7 Work-from-home Jobs that Can Turn Into Careers
Almost everyone spends their time at work daydreaming of the opportunity to work from home. Visions of sweatpants and warm bedding dance around in their heads, before they’re rudely snapped back to their freezing corporate cubicle. But rarely does an office-dweller dream of the hard work and decisions it takes to make working from home work for them. To work from home, especially if you want to work for yourself, you need a solid plan. How you monetize your skills is of the utmost importance. Here are 7 work-from-home possibilities that can turn into a full-time career for you.
1. Put Your Graphic Design Skills to Work
Do you have legitimate skills when it comes to graphic design? Typography is trending, and stationery, greeting cards, posters and other printables are in hot demand. Designing your collections is the hardest part. Then you simply get them up on a site like Etsy or GetAssist for consumers to pay and download!
- Alterations at Home
If you know your way around a thread and needle, consider starting a seamstress business from the comfort of your own home. Many people are always searching for a reliable contact, so focus on securing business through referrals online.
- Be the Light
Craft candles are becoming almost as popular as craft beer. Consumers are looking beyond big-box stores for products that are all-natural and packaged with a hand-crafted touch. The more niche your products, the better. For example, a wine-scented candle line or rustic, outdoorsy scents in mason jars. Take a local workshop or two and consider creating your own candle company from home!
- Blog All Day, Every Day
You may not think blogging is a “real” job, but for a lucky (hardworking) few, blogging brings in the big bucks. If you’re extremely passionate about something, say travel or fashion, start following and analyzing all your favorite bloggers in that space. What do they do hourly, daily, weekly to ensure success? What connections do they nurture? What platforms are they on? If you want to be a professional blogger, it’s all about finding the right mentor.
- Couch Surf as a Pet Sitter
You may not always be working from your own home, depending on the arrangements and your service offerings, but you’ll always be working from someone’s home. If you’re good with pets, responsible and not opposed to couch surfing, this could be the perfect position for you.
- Work Others Out, From Home
Depending on your training style, personal trainers and even simply fitness enthusiasts can easily start one-on-one training sessions from the comfort of their own home. Many fitness newbies are intimidated by overly ripped gym rats they can’t relate to. They’d much rather have someone to act as a caring mentor who can get to know them personally.
- Social Consulting
Most local small businesses and entrepreneurs can’t afford the services of your area’s marketing agencies. Fill the void by providing the services they’re searching for on a smaller level. If you’re already in the marketing field, this transition to working for yourself will become even easier. Learn all you can in your current position, especially the part about finding, securing and keeping clients, and you’re off to the races!
Laurent Lapierre, an assistant professor at the University of Ottawa with a specialty in work-life balance, says working from home, or “telework,” requires the right mix of a good work environment, strong self-discipline and the ability to put aside the enough time to complete your work properly.
If the above aren’t in place, Lapierre warns you could face trouble. “You’re not going to be able to get your work done,” he says, “which means you’re going to make an unfavourable impression — and that is certainly not going to be conducive to a successful career.”
Whatever your work-from-home aspirations may be, the important part is to learn how to market yourself online. Monetizing your skills is easy when you have an interested audience! Consider joining GetAssist to announce your new services and/or goods to your local community through a blog or public page, today!
