Article: Chasing the digital work from home dream.
Article: Chasing the digital work from home dream.
Part One.
Before we get in-depth with this article let’s loosely clarify some simple definitions of what a Home Worker, Internet-Worker, Telecommuter, Mobile Worker, Digital Worker, Remote Worker, Virtual worker etc. actually is.
Please keep in mind that there is a lot of room for interpretation.
There are three basic and slightly different kinds of work at home people:
#1. The Work from home Employee has continuing employment with a company that has enabled them to carry out their digital duties from their home.
#2. The work at home Worker, this is the more generalized definition, it usually means a person who works for various different companies online carrying out a wide variety of tasks.
#3. The self-employed small business owner, this usually means somebody who owns a business and most of their work is on a computer and/or uses the internet. Yes, most small-business owners do use a computer to help manage their business. However, for this article we are talking mainly about people whose business is “on” the internet and or uses a computer almost exclusively for their tasks.
For this article and to keep it simple, these terms can be interchangeable.
How this glorious mess started…
Don’t worry, there will NOT be some huge boring internet history lesson. Just the mention that since the early days of when the internet first became available to almost everybody with a connection and a computer up until the present day, many people have gained the ability to “Work from home” (WFH)
Most people today understand that not all jobs are compatible with telecommuting. For example, a machine operator working in a factory running a production machine or a delivery driver must be at the job itself.
And as you either already know or can easily imagine people who do most of their work from a computer are already in potential position to work from home.
Many companies are increasingly and actively creating ways for their computer-based employees to be able to work from home.
While some companies have been actively doing this for several years many more are seeking the benefits of having virtual employees and are jumping on the band-wagon by enabling their employees to be able to work from home.
With the increasing power of computers and the internet more and more small business opportunities are also opening up online. Currently “work at home” has become a booming industry with no end in sight.
It has become more of a reality that now more than ever people with nothing other than a computer and an internet connection can have a way to make money using the internet.
Within the last few years, the business effects of the Covid pandemic have also significantly contributed to this trend of employees working from home.
Aside from health reasons, savvy employers are also seeing many additional benefits and advantages to having their employees “Telecommute”.
Companies today are learning to leverage the advantages of having a bigger digital work-force and less of an office force. So much so that they are shifting their business models to becoming remote based companies where most or all their employees are working from the home office instead of the corporate office.
This can be a big win for the companies that do this, one item that can save potential millions of dollars is to cut down on the amount of office space that they need to support, this instantly becomes a huge savings to their bottom line.
As more and more companies down-scale their physical space this also opens up new opportunities for people who have the skills and experience to become work from home temporary contract workers. The benefits to work at home are so numerous that it’s too many to list in this article.
Part Two.
The painfully real and GRIM view from the cube-dweller’s perspective (yes, I lived it)
Let’s take a look at another side of this while we are at it. For many people working in a cubicle-farm or a “bullpen” 10-12 hours a day is a horrible and seemingly never-ending nightmare.
In my humble opinion from my experience (and I’m pretty thick skinned) At its best it is dehumanizing, stressful, and most of all, not an environment that encourages good productivity due to the basic nature of what it is.
In a cube-farm environment you will always have several negative things going on. The chief among them is noise, it’s impossible to have that many people working in a confined, small, type of veal-pen setup and it maintain a consistent level of quiet so that employees can focus on their tasks.
There are constant interruptions, the friend stopping by to say hi, the people 2 rows over talking too loudly, the row of cubes next door to yours having a baby shower or other type of gathering. The person in the next cube wearing enough perfume to scare away the local wild-life and the list goes on.
And since many employees cannot have good productivity in this setting, they cannot advance in their careers which is not just frustrating but also a huge blow to overall morale.
It becomes a vicious cycle.
While not all office situations are toxic like this, many in reality are, and in a way, it sets up otherwise excellent employees for failure and the company for high turn-over rates.
With a few exceptions not many companies actually gain from having vast cube-farms at this point in history when having a virtual work force is often better for productivity, morale, health and cuts overall costs.
While working in a cube one learns quickly just how often their work-flow and concentration becomes disrupted and lost due to co-workers and the usual chaos happening in a “cube-farm” type of office setup.
While working virtual may seem nontraditional to some people, in several aspects the data proves that in most cases the remote worker has an increase in productivity while they are working from home.
