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Ask Slashdot: Money-Making Home-Based Tech Skills?
New submitter ThatGamerChick writes "I'm a stay-at-home mom, but I'd like to be a work-at-home mom. I've done a few writing gigs, but I'm not a really good writer and cannot charge the fees needed for it to be worth my time. I'm just looking for something that I can teach myself in a few months and start taking small projects and working my way up from there. I've found that PHP, HTML and CSS to be the most demanded skills on sites like Elance, but the talent pool is flooded with overseas workers and Americans with so much more experience than me. Even when I was offering writing and virtual admin services on Elance I was having a hard time against them. So I'm asking here, because I think most of you may have a good insight on this type of thing as an employer of freelancers or as the freelancer themselves." What success have you had, either working from home, or employing those who do?
Seems like the best way to me!
The cheaper internet competitors from other places cannot enter this market.
There's an article in Cracked about why homemade porn tends to fail: good makeup, lighting, camera work, editing, writing of the frame story, and marketing all cost money.
Lots of software companies will either hire you on staff or contract with you as a freelancer to do remote quality assurance on their products.
You can pitch your writing & communication skills as an asset here. Instead of saying: this doesn't work, you can write reasonable, reproducible, clear defect and quality reports.
Home-based medical transcription pays $14 an hour. Only 2 or 3 classes are required. Then your income is steady and not "competitive" against freelancers, as you have a stable job then. =)
If you are good at video games and enjoy them you could make some money playing video games professionally, making walktrhoughs etc! http://tgn.tv/ is where i started, they have a lot of tips and tricks on how to get started and get more views quickly. good luck!!!
If you are interested in learning a web development language, use that skills to work on a idea for your own sites. When I started learning web development, I created a small on-line tool that people can use. Every time I learned a new language, I've re-written the web app in that particular language as an exercise. So my little webapp went from Perl, PHP, Python WSGI to the current Python Django. Now after a few years, I'm getting 1.5K visitors a day and earning about $300 a month for doing nothing. So instead of working for someone else at $100 per project, I starting on some new ideas and seeing if I can earn more recurring income while sipping on a beer. The only hard part is finding the idea to work on.
You are just stating the reality that all the skills you name can be done remotely and are commodities now.
Not many employers are going to pay you for newly acquired skills, when there is such a surplus of people with experience in those same skills. I work at home, but only because I have 15 years expertise in my field. i suggest two things:
1. Start a blog, and host it yourself. Get your hands dirty in customizing the html, css, php, javascript. Oh, and the blog content should showcase your writing ability.
2. Go work for cheap or free at a local non-proft. Offer to maintain there website or write proposals. They always need help with that.
Yes. I'm not really into mobile, but I'm sure there are a lot of opportunities there. But you'll need knowledge not only of the language, but the specific kinds of apps that are needed in the world.
You'll find that your skills, assuming you can put together a decent website, will do fine if you work with a local organization.
There are tons of organizations near you/anyone who need help with their web sites, but who would feel very uncomfortable working with an eLance or an overseas company...and they don't have the budget to really pay the costs of what most consulting firms would charge. This means you are going to have to get out and make some contacts. The easiest thing you can do, assuming you can present at all, is to put together a talk (approx 20 minutes) that you can give with power point and without on "Promoting your company on the web" and then offer it to your local chamber of commerce and Rotary and women in business organizations. The information has to be useful whether they hire you or not. But there will be leads that come from that and off you go.
My brain is overly lubricated
Little side jobs that I do often come from business contacts of friends, followed by word of mouth from those jobs.
Real people like to deal with real people. Asking someone in India to do work for you feels like a bizarre gamble for your average business. That's your competitive advantage and you should use it.
I haven't done any online projects recently, but for some years I used to work pretty much exclusively on projects from rentacoder.com (now vworker.com).
The way I got into it was by starting bidding low on small jobs, getting good feedback, and progressively moving onto larger jobs. You'll find that the people willing to pay a decent amount on these websites also want experience and good reviews.
Once you have the reputation to even be considered, you need to make sure you bid on the right projects. That means finding projects that don't have a huge number of bids, and projects which match your previous experience. You need a portfolio. If you have spare time, spend it working on something which you can show off to prospective bidders. I'm pretty sure a little javascript asteroids clone I wrote 5 years back got me more work than any other reasons I gave people to hire me.
It also helps to concentrate on projects which are the latest big craze - when I was working, this was javascript. Not many people knew how to use it properly, so there were fewer bidders and you could charge higher prices. Of course, everybody "knows" javascript now days - I imagine phone apps is where it is at.
However you approach it, don't be discouraged when you don't win projects. It takes a while to get into the game. And regardless of how well you do, remember that you'd still make more money by working for locals (which is why I quit). Unless you enjoy it, theres probably better ways of making money.
Good luck!
I've tried what you've tried. I was on Rent A Coder, Moonlighter, Guru, and a few others.
First of all, with a '0' zero score, it will be extrememely difficult to get work - even if you offer your services for $1 or whatever the minimum is these days. Those sites are saturated with people. And many folks posting jobs actually have geographical restrictions: if you're not in a Third World country, you can't even bid.
Local business?
Again. Depending are on where you are matters, but here in Metro Atlanta, things are saturated. There have been a large amount of lay-offs and many folks are trying to do what you're doing out of desperation. Every Tom, Dick, Harry, Larry and Mary are in web development, support and PC repair. And contrary to the opinion here, they're not all screw-ups or mediocre - there are quite a few talented people out of work. Many of them had real jobs doing those things and got canned during economic meltdown. I constantly see signs on the side of the road from folks trying to get web design, coding, PC repair, and support work.
Retrain?
Good luck. Without paid experience it is also very hard. Folks want to talk to previous clients and see what other work you have done. And even then ... Out of desperaton, I tried putting up my own websites under different company names to use as "references" but my measely two websites werent' enough or I just sucked - I don't know because I never got feedback from people who mattered. Sure, all my friends said they looked great but apparently they weren't good enough.
I do know someone who did do well - as a graphic artist. She had a following at her old job and when she quit, the folks who liked her recommended her and when they changed jobs, they hired her - that way she didn't get into trouble for poaching people.
tl;dr Starting in this day and age as a freelancer is extremely difficult. All the folks I know who are making a living as freelancers were doing it since the 90's early '00s.
If you are even marginally good looking, you can make more $ doing that then any type of brain work. I write for a living online, but would gladly give that up and just do cam shows, were I female & decent to look at...
