The Best Ways to Make Money Online from Home
There are many different ways to earn money from home on the Internet.
Unfortunately, there are also a lot of scammers out there that pray on people who are searching for the best ways to make money online from home.
If you have made the decision that you would like to earn an income from the comforts of your own home, then read on below for some of the best ways to make money on the Internet that are currently available.
Telecommuting
If you’ve decided that you would simply like to have a job that allows you from working within the comforts of your own home, then one of the best ones out there comes in the form of telecommuting.
What is telecommuting?
Telecommuting is essentially working either as a customer service or sales associate on the telephone within your home.
These positions have traditionally been available in many areas all over the world in various call-center facilities.
In recent years, many companies have found that it is much cheaper to either hire employees to work from home or contract employees as independent contractors.
If you find a company that offers employment in the form of becoming an independent contractor, then you have probably wondered exactly what this entails.
In a nutshell, an independent contractor basically works as their own business entity.
[box] What this means for you is that you must take care of all of your own taxes, health insurance, vacation time, and other such benefits.[/box]
While becoming an independent contractor is not ideal for some people, it certainly foots the bill for a lot of other folks searching to work from home.
Its also a good way to earn extra income on top of your day job if you can get flexible hours with the contractor.
What is required in order to work a telecommuting position?
Many companies require that you have an independent telephone line that is to be used only for business, a quality headset for taking calls, and a computer that will only be used for work during working hours.
Other companies require that your Internet meets certain speeds and if using what is known as a VoIP call structure you will need to make sure that your Internet services are only used for work during your working hours.
What are some of the benefits of working a telecommuting position?
Many telecommuting positions have very reasonable pay rates that typically average between $12 and $15 per hour and a large majority of telecommuting positions allow you to advance to management positions or quality service positions.
Another benefit that some companies will offer comes in the form of commission sales.
This means that if you are making sales or upgrades in your job, then you can really start to rack up commission checks that can seriously become quite substantial in size.
What are the disadvantages of working a telecommuting position?
For starters, most companies will require you to work a set schedule with very little flexibility.
If you have small children at home, many companies will not allow for any background noise whatsoever, so you will have to make certain that you have arranged for child care during your working hours.
Freelancing
Another one of the best ways to make money online from home comes in the form of freelancing.
What is freelancing?
Freelancing is providing services that are typically provided by professionals or companies such as writing, graphic design, or social media marketing.
As a freelancer, you will provide these services independently and be paid for the projects that you have completed by an individual or group who has contracted to purchase them from you.
There are literally hundreds of different skills that you may have that you could potentially turn into a freelancing career.
The most popular ones online include ghostwriting, web graphic design, working as a virtual assistant, and working as a social media manager.
Many people often turn to freelancing when they are first beginning to make money on the Internet and then bridge the gap into the final recommendation that we have here for you to make money online.
Blogging and Affiliate Marketing
Perhaps the very best way to make money online from home comes in the form of creating your own online business as a blogger and affiliate marketer.
What is affiliate marketing?
Affiliate marketing is when you sign up to sell other people’s products for commission.
Things that you can sell include physical goods from retailers such as Walmart or Amazon, Digital Products such as online training courses from places such as Udemy, or Clickbank, and even things such as iPhone apps from the Apple store.
The problem that many people face when it comes to creating their own blog and affiliate income is that they typically do not receive quality training before trying to take on the endeavor of creating their own online income.
How can you prevent this?
By finding a quality training program that will teach you the steps required to create your own online income through affiliate marketing.
If you take the time and check reviews before taking the plunge then you can avoid many of the scams that plague people who are wanting to create a full time income on the Internet.
What are the benefits of creating your own blog or affiliate marketing company?
For starters, the sky is truly the limit once you get rolling with your online business.
Some affiliate marketers earn as much as six or seven figures annually, and many more successfully create incomes rivaling that of a full-time career.
The downside of Internet marketing is that it does take a substantial amount of work, and if you do not have a quality training background behind you, you will find yourself struggling for a long time.