There are even some people who are living the remote telecommuter life and have taken things one step further.
They have become “Digital Nomads” (and yes some of them are high-paying professional grade jobs) Some of these “Nomads” make a lot of money on the internet. Often living a considerable distance away from the official company office, living on the road traveling across the country from an RV and telecommuting every day for their work.
Imagine seeing the country and earning a paycheck at the same time!
This situation for some is the best of both worlds!
With our current technology, corporate events and remote meetings are happening every minute of every day around the world. We no longer “have” to get everybody together in a physical location.
The Flip-side of the work at home coin for non-company home workers?
Like anything else, working from a home office can have its own fair share of draw-backs and blessings.
Often, people who have never previously worked from home don’t realize that working from a home office is not a perfect Utopia and has its own unique set of difficulties and challenges that they will need to adjust to. Kids, pets, spouses, and the other daily life at home can cause quite the distraction much like the traditional office.
Even so, if given the choice, most people who have previously experienced the horrors of “The-Cube-Life” would rarely choose to go back into the corporate office environment.
They would much rather work with the small hurdles that working at home puts in front of them over having to deal with a toxic, outdated, and often dysfunctional “professional office environment” type of situation that for the most part became obsolete over two decades ago.
Part Three.
SCAMMERS! and HUCKSTERS! and LIARS! Oh My!
The working from home trend is growing daily. For those not working for companies that have enabled their people to work from home, getting into a company position that provides that type of employment can at times be difficult to say the least.
Those that have no choice but to start from scratch and the smaller entrepreneurs continually run into a huge Scammer problem while searching for legitimate work-at-home ways to earn online.
Sadly, there are many ruthless scam artists out there continually searching for victims to con out of their money by offering over the top and too good to be true super-incredible! and AMAZING! work at home offers that never pan out in the long run.
Maybe at some point while searching for “Legit” work from home or starting your own business opportunities you have come across Ad’s that look similar to these semi-fictional examples:
“How I make OVER $7500 per week copy-and-pasting pictures of my dirty kitchen floor to the internet for EASY MONEY! And I can show you the tricks that can MAKE YOU RICH OVERNIGHT!”
“How I made $9000 a day while doing nothing but pushing the number 3 on my keyboard over and over!”
“Order our SUPER-SECRET REPORT of FORBIDDEN KNOWLEDGE here on the internet where nobody else can see it and we will show you how to make a $1500 per HOUR!”
“I can show you how to work for 2 hours a month and bring home a never-ending eight-figure income using this little-known ancient method using nothing but an old door-knob and some used tooth-picks! ($199 monthly subscription)
OK, those aren’t actual ads, but they easily could be…
We see marketing work from home and small business ads similar to these examples all the time.
Like the old saying goes: “If it sounds too good to be true it probably is”.
The internet con-artists know how the work at home internet business movement is exploding and how desperate some people are to get on board with the gig economy jobs.
They prey upon the mobile worker’s desperation and offer their “Special-method” to you in exchange for a pile of money. They like to blur the line between working at home and the get-rich-quick schemes.
Let’s think about this for a moment:
These 17–23-year-old billionaire gurus need YOUR pile of money so that YOU can buy their get rich quick work from home “Training”.
Keep in mind that many of these internet-filth are very internet savvy and use very simple to ultra-complex tactics to help you part with your money.
They always seem to have a never-ending series of training, classes, and software upgrades available for you to purchase.
“Oh, your program is not working? well then if you purchase the next level of the software, training or pay a huge fee to go to the next seminar THEN you can make money!”
This often becomes a vicious and never-ending cycle that some people get trapped into.
They really try to “appear” to be legitimate. But in the end, even if you do everything correctly and use their system exactly as prescribed you will always end up with a net loss of money and are now stuck with their system that does not work.
We know that these types are always finding new and creative ways to play upon people’s emotions to take their hard-earned money in exchange for some pretty lies and useless programs.
For some odd reason, otherwise intelligent people love to blindly dive right into offers that are on shaky ground from the start.
Do you really think that genuine money-making online companies will have on their web site or brochure a ton of pictures featuring piles of cash, hot cars, super sexy people, luxury houses and palm trees?
HINT: Those images are there to lure you into thinking that you too could have a luxury lifestyle if you buy their program.