You are a disgusting piece of shit. I don't think the OP was looking for a patronizing sexist answer.
If you can work from home, you can work from Bangalore. And people working from Bangalore are cheaper.
I provide work and hire online all day. I have more work than I can do. Because I am the best at what I do. Specialize in something complex. Not simple web sites. Something difficult that takes years to learn. Be great. You'll end up refusing work. Some companies will pick you up and hire you full time. 90% of freelancers on those sites are Indians. Most are cheap, and most are bad quality. The good ones are hired full time and pulled offline.
And please do something useful. I'm tired of people choosing useless work (like webcam stripping), and complaining that their market dried up.
You are a disgusting piece of shit. I don't think the OP was looking for a patronizing sexist answer.
I'm not the person you responded to, but I think their answer is pretty valid here. The woman has no real skills, wants something she can pick up and be proficient at in a few month's time, and not be underbid by foreign competition. Porn that takes her particular ethnicity into account is about all she has in terms of career prospects - don't make her feel dirty about it by projecting your personal views onto the subject.
The real home money is in BotNet herding. You can read all about this great money making opportunity in this PDF. ;)
Focus on networking in your local area. Even if you mostly work from home, many employers value the fact that you could come in once in a while for meetings and such. This is what differentiates you from someone overseas. Join local user groups for whatever languages interest you, and any other tech topics that interest you. I see quite a bit of professional networking happen in linux user groups, for example.
Few employers will advertise for a part-time developer, but if you have a chance to make a pitch (hopefully based on a personal introduction from the professional network you're trying to grow), many employers will go for it. But it's up to you to make the case for why it will work.
In the mean time, a great way to get some experience for the resume and learn a lot about how to design software is to work on one or more open source projects.
mod up! she can make money posting ads on slashdot!
Do you even lift?
These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.
A good way to make some money (not to get rich) is being an online tutor for virtual classroom. My local College had set up a Moodle server and created a few contents for "MS Office / Google Docs" course rooms and "Information Technology", that virtual courses are for the University student mass, and requires several tutors. The tutor opens each week a new material, grades homeworks, and help the students on the forum when they are stuck in a problem with the course. I only see the students face to face at the end of the course for the final exam. I don't know if were you live there is this alternative. It is better if it is a local College when you can have at lease 95% virtual and 5% onsite so you can different yourself for overseas contenders. But I don't know if you like teaching ;)
Regards
In my ongoing research into digital nomads, I stumbled across the idea of a "virtual assistant" — whether or not this would be up your street, I've no idea, but mentioning it just in case.
There are loads of results to a simple Google search, but the Wikipedia entry is probably the best starting point.
There are a few ideas presented here, but I would approach the problem from the other side. Find a client or two and find out what they need done. For example, I have had a few aquaintances who need websites. I am not a guru by any stretch, and I am sure there are people here who could code circles around me, but I knew what these people were looking for. In fact one person had spent a ton of money on a website designed by an offshore company. She was not really happy with it, and when I had a look at it, the code was utter crap. I tuned the site, improved the load time by almost 30%, made the site cross browser (yes, the site worked in IE, but it looked awful in even firefox) and added a few features my client wanted.
Another friend wanted a website, and kind of knew what he wanted, but it was very complicated, and would have cost a fortune to have made. I agreed that I would charge him much less than a "professional" with the understanding that it would take me a lot longer than said pro. The advantage of this was I learned a ton about Java while being paid. In other words, I was paid to go to school....
I have yet another friend (yes I have more than one....) who needs help with various programs such as Excell and Photoshop. She could take a community college course, but she prefers to learn from me. Mind you, she doesn't always pay with cash, but she is a great cook. A great meal, and a bottle of wine can be better than $100.
TL;DR find small jobs that need to be done and do them.
With the increase in tools like LogMeIn, could you provide remote technical support to home users, who might appreciate a more personal touch than the likes of PC World?
Starting in the local area, perhaps, to build up a reputation, then expanding? You "kill what you eat," but would need to be available at the times which suited those paying you, unlike, say, documentation writing, which would likely be more flexible on you.
I know an embedded systems (Linux) guy who was freelance but a couple of years ago, he was offered direct employment by a customer and he jumped on it. He said freelancing was getting too difficult and sparse.
Yeah, except for the fact that the OP makes the case that it's pretty much impossible to earn an income that way.
Jesus had a UNIX beard.
Nice subtle slashvertisement for Elance.
Yeah because the OP stating that she was having a hard time finding work using it is going to make people flock to use that service. I know I thought to myself "Wow! I wonder if I can waste my time, too!" and couldn't sign up at their site fast enough.
If you are a geek, chances are you either worked hard, or else found computing easy, I'd have thought? In either case, you likely have a lot of knowledge which you could share, and charge for doing so? Whether running weekly classes in a local community hall, perhaps even library, or teaching remotely over the Internet (which is obviously easier to tailor to individual needs), I would have thought that there would people looking to learn from someone who does not sound like a corporate drone but comes across as knowing their stuff?
Do you have other mothers in the area, who might like to know how to take better photographs of their children, process the images and then share them with family?
Remote home tuition would likely be safer than in person home tuition, although I'd have thought that most people are perfectly harmless.
Thanks everyone for the tips--like the OP, I would like to be able to stay at home during the time that my noobs are young, but I would really appreciate ways to make side money with geeky ventures. Also appreciate that troll/immature comments have been kept low.
Everyone knows someone with computer trouble and often its not that hard to resolve. Especially if you can do it as a house-call.
Additionally, people with computers are often trying to do things with them.. websites, imagery, newsletters, blogs, etc. and many folks don't know how.
Setting them up document templates, blogs, and other workflow in addition to good free software, and advising on purchases is a good way to go for someone with even modest experience.
Computer experience is a "culture" of knowledge that many people aren't connected to. By having face-time with your clients you can know them well enough to do remote desktop or phone support from home on their projects as they do them. They will recommend you to everyone they know if they are happy and that can lead to bigger contracts. In home-based you need both the big and the small contracts.
This can also lead to doing contra with any local businesses you are a customer of. woohoo!
What you are asking for is not possible due to the way markets work.
If there is a skill that takes only a few months to learn, doesn't require formal background, and then you can do meaningful projects, that skill is not worth much because just about anybody can learn it.
Pick something that is more than a simple skill (i.e. artistic aptitude, something unique), find a niche, find something that's still widely used but "out of fashion", go local (works better in a relatively "low-tech" locale), find somebody who will take on an apprentice / mentee in some area deeper than a "2-3 month learning curve".
