Work From Home Opportunities

The desire for better work/life balance has motivated many talented workers to look for jobs that can be done from home.  A quick web search for work from home opportunities turns up an overwhelming number of businesses that let you work by the hour, by the project, and even by the task.  The online job market is a godsend to many who have been hit hard by the recession.

Lower barriers to entry, however, also mean that workers from foreign countries help keep pay rates low. So the challenge for those looking for work at home opportunities is to find the better paying jobs where local workers have a competitive advantage.  Here are four work-from-home ideas suited to workers in the western world.

Online writing

For persons who can write well and fast, online writing opportunities are plentiful and varied.  At the lower end of the skills and pay range, writers are in high demand to produce short pieces of “web junk” - articles created mainly to increase search engine ratings and generate links. The quality of pieces is not particularly important as long as they contain the right key words.  Web junk writing assignments pay anywhere from $.007 per word to $.015 cents per word and are available on sites such as Mechanical Turk and TextBrokers.  Higher paid writing opportunities are also available on web sites such as Elance, Guru.com and Odesk.

Work at home writing opportunities are also opening up on the more traditional employment boards, particular in the areas of technical writing.  Monster and CareerBuilder both allow you to do searches for work-at-home jobs by combining the job title with key words “remote” and “virtual’.


Graphic Design

The artistically inclined can find plenty of work in all areas of design including designing business logos, websites, T-shirts and blog templates through online design sites. Photographers can sell photos for exclusive use, or license works for multiple customers, generating ongoing revenue streams.  Design jobs can range from well-paid to dismal. Some of the better paid opportunities are on websites such as ODesk, Elance and Guru.com.

Virtual Call Centers

The next time you talk to someone at a call center, that person could very well be sitting in their pajamas on front of their home computers. Companies have discovered a ready supply of work-from-home moms willing to provide excellent home-based phone services for sales centers, help desks, insurance claims offices, and employment recruiting.  If you are a people-person, becoming a home call agent offers an attractive way to stay home, while earning money. The hourly pay rates for home call agents are generally more profitable than working by the project or task.


Virtual Assisting

Businesses that no longer need full time clerical workers are tapping into the talents of home workers to provide clerical services, transcribing services, data entry, debt collections and just nearly any work that can be done via computer and a phone.  Virtual assisting jobs may be short-term or task-based, but there are also plenty of opportunities for long-term assignments. Virtual assistant jobs also pay a bit better than some of the other types of virtual jobs.

Talented workers seeking more flexibility and balance in their lives are finding work from home opportunities a good fit for their goals.  The ability to attract top notch workers, however, will ultimately depend on whether the jobs are offer sustainable wages, or whether they turn into a race to the bottom of the pay scale.