One big thing people don’t understand is that smart people can be more gullible than most. Why is that? because smart people think they are “Too-Smart” to fall for these schemes. And that is their down-fall, they have a huge blind-spots that the crooked people are master-level experts at exploiting!
Usually by the time somebody realizes that they have been “played” it’s too late. They cannot get their money or their time investment back; they feel angry, embarrassed, and depressed because they got scammed. And to make things worse, they are now farther from achieving their work from home goals.
Sadly, many of those who have been scammed completely drop the idea of working from home or owning their own internet business and end up going back to the factory, flipping burgers or back to the corporate environment.
Which if you look closely at that situation with a critical eye, is also just another scheme. You work your tail off to enrich somebody else. Yes, you get a pay-check, however you are almost guaranteed to retire poor and never really move up or get to where you want to be financially. But that is a subject for another article.
And then we have yet another class of problem-creators, I call them the “Do-Nothings”.
They offer very official looking programs and training that are by minimum definition of the law “Fully-Legitimate” and above-board, but these programs and methods are lacking in many critical areas.
They skirt the law by staying above board, but their quality of information and training is so low that the results the average person gets trying to use their training program usually ends up being very similar to the results you’d get by using one of the scammers programs. They usually do not work.
I’m sure that some of them might really be trying to help people out, but where it counts, they just don’t seem to have what it takes to help in a real and meaningful way.
Their products usually lack many critical pieces of information because they themselves have never even tried to use it, they make their money from selling their training and NOT using their own product!
People need something real to get them into a position where they can find a real and repeatable ways to make legit-money at home or even a side gig for a few extra bucks.
And then there is this very UGLY truth, if you are easily offended stop reading right here!
The truth is, most people are lazy, sure most don’t like to think of themselves as such but seriously think about this little fact…
This situation would not exist in the first place if a vast amount of people were not already looking for the easy-peasy get-rich-quick methods to make money magically appear into their bank account with zero effort.
This situation reminds me of an old saying, I’m not sure where I heard it, but it goes like this:
” The Junkies create the demand; the Dealers fill that demand” Anon—
It all becomes a cycle where the scammers and the do-nothings try to give people exactly what they want, which is the get rich quick fantasy. But it’s just that, a fantasy.
Oh…your are still here?, and you want more?
OK, here is another dose of truth to make things even MORE Confusing!!!
The fact is, there are “Legit” people and systems out there who are the real deal.
Yes, you read that correctly, there are honest business-people out there who do offer quality work at home products, services, and information.
Their fees are usually reasonable, but the real and big test is that their methods actually do work and are proven systems of earning an income.
Be aware of this one HUGE caveat: The honest systems usually do work but only if YOU put the work back into it! Work in = Money out.
Just to be brutally blunt, nobody is going to hand you a profitable business for no investment of some type on your end. Internet business is not for the lazy or the delusional seeking quick and easy internet Riches.
Part Four:
A bitter truth for some…a ray of hope for others!
Working from home having your own business or working for a company at home is very possible but only if you are smart about it and take the time to honestly educate yourself about the subject.
Let’s face reality, there is no “Magic-Wand” when it comes to any of this.
More and more these days people confuse work-at-home with get-rich-quick schemes, they completely ignore the word “Work”.
If one is truly looking to create a legitimate work at home situation for themselves, they need to do the Homework, foot-work, leg-work and then the actual Work-work! (Yes, that’s a thing)
They need to put actual time and effort and some money into finding the genuine and legitimate ways to earn on the internet. By the way, there are many ways to make money on the internet legally and ethically.
Let’s be real here, yes, when it comes to business it takes money to make money.
To clarify, we are not talking about thousands upon thousands of dollars here, but it’s very likely that to get to the good info and resources you will need to spend some money.
The truth is, there are no short-cuts no matter what the “Gurus” say. You must put in the time and effort to get connected with legit companies or to build an online business where you can work at home.
I strongly recommend before doing anything that you learn how the internet con-artists manipulate people and the tactics that they use to sell their “Quick-and-easy-methods”.
Which is why doing your own homework and really digging into the subject of work at home or telecommuting is crucial.
You must find the truth to get TO the truth!
One must be willing to learn to sift through the pile of scams and garbage to find the “legit” offers out there. And they are out there to be sure.