Also, if you're already writing, they way to get better at writing is to keep writing. Start a blog or two, volunteer to write documentation for a non-profit or open source project or similar, use that as a portfolio to find better paying writing work.
Speaking of non-profits - volunteering with one is a great way to network, find somebody who might pay you for the skills you're using as a volunteer, etc.
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Thank you. My wife made mad scrilla doing webcam work, and transitioned from there into writing about sex & technology. She now edits a popular website on the topic and makes better money than I do ghost writing for "sex experts." Cam work is a great way to get started in the field of making money online.
Maybe it's best to just wade through all the spam that's swamping the journal system..
For justice, we must go to Don Corleone
If you are not an expert in something, don't think you are going to learn it easily and do it at home. "At home" means you get paid 1/10th the pay for 5X the work. if you are ok with working from 7am to 7pm every day and getting basically $1.00-$2.00 an hour, then go for it.
honestly you need to be a seasoned expert that is highly skilled and knowledgeable in a field to make any real money at home. My wife is a CPA with 22 years of experience and does taxes at home for small businesses.
You can look up medical transcription, but you have to be a stellar typist that has a very high accuracy and speed to make it. But you can make a good wage (for home based, entry level wage for a go to work based)
your best bet, find a regular job. Your kids will be fine with daycare, and honestly it's healthy for you to get away from them for periods of time.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Also, you will learn a lot about making graphics/web pages. Good operators run several different websites, each with a different "persona" or character, and often members of the community contract other members of the community who have proven skills to design pages/graphics for them. Just because it involves sex, that doesn't preclude the use of technology.
That's almost like saying being a hooker is good training for being a mom.
The kind of customer who uses $1 dollar an hour coders is not the kind of customer you want to be working for. They have no idea about price vs quality or how an economy is supposed to work.
I have in the past had to deal with more then my fair share of companies and individuals who had let their software or website be developed by either outsourcing or paying some kid a below minimum wage rate. Eventually it turns out that this doesn't result in even good enough code and then they came searching for someone to fix it all. And geesh, often they had spend their entire budget and more on the promises of "it will be fixed in the next version if you pay me now" and now they had nothing left but an average and outdated idea, useless code and a lesson not learned. The lucky ones can loan some more money but now have to start in debt with a website that has to be rebuild from scratch and is now last to market.
I have seen everything from sites where order lines were overwritten with new orders by the same person, to simple exchange rate errors on the financial report which the IRS does NOT find half as amusing as you might think to programs that load everything from the database and then search through it in memory. Works perfect for a demo with 5 products, enter your 50.000 and you need a super computer.
BUT the customers using these rent-a-coder site still think you can rent a coder for a dollar and get quality because obviously quality coders have no other options. Region matters less then they think, if it is no problem getting a coder in a low wage region to work for you, then it is no problem for that worker to get work for higher wages from your region... open borders work both ways. Here is the sting with outsourcing, the capable people in outsourcing regions don't want to work for your wages AND will work on their OWN ideas so THEY get the big bucks.
If the customer is only interested in low price, then you are racing to the bottom trying to compete. There is currently a big market for anyone who can setup a Magento webshop. But there are a LOT of bidders out there thinking they can do it for less and less money. Sure, you might try to persuade that YOU can do it better, make it more efficient, not have pages load in under 1 minute and be proud of it but you would be surprised just how few companies that want to start a web shop have either the know-how or the budget to do it right. You are setting yourself up for despair.
In many ways, getting a cleaning job pays better. People might not appreciate the work of a web developer but they do appreciate the work of the person that stops their toilets from becoming alive. The bottom end of web development is not a place to look for an income. To many competitors, not enough employers who know that quality costs money. Hell, the OP is part of problem, someone who doesn't need to make a real living from it undercutting those who do. How can you make a wage if there are people doing it for tips? Plenty of university girls make a living as a hooker, not so many boys do. How can you sell what so many are willing to give away for free or the cost of a beer?
Same deal.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Are you saying it isn't? Most men who seek out hookers are emotional children anyway; many of the associated skill sets are transferable...
1st -> Find the free open source web content management system used most in your area/country in the professional field. In Germany that'd be Typo3, in your case (I'm guessing you're a US resident) that would probably be EZ Publish, Drupal or something like that.
2nd -> Learn that system and learn it well. Do this in the following order (timeframes mentioned are basic estimates based on my experience in 13 years of web development):
a) 6 months: Editing and Management, understanding the systems structure principles, Backend/Admin Interface Navigation, core system functions and features. (Coverd with User Maunals and User Books on your CMS) --> take on first jobs as an editor for installations and websites using said system.
b) 4 months: Markup stuff. Templating, HTML, CSS, minor changes and adjustments at that level, look into mobile templates aswell, everything is going mobile, you want to be on top of that when doing markup stuff (covered with HTML and CSS books)
c) After about a year: Installing and maintaining, DB structure, MySQL DB Management (I'm presuming it uses a MySQL DB, since they all do), low-level maintainance, basic admining and maintainance at shell access level (Unix/Linux/OS X type stuff), DB and media directory backup, versioning ... Here is where 3rd party tools come into play and will become an important asset. FTP GUI tool, Versioning GUIs, DB Tools, editors, etc. As for versioning my hint: Go with Git right away, the tools awailable now are foolproof and if you start versioning with the distributed paradigm right away you won't have problems understanding it later on. (covered with DB adming, Shell navigation, Linux, Apache and Books on Versioning ... you're entering solid OReilly territory here)
d)1,5 - 2 years into your new field: Programming, internal framework structure, maybe some PL basics before hand (more specialist tools, perhaps an IDE of some sort, maybe your own remote system) (covered with books on the programming language the system is implemented in ... most of them are built with PHP, Ajax / JavaScript would be the other end)
If you really want to make this your job, *do* focus on one system and one system/framework only! Pick the one most people are using or the one with which you get your first big-time paying customer. And don't be fooled, even then getting good money won't be easy at first. Proper editor level maintainace of a non-trivial web CMS requires experience, as does handling whiny customers and keeping your cool when the system goes offline for some odd reason you'll be researching for the next 30 hours :-) . You'll gain experience on the way, but also some grey hairs, so I expect anyway.
Start with maintaining your own test system and your own site running said system. Offer yourself up for editorial and maintainance work. Take it from there going into low-level maintainance and programming This will become interessting after 12-18 months into your new job.
