5 Ways I Make Money Working From Home

Nowadays many people prefer to stay away from 9-5 jobs and really value and desire the ability to work remotely. Does it sound like you? Whether you want to make money working from home or from a tropical destination with a view of the ocean, I’ll share a few ways I do so.

In the last 9 years or so I have moved about 10 times, so I’ve had to get creative about ways to make some money from wherever home was at the moment. I have to admit that I’m fortunate to have a partner who works and makes most of the income in the household, so whatever I make is in addition to that.

I wouldn’t be able to “make a living” but I can help with paying some bills, occasionally buying groceries, and spending money for fun on the weekends. But I also haven’t tried that hard, for the same reason. If we needed it, I could spend more time working on the ways I already do and make even more money. I do turn down jobs. Especially now that my time is limited with a baby at home.

So, here are 5 ways I make money working from home:

(You could also use these income ideas for working abroad!)

1. Freelance Writing

This is the main way I make money working from home and it’s thanks to this blog. I’m a writer at CopyPress an agency for marketing services. Anyone with a blog can apply to be a writer and you can apply to be an editor as well. CopyPress works with big clients like Hipmunk and Skyscanner who provide guidelines for a requested job.

I get assignments from these companies and others via CopyPress to write travel articles including a link they provide and publish them on my blog. What’s great is that you have creative freedom. I can choose what to write about as long as I follow the guidelines and include their link.

I get contacted by travel companies because I have a travel blog, but I believe they work with different companies and topics.

Sometimes they also request articles for them to publish on their site. Like this London Travel Guide I wrote for Skyscanner.

Payment is usually based on the DA (Domain Authority) of your blog. Payments do take a while to come through (maybe a couple months), but once you get through the first pay period and you finish assignments every month, then you get paid monthly or even bi-monthly.

2. Translation

I’m bilingual, which is truly a very useful skill to have and one that pays. For a couple of years, I’ve been using the website People Per Hour (PPH) to provide English-Spanish translation services. I have my profile and clients can either contact me directly for a job, or I can submit a proposal for a posted job. You set your own rate.

In addition to translation, I also offer English and Spanish proofreading services, as well as research services. The latter provides as many 1-hour slots as the client wants to pay for me to research on any given topic. This often includes researching a market and statistics for people who are looking to start a business in such market. These services are all found on my profile on PPH.

But you don’t have to be bilingual. If you have any computer skills that can be provided remotely including design, web development, video/photo/audio, and marketing and social media, you can sell your services!

While PPH does take a fee/commission every time you get paid, the site is very convenient for getting work and you can easily transfer the funds to a PayPal account.

3. Sponsored posts and links

Sponsored posts and links pay well if you find clients willing to pay well. My favourite part of this way of working from home, is that the clients come to you. Starting a blog is easy and if you nurture it, you can gain a lot from it. If you end up with a quality blog, then you randomly get emails from interested parties to pay you to link their businesses. They pay you to write a blog post that is relevant to your blog, and naturally include their link.

This allows you to write about whatever you want, providing something useful and interesting to your readers, and simply implementing the client’s link in a non-invasive but helpful way.

Another thing I like about this, is that it often gives you the inspiration to write about something you wouldn’t think about. For example, a photo booth business can inspire you to write about how to save travel memories! While some are more obvious, and a link to hotels in Montreal creates inspiration to write about the best things to do in Montreal.

Some clients will offer as little as $15 per post, and some will offer more than $100. So it’s up to you how low you are willing to go. There are many articles online on what to charge for sponsored posts based on your blog’s statistics.

4. Ads

I use Google Adsense, but there are several advertisement options you can implement on your blog. But for the freedom of placement and better earnings, you’ll need a self-hosted blog.

With Google Adsense, you get a payment every time you reach $100. There are some ad companies like Mediavine that require you to have a minimum amount of visitors. You can also sell ad space to any company they’d be interested in placing an ad in your blog. The pricing depends on the size and the location of the ad on your blog.

This is one easy way to make money working from home. It doesn’t pay much, but it also doesn’t require much work. You can just see the payments roll in every month. With Google Adsense, you get paid every time you reach $100.

5. Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate linking means you get a commission for every person that buys the product or signs up for the service you’re linking to. Some also pay for just the click. So, there are different types of affiliate payment: Pay-per-sale, Pay-per-click, and Pay-per-lead.

I’m a member of the Amazon Associates affiliate program and ShareASale. There are several other good ones including Rakuten Linkshare and Clickbank.

Affiliate programs are both beneficial for the merchant and the affiliate marketer. So it’s a win-win. And if you’re good at it, you can offer your readership useful, relevant, and good products or services, which they’ll appreciate.

You can link to products here and there, you can write a blog post really selling one specific product, or you can write blog posts that include many different products like gift guides, which are actually very fun to put together. Looking for the best travel gifts under $50?

Note that many times, legally, you have to provide disclosure to your readers about sponsored posts and affiliate links. There are different ways to do this, including at the end of the post or permanently somewhere on your blog.

So, there you go. You can get started on working from home anytime! Do you have other ways you make money remotely?