Data Entry Freelancing Job / Work at Home is the easiest way to earn online since it requires few skills. If you have a computer with MS Office or free OpenOffice and an Internet connection, you can begin right away.
Some of the type of data entry freelancing job / work at home available is as follows:
Simple Data Entry / Word Processing / Typing
You can get this data entry freelancing job / work at home online or offline. For offline projects, you have to keep looking out for opportunities in newspapers, leaflets etc. Then apply for the opportunities, bid for it and do the job. This requires just entering data from printed material like books, bills, journals etc. to MS Word / Excel and so on.
The other option is searching for and applying on online freelance marketplaces like guru.com and freelancer.com. In these (online) projects, clients will send the print or manuscript copies to be converted into say, MS Word, MS Excel. The material to be converted can be a simple multi-page document or a book. You can do this data entry freelancing job / work at home typing manually if the document is handwritten.
If the document is typed you have the quicker option of scanning it using a scanner. Then use OCR (Optical Character Recognition) software to extract characters from scanned data and do the corrections. Another type of data entry can also be to enter data from reports that have tables to MS Excel.
- Skills Required: Fast typing
- Resources Required : Computer, Internet connection and (optional) scanner with OCR
- Typical Rates: Hourly rates – US $3 to $10 depending on the job difficulty / You can also charge rates per page or a flat total rate
- Recommended Course: Typing Mastery: Learn to Type
Proof-Reading
Proofreading is the process of reviewing a piece of writing to ensure proper spelling, punctuation, and formatting. For example a writer has authored a book and wants someone to check and correct spelling mistakes and grammatical errors. Yes, the author can do it themselves. But when you write something, it is better to get it checked from a different set of eyes as they might catch mistakes that the author didn’t. This is where you as the freelancer can help the author.
If it is a fiction book, it will just require you to be good in the language you are proof-reading for. For some jobs, say non-fiction book or technical document may require basic knowledge of the field for which it is written. For example proof-reading of a contract requires familiarity with legal terminology. Another job for medical journal will require knowledge of medical terms and so on.
- Skills Required: Good grammar and patience
- Resources Required : Computer, Internet connection, dictionary
- Typical Rates: Hourly rates – US $8 to $20 depending on the job difficulty / You can also charge rates per page or a flat total rate
Web Research
Don’t be fooled by the word “research”. It just means you get data by searching on the Internet. This requires little more effort than just typing. You need an Internet connection for this since you will do the data collection online.
For example, a marketing agency needs the contact details of all dentists in a particular city. They will search through online freelance marketplaces and after due process select you as the freelancer. So you just open your MS Excel and create columns for Dentist Name, Address, City, Postal Code, Phone, Fax, Email and Website. Then, start your web browser and Google for dentists in the required city. Search results will show dental association directories or listings and also Yellow Pages etc. Go to each of the search results and view the required details. Now copy and paste the required data in the MS Excel file you just created.
- Skills Required: Searching online, copy-paste, Excel
- Resources Required : Computer, Internet connection
- Typical Rates: Hourly rates – US $5 to $15 depending on the job difficulty / You can also charge rates per page or a flat total rate
- Recommended Course: Learn Microsoft Excel – Excel from Beginner to Expert
Simple, right? Data entry freelancing job / work at home can be tiring or tedious. But as you get used to it you will learn to apply keyboard and other shortcuts.You will begin to find shortcuts like using scripts and software for web scraping.
Tip: For large number of records of data which is listed in directories or similar sites, I would recommend a tool like Visual Web Ripper which gathers the required data automatically! You just run this tool after filling in the parameters and it does all the work for you.
A word of caution – Do not fall for data entry freelancing job / work at home scams that are available on classified ads or sites other than the ones I mention here on how2freelance.com. These scams work by taking you to websites with suspicious reputation and then ask you to pay up for a data-entry job. You are meant to be paid for doing the work and not the other way round!!