How to Find Online Jobs

Confucius gets quoted on this a lot: choose work you love and it stops feeling like work. Whether or not that holds up, plenty of people now want that work to happen from a laptop at the kitchen table. If that's you, this is a walk through what online work actually looks like and where to start looking.

So what counts as an online job? Roughly, anything you can do from a screen without commuting into an office. People call it working from home, or telecommuting. The usual examples are freelance writing, teaching, research, and data entry. Some of it runs through a company's platform or dashboard; some of it happens on your own computer or tablet. The appeal is obvious on a cold, snowy, or rainy morning when you never have to step outside.

It isn't all upside, though. Working alone can get quiet, particularly if you live by yourself, or the opposite problem if you're trying to focus while kids and a partner are home. Benefits are a gamble too, since some employers offer them and some don't, and that uncertainty lands hard on a family budget. There's also the fact that work follows you around. Your desk is in your house, so you end up logging extra hours or stewing after dinner about something that went sideways earlier.

For the right person, none of that outweighs the gains. Introverts who don't need a buzzing room around them tend to do well. It also opens a door for anyone who needs income but can't manage a traditional workplace because of a disability or illness. You spend less on gas. And you're close by if your spouse or children need you. Not everyone fits this mold, but if you do, the market has plenty to offer.

On the job-search side, a few sites specialize in remote listings. One, called Online Jobs, lets you enter what you're after and returns matching positions with details and contact info at no cost. Another, Jobs Online, works much like the first and covers openings nationwide; you plug in a title, company, keyword, and zip code, similar to Monster.com or Careerbuilder.com but weighted toward remote roles. Internet Job Store lists somewhere around 70,000 online positions by area. Simply Hired carries over 200,000 and lets you filter by skills, title, or company alongside location to pull up a list.

Now to the kinds of work itself. Blogging and web writing have gone from hobby to actual paycheck over the past several years. Some writers post short pieces on their own sites for free; others get paid to write company blogs about products or specialized subjects. You can share your posts on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram. On Yahoo! Finance's list of top online jobs, blogging and web writing landed at number nine.

Medical transcription is another one that pays. It's a healthcare role that puts you alongside medical professionals, dictating notes, filing claims and documents, and keeping medical terminology straight. You'll need training and certification before you can take it on.

Freelance writing and editing cover a wide range. You might work on print books or online ones, set your own hours, and pick projects that suit your schedule and strengths. A niche or specialty is where the money gets better.

Teaching online is its own category. You'd run classes over video chat, conference calls, or a course room, posting a syllabus for students to read against online texts and respond to. Tests and exams happen online too, as does turning in coursework and getting grades back. The whole cycle lives on a screen.

If none of the specialized sites grab you, a plain internet search works fine. Try terms like online jobs, work-at-home jobs, telecommuting, freelance writing or graphic design jobs, and internet jobs, and see what surfaces.

References: Smith, J. (2013). 30 motivational quotes for job seekers. Forbes. The Wall Street Journal. (2015). How to search for a job online.