It’s simple, If you can use a computer, the chances are pretty high that you have used Google or Bing or some other similar type of search-engine.
If you want to get serious about internet money making first learn to use a search engine to focus in on what exactly you are looking for and to discover scams and the red-flags, learn the invaluable skill of being able to spot the difference between what a legit offer looks like and what a pile of junk looks like. It’s not as simple as it sounds but it is very do-able!
Part Five.
The Ultimate hunt…Stalking the Digital Unicorn!
When it comes to work at home or making money on the internet the old saying: “If it was easy to do then everybody would do it” applies in every way possible.
If you take an in-depth look at how the genuine and successful work at home types of workers do things. You will find that they work their tails off! In fact, they work at it like it’s their JOB! (Get it?)
Everything from making a full time to a part time income while working from home using the internet is possible. However, you could make all of the right moves, you might also avoid all of the scams and still end up failing.
Remember that nothing is ever guaranteed. That is simply the way of the world. In truth nobody can guarantee anything. But on the other hand, you could also make some smart moves and get into something very reasonable and earn a lot of money!
Almost anything “can” happen, however some things are more likely “to” happen over others.
Being serious about employment from home means that you are honestly willing to put real time and effort into it, be willing to dig in and do your homework.
There are thousands of career listings on the internet, do you have the willpower to sift through a big pile of them to zero in on what you want?
Taking the time to Learn about the different internet scams and pit-falls is also an invaluable place to start along with looking for what exactly you want to do on the internet to make money.
Know that it does take time to explore the legitimate ways that people use to earn a living on the internet. Knowing both sides of this coin will help you in so many ways, it’s crazy!
If you can learn then your chances of achieving the real goal of working from home will go up dramatically compared to those who are only willing to put in a small amount of time and effort expecting to “get rich quick”.
Yes, the internet really is a gold-mine, yes, the internet is the world’s largest marketplace, yes there are real and regular people who are not software or marketing geniuses who have worked hard, made smart moves and who do make a very good living every day on the internet.
Pro-Tip: The genuine work at home systems or offers have one thing in common, it’s real and actual work. There are real tasks to work on and real goals that need to be achieved through a lot of actual work. A legit work at home deal will try to teach you the real steps needed before you can make any money.
The truly knowledgeable professional internet teachers out there usually provide a ton of free and valuable info to get you started and usually a simple way to get their guidance if you need more help.
Keep in mind that yes, they are also business-people who are trying to earn a living and make money and yes, they will probably charge a fee for their time and effort to spoon-feed their hard-won knowledge to you.
And to be honest, that is totally legit and OK, after all, the basis of business is trading one thing of value for another.
If you don’t like that ancient fact of life perhaps starting your own business or seeking a work at home situation is not right for you. Perhaps delivering pizza will help you achieve your goals?
One of the biggest, oldest and most often told stories in the world is the story of people wanting to get rich quick and easy.
Sorry to burst any bubbles out there but that simple path does not really exist for most people.
Maybe one out of millions of people might stumble upon a rare and lucrative internet deal but for most people the odds are firmly against them for making a quick buck.
The odds are against them because they are not willing to do the work, they insist upon holding on to the childish and unrealistic fantasy of “Getting rich quick”.
Most people will never make any decent money on the internet because they want it handed to them without having to do any real work.
Sorry to make this huge of a point but it IS the heart of “why” most people never get anywhere.
Sure, there are the scammers to deal with and all of that mess but the whole story is much bigger and more complex than that.
Part Six.
Here we GO!
“If you have half a brain…if you’re not a complete dumb-ass…you CAN make a living from using the internet!” Anon—
Working from home, telecommuting, digital nomad, social networking jobs, money from the internet jobs and actual work at home systems are really out there.
They really do exist, and you can find them. They are not some weird unobtainable or mythological “Digital Unicorn” type of situation.
Here’s the straight-scoop, it can and often does take a lot of study and long hours of real work to earn a living online (Excluding a company who has set up their employee to telecommute)
Unless you catch a lucky break working at home, finding something legitimate to work on at home to earn a living, can be a super difficult situation to understand and to get positive results from.
This is the truth of it: The competition is high; the workload is large; the scammers are ruthless and always out in force trying to rip honest people off. Not to mention that the learning curve can be quite steep.
