If you have any administrative skills that you feel you could be putting to better use, why not find some work via your home computer?
The beauty of the internet is that you can actually work for people in lots of different countries without leaving your own home. Work is sent via email and so long as you are quick and efficient you will have a deluge of clients who are desperate to find someone who can do the job they need doing.
Why work in a stuffy office when you can work from home doing exactly the same kind of thing for a wide range of people, choosing when you want to work and taking control of your own life?
Virtual assistants are everywhere nowadays. The combination of email, online messaging systems and telephones has made it easy to keep in touch with people from all over the world. You don’t need to be able to hand someone a solid document anymore – you simply attach it to an email and off it goes, arriving in the inbox of your recipient in just a few seconds.
Virtual assistants have a wide range of skills so it doesn’t matter if you don’t have all of them; in fact it can often work in your favor if you can demonstrate that you have extensive experience in one area. For example it may be that you are an exceedingly fast typist, or a good researcher, or you have passed all your bookkeeping exams and you are qualified to help people with keeping their own records.
But how do you find the work in the first place?
The best thing to do is to visit one of the many online job sites that invite freelancers to sign up and look for work. Employers (often self employed freelancers themselves) post the work they have available and if you like the look of the job and you want to bid on it you do so, making sure you post a realistic bid and you are happy to do the work for that amount should you win the job.
Be persistent to begin with, since it may take a short while to get that first contract, but once you are off and running you will soon start winning other assignments. Most sites offer a feedback rating tool and once your feedback starts going up more people will give you the chance to work for them.
It is a good idea to join more than one site since there are a number of them around and you may find you like one more than another, or you get more work from one as compared to another. Make sure you keep accurate records of everything you do and take the time to develop a good personal profile, listing your talents, achievements and skills so that other people can read them and make a decision on whether or not to hire you.
You will often find that once you get a few paying clients they will come back to you for more work in the future. While these websites take a small commission for essentially matching clients with freelancers, in the future you will be able to work for them directly, which will make a difference to your profits.
So think about all the skills you could offer to people from home. No matter what they are, you are certain to find someone somewhere who is in dire need of them.
Before you rush off in search of those freelance sites, leave a comment below to tell us what you think of this idea. It could change your life!