For this reason, we have decided to include this form of making money on the Internet as our last recommendation due to the fact that many people will begin earning money online with one of the other two options, and then eventually bridge the gap into creating their own Internet business.
Final Thoughts
As you can see from the few recommendations above, it is fully possible for you to create a full-time income working in the comforts of your own home on the Internet.
Regardless of which method you choose, it is important to remember that you must always complete your due diligence in order to avoid scams on the Internet.
If you truly wish to create your own full-time position at home, then take the time to learn exactly what will be required for you to do so.
It is a wonderful career path to pursue that will allow you to have a much more flexible schedule than a traditional 9-to-5 job.
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About Author
I am an affiliate marketer and in my opinion it is the most cost-effective way to start making money online. As long as you are marketing something you care about and do it in an ethical manner, it can be a very rewarding way to create some extra income.
Freelancing is another good option, but the constant requirement to look for clients and meeting their demands is not my cup of tea.
Affiliate marketing can be lucrative when planed out and worked correctly. It depends on your niche and the affiliate programs available. There are more and more programs available on the market now and marketers don’t have to reply on Clickbank and Amazon to make their money.
Freelancing is a good way also as you say and if you just want to perform tasks for someone else a good way to be productive and make money. Signing up to a platform like Upwork will save a lot of time in finding work once you have established your name as a good worker.
I quite like the sound of freelancing at writing online – I can imagine there are quite a few sites out there that cater for this sort of thing right?
What about mixing the two – freelance writing and affiliate marketing? I mean the two could work well together if you are good at writing reviews etc…what do you think?
Hey Chris, yes that is a good combination if you are good at writing, however most find it difficult to get the writing done. It can be a challenge to come up with good content week on week.
Affiliate marketing can be lucrative if you put the effort in and a good affiliate page will create revenue for weeks, months and even years while freelancing will only get paid once per article.
Hi Mark,
Just stumbled on your website!
Very impressed and I have to praise you for your perseverance. You’ve really put a lot of work into this website and it seems to have lead to some happy endings.
And by the way you’re absolutalety right about WA and Affiliate Marketing. When you build your own website you will make mistakes but this is where you get your foundation.
Keep up the good work !
Serge
Affiliate marketing is one way to go for sure, loads on wealthy affiliate do exactly that and make a good living.
There are other ways as pointed out and each person has to decide which route they want to take.
For me selling products on eBay along with some affiliate marketing has been the route I have taken so far.
However as you learn and grow you will find you move around and add new ways to your arsenal.
In fact I would recommend not putting all your eggs in one basket. Having multipul revenue streams is by far the best way to keep you safe.
Hi Mark,
Thanks for those great ideas on making online money. I have never been in telecommuting though I know it has nice returns but I have certainly done freelance writing and online research. I used to be on ye oDesk platform (now merged with Elnce) that was truly good and legitimate money. It was not much but it could meet all my expenses and a bit more.
In recent months I have embarked on online entrepreneurship where I want to bold my own successful online enterprise. Thanks for legit ideas like that that you are giving us!
Yes odesk now called UpWork is a great place to outsource work. I have been looking into this lately to off load some of the extra work I have to help me concentrate on the meat end of my business. Its also a great place for folks to earn as they get into the online business world.
As a business grows it will need support from admin staff in roles like data input, virtual assistants, content creation, social networking, etc etc. There are loads of ways for someone to earn from there.
Great read on the best ways to make money online, Mark 🙂
I hear what you’re saying about online scams because they make me feel angry just thinking about them!
I see there are some benefits to Telecommunting and Freelancing for people who are interested, but they are not jobs for me!
However with blogging and affiliate marketing, now there’s a different story because they sound like AWESOME ways to make money.
So, I’m off to get my starter account with Wealthy Affiliate 🙂
Neil
Hey Neil
Thanks for stopping by, Good luck with your starter account, give me a shout out at WA I will be more than happy to guide you through the early stages.