But hold on a second…with some basic common-sense it’s not Impossible!
Aside from a good computer and a solid internet connection the single biggest asset, the most critical and Powerful “Skill” that you ALREADY possess is the ability to LEARN!
Yes, that’s right, if you can learn new things, if you can slow down and really try to understand how it all works and fits together you can put yourself into a position to become successful using the internet as a job, side-gig, home business etc.
The proof is this: Regular non-expert people make it happen every day all day year-round. This is a fact.
“But how do I learn internet stuff?”
It’s easier than you think, almost anybody can learn how to learn! If you are a functional human being, you already know how to do this and have been since you were a child.
The ability to learn is one of the single most powerful tools that you already have, this fact cannot be stated enough, the ability to learn is the single most helpful and powerful tool that you already have!
And the more you use this tool, the stronger it gets and the easier it gets to learn even more new things!
Sure, some people might need to polish that skill up a bit, however it’s always right there inside of you because YOU ALREADY OWN it! (You go you!)
Time to learn all the stuff!
The first thing that I would like to recommend is to conduct a basic search-engine search for things like: “Free work at home education, Free home business learning, Free affiliate marketing training, Free online marketing training, Free internet training”.
There is an amazingly large list of jobs, work and other money-making things that can be done on the internet to choose from.
Those are just some of the basic examples of the search-terms that you can use, there are probably thousands of other similar combinations, but you get the idea.
You will notice in my example that the first word I use is: “Free”, most people like free stuff and considering how huge the internet is, if you can do a bit of search-engine digging you can usually find a large amount of solid free training for internet related subjects.
At first, I strongly recommend that you focus only on the 100% free sources and online classes. I say this because there is a huge number of pay-for-learning deals out there. And at first you will probably waste your time and money on some of them until you learn how to find out what is the real deal and what is junk or just not that good.
Avoid starting off on the wrong foot and focus on getting into the free stuff for now.
Time to learn more stuff about other stuff…which leads to yet more stuff!
Next, spend some time learning! Binge-watching the videos, take the classes, read the article like this one, book mark the good stuff, make a simple list to keep track of the good stuff and the junk.
It doesn’t need to be some big, complicated spread-sheet or anything, just a basic list will work just fine.
I recommend YouTube, Udemy, and using Google to search for more free classes. I know there is a mind-blowing number of free resources out there if you can dig them out.
The point is to use whatever free sources that you think will work first and fully take advantage of them, this knowledge gained will then help you to move on to the next one and on and on…
When it comes to educational videos YouTube has a ton of free internet learning material available. Yes, many of the videos are also trying to sell you on their learning product but that’s OK since you know this up-front.
You are not “obligated” to make a purchase of what they are trying to sell just because you watched their video. Watch them, learn from them, gain what you can from them.
Perhaps later on when you have a better idea of what you really want and have a better idea of what you are looking for then go back and purchase their course. Just be smart about it. Check out some reviews of their product and see what the deal is before you pay for a class.
When you first start down this path it might not seem like it but every video, every article every small class on this will help you to understand.
Nobody will become an expert overnight, keep in mind that even a little progress at a time adds up to much bigger things!
After a while you will begin to see patterns in the classes that are offered, and the videos and information offered. You will see one saying one thing and then another saying something contradictory! And at other times you will also see them saying and teaching the exact same things!
There is nothing weird about this situation, it is 100% internet-normal. It’s ok to be a bit confused at first.
It is to your advantage once you get to the point of where you can notice these phenomena, seeing the overall situation and the different patterns because it confirms that you are in fact learning and on the right track!
No sugar-coating, it will take time to do this, remember there is no “get rich quick” or “fast money” All of this will take time. What you put into it is what you will get out of it.
The more of this information that you digest and absorb into your brain the more you will be able to focus in on the critical information and be able to tell the difference and “see” what good information looks like and what is clearly junk.
In other words, the more you look at the subject more you will be able to tell the gold from the garbage.
This simple skill in itself will save you money, frustration and also empower you to seek more accurate information. Which will help you to move forward.
Part Seven.
Ah Ha!….Now the real learning begins!
Once you have found reliable and credible sources of learning about your work at home subject. Then dig-in. Set goals to learn more.
However, please keep in mind that there is no need to burn yourself out, there is no point to being a maniac and trying to learn this huge subject overnight.