Bottom line:
Popular system, start of as an editor, take it from there.
Good luck.
My 2 cents.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
First, to repeat what others have said - think local and network like crazy.
There are a lot of small-mid sized corporations that have a small (1-4 person) IT team but have an infrastructure that needs 24/7 monitoring. And if there's one thing that's universally despised by overworked sysadmins, it's being force to carry "the pager".
No matter how well you set up your Nagios/Cacti monitoring, there is inevitably a high number of Flaps going to the pager "WARNING!!! Agg!! I can't ping Server Z! Panic! Meltdown! The sky is falling" page goes out automatically to the pager. 5 minutes later after an automatic recheck "RECOVERY!!! Oh, never mind, it was just a network burp, the sky is not falling, the world is a calm blue ocean."
For anyone who's been through the "pager" rotation mill, you'll know exactly what I'm talking about.
The actual skills needed are "common sense" and responsibility. The pager goes off, you read the page, and try and determine whether it's something mission critical (ie: worth waking up the high priced help at 3am over), head to your keyboard so you can do a quick check of the detailed message/status, and fiddle and kill time for five minutes while you determine if it really is a flap. If it turns out to be something that's a) Important (something that can't wait until the morning) and b) not a flap, then you call the high priced help and they sort out the problem.
Equipment needed: A Cel phone with an obnoxiously loud ringer (the better for to wake you up), a computer/laptop with an internet connection (so you can log into Cacti/Nagios remotely), comfy sweatpants.
In a short time you can build yourself a rep for being reliable and trustworthy, you will have no problem increasing your income by adding more and more small customers.
I assume your experience is in writing fiction or somesuch. Have you considered technical writing, i.e. creating user manuals, etc.? The skill set overlaps somewhat, but if it's the creative aspects of writing that were the problem, this may be an option.
--
(tech writer)
your first projects will requires lots of time. after time you will have a library of re-usable html and code. re-use will reduce the time and effort to produce a decent website. Or just learn to configure Drupal/Wordpress. there is a lot of functionality in those packages. I'm sure those low-ballers are just configuring their in-house cms or drupal/wordpress.
My girlfriend is deaf, and traditional office environments have typically been hard for her. At some point she decided to start working from home so most of her interactions would be over email. She had experience working for non-profits and picked up some SQL and knowledge of some of the databases backed financial systems that those non-profits use (notably Raiser's Edge). She found a decent amount of work on E-lance doing financial reports for non-profits using Crystal Reports and SQL Server Reporting System, and when it came to hard SQL she was able to ease her way into it, taking on more and more complex reports over time. Now she's a full time contractor, working from home, telecommuting to non-profits all over the world, making good money.
Learn some SQL, one of the report generating tools, and how some type of business stores its financial data, typically a non-tech heavy one that's not likely to do this stuff in house.
First of all, get experience and knowledge in many different systems (e.g.: MS, Unix, Linux, Cisco, Mac, etc.) and learn how to make them work together. Use your house LAN and your free time now to interconnect them in ways that would be useful to potential LOCAL clients. Combining free Linux applications (installed on cast-off computers your customer has in a closet) with local licensed applications can often save a small LOCAL company a lot of money.
Secondly, make a business... I suggest an LLC or an S-Corp... with business cards, letterhead, and web site of your own (I now use Bluehost).
Thirdly, get out there and join local business associations, clubs, and even fraternal organizations (Elks, etc.) and hand out business cards. This is the old-fashioned form of networking.
I subsidize my retirement income with remote administration of several databases, VPN networks and backup systems. Plus I have one Internet web forum that uses advertising to give me a small income.
You won't get rich but since you have to be around the house anyway you'll get some income (possibly), some more experience (probably) and have some interesting stories for when *you* retire. :)
No one ever had to evacuate a city because the solar panels broke!
the trick is if you have any talent at all you can in fact work (at home) and raise kids at the same time. If you want to get very old school look up proverbs 31:10-31 and then ask yourself IN THIS DAY AND AGE would not this translate to doing a good bit of work at home??
Any person using FTFY or editing my postings agrees to a US$50.00 charge
There are companies out there like Support.Com that pay about double minimum wage for North American English speaking tech-literate folks to help tech-clueless folks do stuff like install printers and fight off viruses. Maybe you should look into that angle.
I wish I could put a couple months of effort into something and make a reasonable income on it too, that way I could spend as little as I possibly could and reap the greatest benefits
God bless America
Most men who seek out hookers are emotional children anyway;
oy! the rest of us are emotional children too. So there, naaaaa.
What you want to do is possible, but might take more than a few months -- think a year of sustained effort and attention. Building off of previous posted suggestions, if you have some decent web skills perhaps you might take a look at Drupal. There are an insane number of jobs, BUT you need to know what you are doing to get gigs. Drupal is very capable and powerful. It also has a steep learning curve and can be very frustrating to learn...which may inadvertently relate to why all of the jobs aren't filled. However, there are tons of free how-to screen casts, the community is very active, and you can learn at home. If you want to check it out I would suggest using the Acquia DAMP development stack as it is the easiest way to get setup on your home computer: https://network.acquia.com/downloads/7.x
I've noticed that a lot of the screen casts tend to be very pointed how-tos. If you don't mind paying $25 for a months access, Lynda.com has some good tutorials on Drupal 7 which may help you get a good overview. After doing the essential training you can see if Drupal clicks for you or not.
If you want to go the Drupal route, make a website for yourself as part of the learning process, do the normal networking things things like signup at Drupal.org and join LinkedIn and its various groups with interests similar to yours. Then look around locally and start making websites for people, small businesses, local charities, social groups, schools, local political candidates, etc. You might donate your time initially since you are learning, but get them to pay their own hosting fees. Participate in the Drupal community by submitting good bug reports, answer the questions of others when you have figured something out, attend meetings of the local user group, contribute to documentation, etc. By this time you will have gone through the process a few times and be able to leverage previous projects, have figured out hosting, and started to get a portfolio. Once you are an expert and have a portfolio, recruiters will start calling you.
Good luck.
I admit, you might need to get a babysitter for those times when you're actually doing initial networking and later meeting with clients, but you might be able to find a high schooler in the afternoon, depending on when the local high school lets out. In the summer, it might be even easier.
Anyway, the local chamber of commerce -- do your research first:
If you can get a job from that, then you use that (and their contacts) to build up more clients. (and you might want to join the Chamber of Commerce, too, once you're established). If you can't, then you go for other ways to build up your portfolio -- find business with no web presence, or you might check on what the local non-profits are in your area, or if there's a small municipality, or even just check 1-800-Volunteer to see if there are local groups that might need website work. (eg, I volunteer for the local Friends of the LIbrary, and our town's annual street festival, run through the local Recreation Council; both could use help, and maybe also a presence on social networking sites so we can do more 'push' of information).
If none of those work out, I'd then look to see if you can help out with Code for America or any other open source group you feel passionately about, while still trying to network to find local work. You could even look to start up a local community website if there isn't one already (list local businesses, events, what's going on in local government, etc.).
Basically, don't just look it as a way to make money -- look at is as a way to help local businesses/non-profits/government to improve ... making it easier for people to find important information (when do you open on Sunday? does the restaurant offer anything vegan/gluten free? What services do you offer? etc.), presenting the information in a better way (ie, the website is too disorganized; it might be how their business is organized, but the general public doesn't expect to find (x) under (y)), or helping them reach out via social networking or e-mail (eg, this week's specials; important upcoming events; etc.)
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
1) Pick a new technology that seems interesting enough to you, is on the rise, and has a lot of demand. For me it was Adobe Flex (but I would not suggest it at this point in time). I have heard some stuff about SharePoint being hot right now, also most anything to do with mobile programming. The nichier the better.
2) Find user communities (Forums and such) pertaining to that technology, and entrench yourself within it. Answer everyone's questions, especially the ones you don't have an answer to without having to look it up and/or try it yourself. This will give you some experience with real world problems needing to be solved in that niche. Once you are confident that you can answer most people's questions without having to work at it, you are ready to move onto step 3.
3) Use the ties in the community you built up to directly market your services. Almost every community I've been a part of will have a certain number of people looking for help, and are willing to pay for it. A lot even post full contract positions. Always market local if possible. The idea that you can easily fly down for a face-to-face is a big selling point a lot of the times.
4) .......?
5) Profit!
Sincerely,
A former fry cook at Taco Bell :)
Fanboy Status: Apache Flex, C#, Eclipse, KDE, Pirate Party, Ron Paul, Slackware, Windows 7
A lay at home Mom.
I've been freelancing for a little under a year (I'm a work-at-home dad ;)), and so far have had overwhelming success using some of the sites previously mentioned (freelancer.com, elance.com, etc), so here's my two cents...
First of all, don't let the fact that you have to compete with dozens of other bidders take you down, as most of these are just low-quality unprofessional washouts or even outright scammers.
If you put some effort into your proposals (like sending the employer a private message letting them now you've actually read the bid, showing links to related portfolio, etc), will get you noticed faster than paid highlights or anything of the sort.
Ask the employer a direct question related to the proposal, so that he feels compelled to answer (once any type of actual conversation is started, you're leaps and bounds ahead of the competition).
Feedback and reputation are very important, as they're the superficial tools that let the employer gauge your risk and potential, so you have to start building them somehow.
My technique when I'm first starting on a site is to bid low (though not the lowest), put in a line such as "Since I'm building my freelance portfolio, I'm willing to work below my standard rate", and never charge any money upfront (yes it's a risk, but I've never had any problems so far).
Always keep your proposals short, clean and direct, as employers are usually busy people who don't have time (and don't care) to go through all the fluff.
Mention your schedule and availability, and try to be available through Skype or gTalk during work hours, so you can report to your employers if need be.
When choosing which projects to bid, go for the ones that are a little out of the ordinary, or that may require specific skills that are not available to everyone.
Try to bid on less projects and focus on getting in higher quality proposals, than to post crappy bids left and right all over the place.
I've started my freelancing venture with just two flash projects, one for a virtual makeover tool (http://danielbrinca.com/makeover), and an AAC radio player (http://danielbrinca.com/audioplayer), and these became so successful that now I'm able to win bids just by showing these off, or any of their spin-offs, to a new client.
You can also consider doing or participating in an open source project, even if you feel you're not good enough, and show this off to your clients as this will prove that you're serious and have the determination to see your projects through.
Yes there is a lot of competition out there, but if you're professional and competent, you're already a cut above the rest, so all you need is to be able to demonstrate this to strangers.
Once you land a few jobs, you'll probably start winning more bids (and you may then ramp up your rates), or even get new jobs from previous employers.
Hope this helps,
Daniel Brinca
http://danielbrinca.com
Leverage what you've got: kids, time, a local network. Many have walked this route, but I don't see the market saturating any time soon.
http://www.moms-with-cameras.com/
If you're able to leave the house on occasion then look for local work instead. It took my wife a while but she found part-time work that she can do partly from home. Granted, it took a lot of wading through scams on Craigslist. My job is more flexible than hers so I can cover things at home if she needs to be out.
You need to find a task that either can't be outsourced (personal assistant, Girl Friday) or that the employer doesn't want to outsource. Find local companies that would rather have their tech needs met by someone they've met in person, yet that don't want to have a full-time person.
The catch is you'll have to work to get those jobs. You can't just sit around surfing the web looking for work. You need to call companies, leverage your friends and neighbors, and even cold call businesses in person. You have to earn the work...it's not going to fall from the sky.
1. Small businesses that don't already have a website probably haven't got a clue as to what they want. You'll burn up lots of time being unproductive.
2. Pretty much everyone knows someone who can "make web pages" - whether it's their kid or a relative or a friend of a friend. You won't learn enough in 3 months to even begin to differentiate yourself from them.
3. The original poster isn't going to be able to go from zero to competitive - ever. This is a moving target, already super-saturated, and people are literally "giving it away for free to build up their 'portfolio' " after blowing $$$$ on a year or two at a useless technical college diploma mill;
4. Before expecting to make money on craigslist, why not check out the competition on craigslist - they're all super-cheap. And check out the businesses looking for someone - they're also all super-cheap. There's a reason they're both on craigslist - they're both super-cheap.
The world is full of people who thought that they could buy a computer and make money at home. It didn't work 20 years ago for all those "I'll do resumes for other people", and it's not working for people who don't have the skill and think that they can be competitive in 2 to 3 months. (Hint - you won't be, not in 2 to 3 years).
Honestly - would you pay someone with no experience when you can get people to work for free for 3 months at a time because all those "diploma mills" are looking for "job experience placements"?
You'll make more money ghost-writing student term papers (desperate students will pay real money to keep from having to repeat a course). Of course, it depends on your ability to research a vast number of subjects and churn out 2,000 to 50,000 words in a week.
Let's call it what it is, Anti-Social Media.
