How to Switch to Working Online & Make it Through the Coronavirus Pandemic

With a COVID-19 pandemic outbreak, it became a lot tougher to make money staying put during so many layoffs and job losses. Not every industry or business can go completely online and be as effective in the virtual space as it was before the chaos. It seems like the virus has sparked a demand for new approaches in handling business ventures and income earnings. We live in a world of social distancing now. Work from home becomes a “new normal” tuning workers to virtual space, rewriting policies and procedures, setting up new measures for corporate aims.

It seems like the coronavirus pandemic hit marked a new era of maintaining business processes, online job interviews, and video conferences. Even such a corporate global giant like Amazon, being under the social duress of financial crisis, hires remotely now.

Obviously, many of us face the challenge of conveying into new realities. This transition can be especially tricky if a person has never worked from home before. How to find ways to make a switch and move online? What if your skills are not in demand by the job markets anymore? This post will help you to find more ideas about learning new skills, getting back on track, and making your life okay during the lockdown.

Make money by streaming on gaming platforms

Are you an adrenaline junky who plays online games for the most part of your day? Try yourself as a streamer. Play on the world’s largest gaming platform called Twitch. Earn extra cash on Twitch by playing and building an audience of followers. The process of growing followers is tricky. Streaming all day long is a tiring process, but it will give you a good chance to build a sizable audience quicker. Your channel will become consistent and much more competitive to others. If you’d invest some effort into your channel making it educational but yet entertaining, you’ll earn money faster.

Also, don’t omit such a useful feature of Twitch like popular chats. Make sure that you will be engaged in active communication with your followers while doing streams. Some people make decent money streaming on Twitch through channel monetization and sponsorships offered by popular brands, donations, and contributions from fans, by selling products. Other options for earning are selling subscriptions and through Twitch ads. And after all, the potential of Twitch is just as high as blogging on the YouTube platform.

Go through your closet for the “it must go” stuff and offer it for sale

People accumulate clothes and other different stuff that end up just sitting around being stashed in the closet. And it’s normal. If you think that you bought more stuff you actually need, sell it on the online platforms. Of course, going through things to decide what to give up or what you can’t be a challenge.

First, review what you haven’t been wearing or used for the last year or so. This is a good strategy to find clothing or apparel you can give up for sale. Fashion items, even if used, will always have a price tag of some kind. Pick sites or platforms that sell second-hand clothes, such as Tradesy, Poshmark, TheRealReal, Refashioner, or ThredUp. You will be surprised how many platforms out there which sell second-hand fashion items. 

Another way is to find people on the Internet who usually create groups with the intention to sell stuff. Talk to people who can teach you how it needs to be done. Try yourself as a retailer by creating a store in the virtual space. It is easy to do with the Oberlo marketplace.

Deliver groceries with DoorDash

Now even more people are locked up in their houses under quarantine voluntarily. Grocery stores, bars, and restaurants are places where they don’t go out to eat anymore being afraid of catching a disease. This current situation is harsh especially on older people who are already affected by health issues. Since many grocery stores get short on supplies, shoppers need to spend extra time browsing for stuff they need.  Providing delivery services to a local community will bring you some extra money. 

Some good delivery services collecting orders through the submission online are Postmates, DoorDash, Uber Eats. These services proved themselves handy and are ready to pay up to $12 p/h for meal delivery service. Once you decide to try this option, read all guidelines issued by the state or federal authorities regarding safety procedures for COVID-19. Always follow these guidelines and stay safe and healthy.

Become a freelance author with the Textbroker platform

Always liked to write, keep a blog, or just want to share your expertise with others? Turn your passion into a gig that will bring you money. This is easier now with a useful online platform called Textbroker which connects freelance authors across the U.S. To collaborate through this platform, you have to be a lawful U.S. citizen and over 18 years old. Also, providing your personal information by filling out an application form is necessary. A whole process of registration is free of charge. Sign-in just simply by hitting a sign-up button on Textbroker’s homepage.

Then after registering, write a short sample and submit it for review and being rated by editors. If everything is okay and you are accepted, you begin a freelance job by writing blogs, white papers, reviews for products, and other content you can write and sell. If you have any trouble with grammar and spelling, you might look into taking a spelling rules course offered on Grinfer. This step-by-step course will be your greatest aid in getting rid of frustration in spelling and grammar rules.

Educate others with online courses or tutoring online

With all the recent changes caused by the coronavirus epidemic, a public education system switched to distance learning offering teaching online. Make this transition and begin teaching online courses on some of the well-known learning platforms like Udemy, Skillshare, Coursera, or Grinfer. These virtual environments require specific approaches, but you’ll adapt fast. Look at this as a perfect time to be a tutor online and establish yourself as an author of online courses.

The online environment provides total safety in terms of health risks, as well as flexibility in teaching approaches. The best part of this job is that all courses you create will be available for sale in any part of the globe, so you can go internationally. You’ll probably have to do lots of typing. Creating online tutorials, writing e-books, and making content to videos requires time and effort. You’ll benefit from this process by staying very busy for a good chunk of your day boosting your own skills and creating streams of passive income.

Some tutoring platforms to think about:

• Yup – pays $10 – $13 p/h mostly dealing with math and science classes;
• Brainfuse – pay ranges $10-$15 p/h for teaching elementary or college courses;
• Chegg – pays about $20 p/h for teaching such academic courses like calculus or biology (or any other academic course);
• Tutor.com  –  earn from $9 to $13 an hour by tutoring;
• Skooli – earn up to $25 per hour by teaching K-12 courses and college-level classes;
• Grinfer – will let you register, become an author, and set up your online course free of charge. Earnings can be unlimited with selling courses or providing consultations to students.

Website testing can provide you with a decent income

Testing is more for computer geeks whose English language is fluent. If you checked “yes” for both of these requirements, try it and earn extra cash with this Internet side hustle. This job is not something that people do full-time, however, companies pay about $10-$25 per test for this job. 

Today it becomes even more popular since a fair amount of businesses worry about issues regarding their site navigation. To have a broader and clear picture of site functionality, businesses collect side opinions. They need information regarding their websites, products, or services to find out whether they are user-friendly and easily accessible. 

Sharing opinions and providing feedback after testing is a part of the job. To do this job successfully, you’ll just need some basic equipment – a computer with a camera and a microphone since you’ll have to record video material. Also, make sure you have either a Payoneer or PayPal account. This is a must for receiving deposits of money they’ll pay for your job.

Some web resources available internationally:

• Userlytics – pays for 20-minute testing sessions which have been rated positively by clients.
• WhatUsersDo – requires testing of websites before they go live. This company does a detailed screening process, but after one is accepted, it distributes payouts once a month via PayPal.
• UserTesting – highly rated company and popular among such large corporations like Apple, eBay, Twitter, Yahoo!, etc. Pays $10 for every 20-minute video. You will be receiving deposits via PayPal.
• TryMyUI – popular and highly rated but won’t accept hasty feedback or half-hearted efforts from testers. Pays $10 per 20-minute session and asks for submitting recordings of sessions via video and audio.
• IntelliZoom – pays $2 for surveys and $10 for videos that need to be about 10-20 minutes in length.
• StartUpLift – pays about $5 per each “feedback”.
• Validately – this company hires experienced testers and offers up to $100 per each test.
• uTest – this platform has been created for collaboration with independent contractors worldwide. It does quality assurance testing for different types of software or hardware. Start with filling out an application form and submit it online, then take an audition test. This test is required as a showcase that will prove your tech skills and capabilities. They usually send all assignments via email.

Stay safe and find your way to make money online.