Apple pencil, try to create decorative wallpapers. People do pay good money for that.
Forex trading
Is the act of buying one currency and selling the other in a “currency pair.” Forex trading is extremely volatile. The potential to earn can be huge but the same can be said for losses. Please make sure you know what you’re doing before you get into Forex trading. Create a dummy account and learn the graphs. Understand how the market works and only trade with money that you don’t need.
Day trading
Similar to Forex trading, Day trading is also a dangerous gig, especially if you don’t know what you’re doing. Take the time to research, open a dummy account and find a broker with low trading fees. And remember, always trade with disposable cash after paying bills and clearing debt.
Be Optimistic, Be realistic.
The world we live in today is different. You see kids making millions from TikTok and Youtube. You see businesses moving operations and operating fully remotely. You see yourself in a world full of opportunities and it makes you wonder. What if I embrace the digital age. Am I too late to the game? Now is the time. Take that leap and start something.
You have the tools, you have the information, now it all boils down to you. This article does not encourage anyone to quit their job but shows you what is possible with the right work ethic and mindset. Believe in yourself because the sky is the limit.