TIP, work out a plan, put in as many hours a week as you can and stick to the work. If you keep working it will prove to be fruitful after a while. How long depends on how much time and effort you have to give to it.
Mark
Hey Mark,, I like the different ways to make money from home, telecommuting especially, I did not know that one was possible? I guess I missed it. Wealthy Affiliate is a better fit for me, so I went ahead with that one. I must say, that is definitely up my ally. The training is so easy to follow, and being over 50, the look over the shoulder approach, fits me well.
I am glad that you take the time to get this out there, I have been scammed so many times with online business for years over the Internet, so I stayed away for quite sometime. I must agree, I was very skeptical at first, but once I see where this is going, I had to dive right in, and I glad I did, I have no regrets. I am involve with the training right now, but how long do you think I will be able to see some profit with this business?
Thanks,
David
Hey Bishop the time frame is different for everyone. I have seen WA members make money in their first month others can take anywhere from 6 months to a year. It depends on the time you have to devote and how well you put into practice the skills you learn along the way. This is not a get rich quick scheme it does tkae time but if you build properly your website can be fruitful for years to come.
Nice post. Like other posters above I hadn’t heard of telecommuting either, which is silly because I have been online since 1996. I have heard of something similar though – as a virtual assistant.
I’ve tried a lot of the methods you have listed there. I feel your success is proportional to the amount of work that you put in. So if you sign up for an affiliate program and post 1 link per day to Facebook (as I have in the past) then no-one will get anywhere.
What I am finding out the more experience and hardened I become is that the harder you work and the more detailed you are about your wants and needs then the more successful you are.
Good article Sir, I enjoyed reading it 🙂
Hey Raymond, it takes time hard work and a plan to make money online that’s for sure. There are many ways to do this and some folks get confused as to which way to go. The simple answer is the one that suits you the most.
My advice is to go with a niche you know something about then start writing about it, sharing and promoting and before long you will be getting decent traffic to your website which is potential customer and revenue.
Hey
Nice article, I have considered telecommuting but never did. It is cool to know that not every online opportunity is a scam. Freelancing would be a good gig I believe, for copywriting a lot of people are doind lots of different things at Fiverr. I have used a few of them myself and was satisfied. Save the best for last affiliate marketing at Wealthy Affiliate.
Yes there are loads of ways to make money online, the key ingredients are to get busy, make a plan and keep moving froward. Within time you will find you are either making a good passive income or growing to become a small business online.
Hi Mark,
Thank you very much for sharing ways to make money online. I like they way you showing us the good side and bad side.
Introduce a great community WA to us. It is awesome. Everyone there is friendly. And the great part is step by step training. Anyone can learn so well.
Wealthy Affiliate step by step training is very useful, not only are you being shown how to build your website properly but help is on hand when you get stuck or things just don’t work out the way they should.
Hello Mark,
Nice article. I never thought about adding the telecommuting idea. How did you find out about the customer service call receiver position? Sound like maybe you tried it.
I have been working on a similar stance for work from home ideas. I like the way you bring it out.
Thanks
San
No never tried that myself but I know that a lot of companies are using telecommuting to gain workers. Its cost effective for the company and the client. All you need it a computer a network connection and some time. 🙂
With the world that we now live in finding a way to work from home and make money there is definitely a viable option for so many people.
This is a great article because it shows all the different ways you can do it.
I see you have mentioned telecommuting at the top. I personally do not like this because it inevitably means that you are working for someone. In my opinion that’s a darn of a deal.
In my opinion people should lean more towards blogging and affiliate marketing. This is certainly the best method I can think of as it affords you total time freedom and also the ability to earn as much money as you can and are not limited to an upper tier salary level.
Yes affiliate marketing means you are working for yourself and what you earn is yours, however for some people starting out it can be nice to earn a few dollars here and there working for someone else as you learn how to do it for yourself. You can use that income to pay for services going forward.
Great review of probably the best ways to work from home on internet! Thanks for sharing your knowledge! I am glad to say that I have followed your last advice and started the awesome training! I learn something new everyday and the best is that it is not hard to understand the “lessons” at all.
Thanks again/ John
Good for you John you will not be unhappy with your decision. WA has got it all for learning how to make money online.
Hi, Mark.
It is a good thing that you have mentioned how to work online from home. Many people are struggling to choose the right platform to build their online business because a lot of scams out there. With your post here, clearly make people choose the right career path and quit their 9 to 5 job.
Cheer,
Calvin
There are many scams on the internet that is for sure. I think people are getting more savvy to what they will pay money for and so your reviews need to provide GREAT detail of the product you are promoting.
By being upfront and transparent in everything you do you can build trust and a good following of people looking to make money from home online.
Hi Mark I know a lot of people are looking for the best ways to make money online from home. I hadn’t heard of telecommuting but you explained the advantages and disadvantages of it very clearly.
As Rufat said in a comment up above, there are so many scams out there that if you can try something before you buy, as in the Wealthy Affiliate programme, then that is a great advantage.
With Wealthy Affililate you know it isn’t a scam or they wouldn’t let you in to try it for free!
That is one of the strong selling points for Wealthy Affiliate is that you get to try before you buy.
It was not always that way I had a week to make my mind up for a dollar bought during a Black Friday promotion.
It went straight up to $47 after that, luckily I had the cash to pay yearly on the next promotion and got it for $299 my current price for the year.
That’s only $25 per month for web hosting of 50 websites plus all the training, to me that is a steal.
These are all great ways to work from home. Many companies in many industries now offer telecommuting. For many people, they just need to ask their boss and they could start working from home. The freelancing is something anyone can do. It can be challenging at first to find clients since you are new but many people do it all the time.
Yes Kim starting out as a Freelancer can be daunting especially when no one knows your work and you.
You need to just do a few gigs that pay low money to start with but make sure you do a good job so you will get high ratings and positive feedback.
That way you can grow your portfolio and proceed to better paid jobs.
Its like any business you need to start on the bottom run and work up the ladder.
This is a great post and I am sure it will help people that are looking for a way to work from home. I personally have been working from home since 2009 and I truly enjoy that I do not have to drive anywhere to go to work. This means I can sleep later and even work in my PJs if I want to.
The one thing that many fail to realize about a work from home opportunity is that you will have to work as hard as you would if you went to an office. Working from home is no easier as far as workload as someone that sits in an office. But working from home is fun for the reasons I mention above. I know I will never go back to working in an office again.
Very true Robert you need to put in the hours at home to make sure your income still comes in. If you are thinking it will be easy you may be fooling yourself.
However if you put in the hard work at the beginning you may find as time moves forward and steady income comes in you can treat yourself to days off or vacations.
The fun thing about working from home is you can be very flexible with your hours.
You can work early and take the rest of the day off or start late and work longer or split it up if you have something to do in the middle of the day.
You can also miss a day and work hard for the next two. Its completely up to you as long as you cover all the tasks for the day/week when you do them is up to you. 🙂
I agree 🙂 Telecommuting increases productivity and is cost effective 🙂
Telecommuting can be a good fit for some people working for a corporation from home and negating the need to travel to your job. You can save easily an hour a day not having to commute to and fro and save on travel costs.
You may need to include the cost of heating and lights while working at home as an outlay but if you are savvy you can keep these costs down.
Great article Mark! I think your article can be very helpful to those looking for a legit program to start making money online because with so many scams out there it’s really extremely difficult to know which program is a scam and which one is genuine. I think affiliate marketing is the best option if you want to make serious money, but it requires time and effort.
Yes Rufat the internet is full of scamming programs. Programs set up to target those with no idea what they are getting into with promises of making loads of money.
The problem is newbies have no clue as to what can be possible and how it works so they jump on these get rich schemes.
Its sad really as there are loads of legit programs that will make money but it takes hard work and commitment.