Hi, OP here. I would also like to thank everyone for the tips and suggestions. I'm still doing my own research, and this thread has given me more to think about. I just wanted to address a few things. I know I'm not going to be a complete master at the end of 2-3 months. I was hoping that, like some other fields, you can learn a bit and then start working. Like programming scripts to automate tedious tasks, or gather info from the web, etc. I figured that I could offer something small and reasonably priced. At first, I thought about learning a piece of specialized software like ACT for real estate agents, or how to set up and write scripts for Ubot. There's just so much out there, I'm not sure where to focus on. Also, I am and will always be a full-time Mom. They come first and is the main reason I'm staying at home. But the household does need a few extra bucks a month. I'm not looking for the equivalent of a full-time job. So, thanks again for all the comments :)
Cherish the good friends you make over the years, because like you, they're rising in their careers, and some day they might have a contract or job bid to throw your way.
Never be afraid to meet people, hand out your business cards, and introduce yourself and your business. Even if they're not interested, give them TWO cards and ask them to pass one along to a friend (you'd be surprised how often they end up in the hand of a friend who's looking for such services.)
You can not win the game of life playing roulette with every other schmuck on the planet who thinks slinging code == programming. It's not. Programming is a broad-based skillset of analysis, debugging, design, and coming up with unorthodox ideas to solve everyday problems. A coder is a dime a dozen; a PROGRAMMER is a special breed.
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
If you'll give me your name, I'll write you in on the presidential ballot.
AC for pres. 2012!
Only on Slashdot does someone make a joke about doing home porn... just to have another person point them to relevant articles about why the idea is unsustainable.
And get modded up!
I'm also trying to make the transition from stay-at-home to work-at-home. I decided to try to learn how to make a very simple app and release it, and if that worked I would move on to more complicated things. Since I have a small child I thought I would try to make an app he would enjoy and then release it to the world.
so, first off, *shameless plug* the app is called Baby Animal Balloons ( www.littlelaptime.com ), aimed at 1-2 year-olds, and it's up and selling on iPhone, iPad, Amazon Fire and Nook Color/ Nook tablet.
My sales on Nook have been more than sales on everything else combined.
It made about $400 in November and $500 in December. Not enough to live off, but certainly a good start! The awesome thing is that it keeps selling after I've done the work and keeps selling while I work on more apps and keeps selling... for who knows how long?
Anyway, that's been my experience. It's not nearly as hard as it seems at first, though it took me about a month to get started on Android and another month to get started on iOS. If you're going to give it a try, I really think starting simple is the way to go.
You say you aren't a good writer, and presumably you don't know PHP etc.[1] since you specified a skill you can learn quickly.
What skills do you have? I'd say that's the place to start.
[1] When you reply to a post crapdot shows it above the editing area, but when you reply to TFA it doesn't.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
This.
Reading your question I didn't see anything to say what your interests and talents are. Despite modesty, you show some writing talent. Your output will improve with practice. The responses mostly assumed a typical /. profile of procedural coding and systems, but that may not be you. Some of the basics apply no matter, online is harder because of competition unless you have an advantage.
Think through your education and interests. Decide whether the marketing, accounting, bureaucracy, and risk of your own business is worth some multiplier on your pay. Talk to people around you about what might work, and ask relevant businesses (newspapers, ad agencies, etc,) about possibilities.
Good luck!
I won't call you chauvinistic and old-fashioned (though I'm sure you are), but I'll point out that parenting isn't always an around-the-clock job. With a responsible spouse who does his (or her) part, it damn well shouldn't be. Infants sleep. Older children go to school. Teens make themselves scarce. If your children require as much care when they're 12 years old as they did when they were 12 weeks old, you're doing it wrong. During those times when children don't need attention, a parent can (and should) pursue other things (and not just housecleaning and cooking), such as hobbies, volunteering, athletics... or part-time freelance work. Sounds like the submitter knows what she has time and energy for... and you don't.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
I have been working from home for seven years now writing software and selling it to other companies. I'm really having a lot of success on the Mac App Store, bringing in a respectable salary from that alone. If you're curious about my apps just type "Rebrand Software" into the Mac App Store.
The trick is:
-Make your apps available in every language supported by the app store
-Rating is more important than price. Make your apps low price until they have 4/5 star ratings, then you can raise them slightly.
Doing this I'm selling 50-100 apps per day at $2 to $3 each. I use RealStudio (http://www.realsoftware.com) to program for Win/Mac/Linux, it's easy to learn and there are tutorials for getting your stuff on the Mac App Store. When the Windows Store launches with Windows 8 I'll be in a position to immediately put all my software on it.
Some freelance/flexible workplace websites: 1) flexjobs - job site offering over 50 career categories and jobs ranging from entry-level to executive, freelance to full-time. http://www.flexjobs.com/About.aspx 2) Elance and oDesk - online employment sites for freelancers/contractors. https://www.elance.com/q/about-elance and https://www.odesk.com/ 3) Mom Corps - offers part-time, flexible work for working moms http://www.momcorps.com/home.aspx Also check out info on http://sites.google.com/site/techcareerreentry about networking and online classes. (It's aimed at tech career re-entry, but also has info useful for your situation.) Linux groups often are good sources for info on work opportunities, often small short-term projects are advertised on the email list for a couple Linux groups I'm a member of.
No experience is required, and local positions, e.g., city council member, do not require large campaign budgets. Go to your local democrat/republican party chair and find out what's available. Then go to some prominent business people and let them know that you can be bought. The rest should be easy (except the part when you have to bend over and take it from your donors).
One thing you could try to improve work is to focus on web development specialized to mobile devices.
That way you could also create jobs by going to places around you who have a web site that does not work well for mobile devices, and tell them how you could improve the site to provide extra features for mobile users or just better usability.
Another possible side niche is accessibility, you could specialize in that and overhaul sites to add accessible features. Again a demonstration of how a disabled user might have trouble on the site would be good.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The best and easiest remote job I had was 'typesetting' a manuscript ready for printing.
Most authors use a word processing program and submit their work to a publisher. The manuscript often is really badly formatted, inconsistent as authors dress up their work to make it look pretty, which is totally useless when it comes to the print stage.
The publisher then needs to convert the text into a format that the printer can read by adding and
The process is something like this:
* Convert to plain text or RTF if footnotes are used.
* Fix formatting errors (double spaces, page breaks, remove tabs, capitalization, punctuation etc) - lots of Find and Replace work and repetition.