I strongly recommend that you do take breaks, I recommend that you do not make yourself miserable with this, you still need to live your life!
Then, once you have caught your breath get back to it and keep learning more!
It’s all about being smart, learning the subject and paying your dues; I know nobody wants to hear that, it’s an old and tired cliché but it is 100% true.
If you are currently still reading this article, that alone should tell you that you are probably a bit closer to being truly serious about this then most people will ever be.
It’s true, just by reading this far you have proven that you might have what it takes to really pull this off!
Onward.
The learning never really stops. Once you focus on your subject you will keep finding more layers and new tid-bits of information to use. That is a good sign, it means that you have achieved another and deeper level of understanding of the overall subject.
Eventually the learning will slow down however, once you get to this point this is when you should start to take action and begin work on the first steps of taking action.
You will know when you probably should get more hands-on and when it’s time to start building web-sites, starting that home business, becoming an entrepreneur, or getting that coding or software certificate.
This is the time when you should seriously consider taking that hard-won knowledge and putting it into action by “Lining up your ducks-for-real” this in itself is a huge and critical step.
Think about this, you could become very knowledgeable and still completely miss the mark because you short-changed yourself on the planning. This is where most fail, they don’t make even a simple plan, they expect that since they have learned all of this stuff that somehow…by magic…. that money will just appear in their bank accounts!
That being said, it is crucial that you do take your time and carefully think about what you want and how to do it. Ask yourself what is my next move?
Plans can and do change, that is totally 100% ok, but HAVE a plan, remember it’s your plan so you can work it how you want. It can be as simple or as complex as you want it to be. It can change every day.
Remember this, having a Map is way better than having no Map. This is one of the few things that will actually give you real help to get where you are trying to get to. With no map you cannot reasonably move forward in a meaningful way until you make one.
I cannot emphasize enough how critical is it to do the research on what it takes to start a business or to embark upon a new career using the internet.
Taking action is of equal value with gaining knowledge. Knowledge plus smart Action = Win!
You can have all the knowledge in the world of something but if you do not act on that information in a realistic way, it’s worthless.
Take a look at the achievers out there in history, business, science, entertainment, sports anything that you can think of. (There are many to choose from) They all for the most part share some very common methods and traits.
And usually it’s stupid-simple: In most cases they learned stuff and then they did stuff!
They took action and learned or learned and then took action, the order doesn’t always matter.
With some things we learn better by doing. As for the internet you can learn that way if you are smart about it.
When I started learning to create websites, I’d watch a few videos and then hop on to my site editor and play around and build test-sites. And I always learned from doing that. Heck, I am still learning to this day!
The point is that the achievers in this world used those two things side by side as they needed to invent that new thing, or to build that amazing new product, or to do that cool thing in the sports arena.
The awesome thing about this is that you can do this too!
Hey, I’m not making this up! (Seriously)
You do not need to be a genius or some type of super software-internet expert to make money on the internet. However, you will need to learn and to take smart action and yes even to fail.
Have no doubts, at some point you will have some failures but that is also when you will learn the Most!
Often you will find that some failures can be a gold-mine of information! But only if you are willing to get over yourself and look for those gems of knowledge when you feel a stupid for making mistakes.
Sadly, many people take their failures to heart and stop what they are doing and give up.
The serious people, however, will stop, take a deep breath, and look at what went wrong. They will look over why their online store failed, they will look over the data to learn why their blog didn’t do so well.
They stand back up and gather even more knowledge and gain a deeper insight which will help them to come back more powerful, stronger, and savvier to the realities of what needs to be done.
Those types will make it. It’s all about your willpower, if you want something real you will have to spend your real time, money, and effort to get there.
I will let you in on a HUGE SECRET! Getting there is possible, getting there is real, getting there is achievable…. You just have DO it!
To help out here are some links to get people started:
Disclosure*
I am the owner of an online marketing company. The following links are for some of the affiliate products that I offer. Yes, if you order something I will get a small fee. Hey, I like to be open and honest as possible and to lead by being a positive and transparent business example.
Hopefully these might help you!
Use this link to work from Home with Twitter, Face Book, and some others:
Use this link for work from home Writing jobs:
If you’re an experienced internet user and businessperson here is a small business offer called: