Even OFWs experience being penniless every once in a while where we are counting the days when we will receive our salary. Or we try to survive on a college student diet (cup noodles and the ever reliable canned tuna, canned luncheon meat and corn beef) while budgeting our remaining money.
Isn’t it a shared dream amongst us OFWs to spend without being concern with a budget? So why not take an online part time job and spend less time Netflix-ing and chilling and more time earning those dirhams, riyals or dinars? Be it for emergencies or if you really just could not forget about that pair of shoes you saw at the mall last night.
Be a blogger
Being a blogger takes a lot of time and effort, not to mention it takes time before it starts being lucrative. There are a lot of ways to make money while blogging (although I am still a broke blogger).
The first thing to do to make money as a blogger is to increase traffic to your blog and you could do this by doing the following:
- Post valuable content (Know your niche!)
OFW Talks is all about OFW life. This is our niche. If you are serious about blogging, knowing your niche is vital. It will help you write valuable content and will be the reason why readers will flock to your blog on a daily basis. Consider something you are passionate about, but don’t forget there must be a “market” for your blog’s niche.
Sample blog niches: Making money (obviously), Food, Travel, Fashion, Lifestyle, Personal Development
Try to find a new twist to these niches so as to stand out in the blogosphere.
- Be consistent
Don’t write a blog post this week then nothing next week. Readers will think you’re flaky and will not visit your blog anymore. If the readers know you are posting every Saturdays, don’t post any other day. Unless you have informed your readers beforehand or it is an “extra” post and you will still post on the day you are supposed to post.
- Be active in social media
Chances are your readers will want to subscribe in your blog’s social media accounts. This will help generate new readers to your blog as well. It is also a perfect platform to let your readers know about blog posts they might have missed and a channel for you to reach out and communicate with your readers.
Now you might be thinking how you will actually start earning money when you have done all three and you managed to rake in thousand of readers?
- Ads / Private Ads
Google AdSense is perhaps the most well known by bloggers. This program is owned and maintained by Google in collaboration with bloggers’ websites where advertisements are administered to a targeted audience. Bloggers generate income either by readers clicking on the ad or per number of readers who see the ad (hence why you should need to have at least thousands of readers). There are some requirements though and not every blog/website is eligible to run some ads for Google.
You could also communicate with advertising agencies. But this will only work if the agencies’ client’s customers are your readers. For example, if the agency is serving a make up company, they will of course collaborate with beauty and fashion bloggers.
- Affiliate Links
Cooperate with those entrepreneurs. Write a blog post about their products and include links where the readers (aka possible buyers) will be able to buy said product. How this usually work, is if a buyer was able to buy product using the link in your blog, you earn commission.
- Digital Products / Printables
If you are not successful in finding an agency or an entrepreneur to work with, don’t lose hope. You could develop and make your own downloadables / printables. For example, if you are a personal development blogger and you already uploaded some blog posts regarding invoking positivity in the morning, you could expand this into an e-book with more in depth advises, or a printable calendar with monthly motivational quotes which your readers could download for a fee. Don’t make it expensive thought at the first bat. Let the readers first see that what you are offerings is indeed what they need to make it easier for them to shell cash for it.
If having your own blog is still a bit overwhelming, you could still earn money as a guest blogger. Google “write for us + the topic you could write about” and you will see the websites/blogs that accept submissions.
Note: If you are an aspiring travel blogger, help me help you! Click on the link https://travelista.club/write-for-us/?refid=112909
P.S. This is a paid gig!
Be a Virtual Assistant
We all know Philippines is the land of outsourced contracting. If you have been living under the rock and is not aware what I am talking about, outsourcing is when a company or an entrepreneur hires a worker from a distant country (aka the Philippines) to do some tasks for an affordable wage. And since Filipinos are one of the best non-native English speakers, we are excellent Virtual Assistants.
What is a Virtual Assistant?
Not much difference with regular executive assistants. The only difference is everything is done digitally. You will communicate with your employer mostly through video calls and emails and tasks generally involve answering emails, encoding, calendar management, transcribing, writing reports, etc.
Before agreeing to be someone’s virtual assistant, make sure your job responsibilities are clear and you will not be asked to do something you are not comfortable with.
Be a Social Media Assistant
Perhaps this is one of the most enjoyable part time jobs there is. Who would not want to get paid while managing a Facebook page, an Instagram or Twitter account? Who would not enjoy chatting up online while promoting a service or a product in the comfort of one’s home?
Of course these are not the only tasks a social media assistant does. You will also be in charge of creating engaging content. But if you have a flair for designing social media posts that will make the readers click on the link, buy some stuff, avail of services or read a blog, then you are on your way to becoming someone’s trustworthy social media assistant.
There might be some skills required or apps/software that you must know how to use to be a social media assistant but in this time and age where everything is digital, this is a work experience worth having.
If you are not a writer, or not organized enough to be someone’s assistant or someone who is not fond of using social media (I need to meet you and ask you to help me overcome my addiction on pining countless pins on Pinterest), rest assured that you could still earn some extra cash doing online part time jobs. The world is in need of graphic designers, architects and web designers on a per project basis. Good with numbers? Be someone’s accountant or bookkeeper for a month! Bilingual? Be a translator!
Now that you have an idea on how to productively spend your weekends, register at onlinejobs.ph to comb through numerous job vacancies.
You’re welcome.
An Overseas Filipino Worker since 2008, Yvette is back in the Middle East after a brief stint in a first world country in South East Asia. She is a binge watcher and is part of numerous fandoms. She writes to keep her sanity (read her rantings on Wattpad @yvette_dc) and is happiest when she's in a bookstore. If given the resources, she would see the world.