* Add and for chapter headings, paragraphs, quotes, sections, indents, italics etc.
* Footnotes changed to end notes
Zip and send back to the publisher.
All in all, a 500 page manuscript may take 8 to 12 working hours to do and can get you $300 to $500 or more.
Your job sources would be publishers and authors (who get told by their publisher to tag their work in plain text).
Place ads and start ringing publishers/authors. Publishers are more than happy to send you a glossary of tab headings, formatting codes etc.
You can learn the skills by the end of your first book or journal paper and you already have the hardware/software.
It's pretty intense and boring at the same time and it does help if you are familiar with the subject matter, but very worthwhile.
Don't be apathetic. Procrastinate!
"If your children require as much care when they're 12 years old as they did when they were 12 weeks old, you're doing it wrong"
Or perhaps they have physical and/or learning disabilities? I'm asking you kindly to please not generalize quite so broadly, because it is NOT always the parent's fault that the child(ren) take the same amount of care at later ages. Consider, please:
A woman with a moderately to severely autistic son (age 14) and an 11-year-old daughter who has ADHD, learning disabilities and social issues in a school system that just doesn't care. Just ONE of these children can take as much time as an infant, and both present potentially very expensive situations, thus resulting in a husband who takes every second of OT he can get--both for the cash and to escape the problems at home.
That woman would be my sister. She spent countless woman-hours pursuing the cause of her toddler son's lack of communication, followed by loads of work to get him into the programs allegedly available through the public schools, and has done everything in her power to help him live as normally as possible. Then a few years ago some classmates thought it would be FUN to cajole/trick him into dropping his pants in class. It took weeks of constant effort with the police, teachers and administrators to convince them that this was a combination of the autism, the need for friends (which is what these kids claimed to be), and other factors--so that he would not be on the sex offender registry for life.
Then she got the great fun of trying to get the school system to walk its talk regarding the bullying being experienced by her daughter. Through personal experience, I know they have never actually done anything but blamed the victim, and it again took far too much effort to get the situation changed so that my niece could be in an environment where bullying would not distract from actual LEARNING in school.
In this case, her kids ARE her full-time job, and it's not because she's doing anything wrong. When the kids are in school she's pursuing anything and everything she can find to make THEIR quality of life better. More "normal." To give them potential. I apologize if this seems off-topic, but unless you're walking in someone else's shoes you do not have the right to say they're "doing it wrong."
Gross generalizations are just that--GROSS. They're often also, frankly, downright offensive. As offensive as chauvinism.
OP, I don't know if this was covered already - there's a ton of comments here.
What about building niche websites and doing Affiliate sales? This is something you could learn on your own and spend at little or as much time as you like. It also doesn't need to fit within any time boundaries and can be done during sleeping times or evenings, early mornings, whatever. You are master of your own time and business and setup can be quick and easy.
Affiliate sales using Google Adsense, Commission Junction, Amazon, etc can bring additional money into the household fairly easily. You'll need to learn probably something like WordPress (a common favourite) and Search Engine Optimization and other SEO techniques. 5 - 10 websites when they are up and running can provide a good income.
I do this on the side and it has been profitable and all activities (for me) can occur outside of regular business hours.
Worth a serious thought - my two bits!
You misspelled fellatious.
Would you mind taking another look at the statement "parenting isn't always a full-time job" in the first sentence? I included (and italicized) the word "always" on purpose – instead of writing "isn't ever a full-time job" or simply "isn't a full-time job" – because that word changes the meaning of the sentence to acknowledge that sometimes it is a full-time job. It goes without saying that there are exceptions, such as children with special needs who can require full-time parenting no matter how old they are. Do you really think anyone here needs that explained to them? Do you know how insulting that is?
A generalization is merely that: a statement that is generally true. If I say "Americans need to get off their asses and walk more," my friend with cerebral palsy who has never been able to walk doesn't get offended; he understands that there are extenuating circumstances in his case, and I wasn't talking about him. I was talking about Americans in general. If you get this overwrought just because someone made a generalization that didn't specifically call out your sister's situation as an exception... well, best of luck with that.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
I know it's frowned upon but this site has great advice and the course actually helped me. if its not permitted please delete. I just think its the perfect match for you. http://earn1k.com/
BUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!
... Your post almost seemed coherent, but then you ended it with ... LOTUS NOTES!?!!
Lotus Notes?!!!?!
Speaking of pretending we are still living in the 90's... why don't you plug that first-rate, extendible, user-friendly email software into your brand new Novel network, and ask to be paid more money than your boss!
While you're programming in Notes, why don't you brush up on your COBOL skills to make sure you're employable well into the future!
You're not going to make any money competing w/ 27 year old computer experts, who work for mt dew's, and have had a hard-on for IT since they were 10. IT requires a lot of passion and experience.
I would suggest starting up your own niche business locally, if it's not an overly competitive area, and if you can take some risks w/ your time. There are a lot of people making executive salaries delivering simplistic business solutions. For instance, my friend makes close to 150k, working seasonally, managing a group of workers that cleans, stains, builds decks, paints, etc. It took him 10 years to build, but he's lives a very good lifestyle.
Then sell the botnets to the highest bidder.
Kidding aside, with the way the market is, its going to be pretty rough.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
You could always start a business. Find something interesting, cheap and bulk order online (probably from china (be careful not to get ripped off)), and re-sell it on your own fancy website or just ebay.
Rocket Surgeon.
I'm sure I'll be called chauvanistic, old-fashioned and be modded into oblivion for saying this, but how about ... oh, I dunno, being a mom and raising your children?
Parenting is not a part-time job. I'm not going to pretend to know your situation (maybe daddy is out of the picture for whatever reason), but you'll contribute more to society by spending your time raising your kid(s) to be decent human beings.
And society shows how much it values it, by paying stay-at-home moms accordingly, right?
One of the problems with coding jobs is that your productivity can scale dramatically with your experience. My dad, who is a very intelligent guy, decided to do some programming work in his retirement. He found a local business who needed something done and did it. He doesn't make any real money at it, but he enjoys himself. The thing is, he doesn't understand how slow he is. He complains that his customer isn't appreciative of the work that he does, and that he works practically full time with little reward. In reality, what takes him a week to do would take me (a professional programmer with 20 years of experience) an afternoon.
Even if you are talking about building web sites and writing small web applications, there's a way of doing things. I often think this industry needs an apprenticeship program. You wouldn't be able to find work as a carpenter without significant experience apprenticing. Yes, pretty much anyone can build cabinets, but doing it well and in a reasonable time frame/cost is something that requires experience.
I don't want to disuade you. If you go down this avenue there are a lot of potential rewards. But they will be down the road. You might be able to get gigs after 2-3 months of training, but it will be years before you will be making money worthy of your time (similar to writing, really)
Yes, it's unoriginal and probably a piss poor idea, but it's hardly because the $99 you pay will put her in the poor house or that you chose an iDevice as the target of your idiotic anger instead of the roughly 10 BILLION other devices that are the same way.
Can you develop for iDevices on Windows/Linux without jumping through hoops now? If not, don't forget to add the cost of an overpriced, underpowered computer to that $99...
You've told us what you can't do. To parrot career advice from the guy in the Dos Equis commercials, "Find what it is in life you're not good at... and then don't do that thing."
But what skills or experience do you already have? If you have any skills or experience out of the ordinary, you might be able to leverage them into interesting work-at-home gigs.
Example 1: I spent a few years as a web developer at a well-known travel dot-com, ending about a decade ago. Five years later, some folks for whom I occasionally consult (completely unrelated to the travel business) needed someone to coordinate flights all over the world for their consultants, and someone pointed out that I had "worked in the travel business." I'd never been an actual travel agent, but I'd had to maintain databases of things like airport and airline codes, and had a pretty good feel for what airlines flew where, so I was able to leverage that for a couple years of pretty interesting work, from home, at a decent hourly rate.
Example 2: As a two-time college dropout with a variety of tech skills, I had a part-time job at a university operating and troubleshooting some equipment used for research by grad students, professors, and a big multi-national research collaboration based at a national laboratory in the next state. The collaboration folks communicated using, of all things, an AIM chatroom - and since I was the only operator who was enough of a techie to chat with them, they wound up adopting me, teaching me to take data for them, and eventually getting me a part-time position as research staff "at" a (much better) university, working from home taking data for them.
So if you already have any skills that aren't in a state of immense oversupply, you might be more able to find work leveraging them, instead of learning a little bit of something a lot of other people already know a little bit of, and then trying to compete with everyone else.
Village idiot in some extremely smart villages.
Have you considered just looking for a straight-up part-time job? If you're an extrovert, you could try your hand at being a real estate agent. You only need to make a few sales a year to bring in some cash. Typically 3% commission on the cost of a house and you pocket your cash at the point of sale. That's one option.
As far as computing goes, if you had some coding experience, you might be able to rustle up a part time gig. Check out dice.com for part-time tech gigs. Go to advanced search - expanded to find part-time work. I think looking for a part-time gig will give you the best opportunity of flexibility in terms of where you work.
I'm just looking for something that I can teach myself in a few months and start taking small projects and working my way up from there.
In a few months you can learn to play some online MMORPGs.
Look for MMORPGs where rare items, gold, characters, etc, in the game have a high resale value.
Work long hours building characters and obtaining rare items to resell.
If I had a stick for each person with who uses the hackneyed phrase "digital nomad", after allowing for breakage from thrashing them so hard with the sticks, I could still build the world's largest tree castle.
With thorned branches for anyone who added "location independent" to their "digital nomad" description.
We were talking about a job you could train up to in a couple months and do from home, doesn't involve significant writing skills, and has a reasonable job market. Being a doctor or an engineer is not one of those options.
I find it funny that you think the GP is the one who is "delicate" and a "pussy" when you're the one clutching your pearls at the thought of drugs and sex and online nudity.
...any MLM where you can be a profit maker for someone else. Oops, you wanted that money for yourself, didn't you.
How is this different to any other job? At my job, the boss makes the profit and I don't do anything related to direct selling.
http://marriedmansexlife.com/
And society shows how much it values it, by paying stay-at-home moms accordingly, right?
I think the problem is not that stay at home moms don't get paid but that too many people only attribute value to things that have a price attached.
http://marriedmansexlife.com/
Actually, doing translation might be an option for her. See, a lot of translation agencies look for native speakers to translate to some other language (or from, I don't remember). If she dominates a second language she can actually offer her services advertising as "native speaker" which will give her an advantage against all the Apus from India or the Josés from México.
Ubuntu is an African word meaning 'I can't configure Debian'
"If your children require as much care when they're 12 years old as they did when they were 12 weeks old, you're doing it wrong"
That was the offending statement. Unqualified and my lead. The statement you point out in your post, which WAS qualified, did not offend. The unqualified blame on the parent ... there's the problem.
Overwrought? I think not.
http://unixwiz.net/techtips/be-consultant.html
Sometimes the truth is arrived at by adding all the little lies together and deducting them from all that is known.
A good one is computer repair, if your half way decent in computers you can solve the majority of problems and you can charge people all that is needed for your expenses. I don't charge people that much and get them high quality work for a few quick bucks, and well if you don't know the issue Google always helps. Just a suggestion.
Stick to tutoring. You have localized knowledge and a established client base.
Just this weekend I published an article specific to this topic. It is available in electronic form from Barnes & Noble and Amazon. Readers for your laptop, computer, or other device are downloadable free. The title of the article is "Micro-Tasking -- A Productive Use of the Internet".
First question: How do I work from home?
Answer: Easy. Ask your manager. You need a job first.
Second question: How do I get a tech job?
Answer: Difficult. Prove that you can do the work. Most people start with a traditional job search.
Lump the two questions together and you are asking for a long wait.
I've known competent tech guys who thought that they could levy their connections into early retirement and lucrative work-from-home contracts. Some of those guys keep jobs, but a lot of them end up losing them. Being a commercially employed person will sober you to the fact that contracts come and go rapidly (within years) and when a manager who can vouch for you goes away, and you're not around to defend yourself, you're typically the first on the chopping block.
The only people I've seen who succeeded in working from home for 10-20 years are wealthy people who made millions beforehand and have the financial temerity to take on potentially years of joblessness. Ironically, they all seem SO happy! But I guess having a few million dollars in the bank helps.
You might be surprised at how many sellers on eBay don't use simple HTML to their selling advantage to present a professional looking listing.
If you have things to sell, and you know HTML, you can build up a decent store with decent sales, within months.
Also, finding work as a freelance web developer is painful and extremely difficult (I know, I used to try), so why not create your own site with your own content and/or user-contributed content, and advertise. If it's local in nature, you can accept local ads.
None of these can be achieved overnight, but I think they're better ideas than spinning wheels trying to get freelancing jobs.
Steve Magruder, Metro Foodist