Microtasking Jobs
Microtasking jobs are "jobs" anyone can pursue.
Depending on one’s circumstances, these jobs are suitable for people who can multitask effectively, have a lot of free time to invest or for those who do not immediately need money.
A microtask is a small task that a person performs over the internet for a minimal fee. It also goes by other names such as microjob, microwork or short task.
These microtasking jobs are simple short tasks you could apply to without worries that your educational background is lacking or that your computer system might not be suitable.
There can be many possible scenarios about why you might think to apply to these jobs. One possible situation is when you need to stay at home and you want to have something worthwhile to pass the time.
Another possible scenario is when you want a part time "job" that you can do without spending so much energy and effort.
How Is Microtasking Done
In other virtual jobs like video editing, they call you the employee while the person or company that hires you is the employer. With microtasks, you might encounter terms like buyer and seller of services.
The seller is the person who wants to do the microtask, while the buyer is the client that requires the services of an individual. There are many names used, but the essence is the same.
There are microtasks you can complete online from start to finish. Sometimes, you need to complete a task in the real world, with the buyer requiring you to provide proof that you have completed the task.
Sometimes, a task may involve both online and real-world situations.
For example, a company will ask you to visit a brick and mortar store to photograph the product display or the prices of products. Then, you will submit these photographs online through your cellphone or computer.
Microtasks are available on many microtasking websites. In some websites, the buyer and the seller connect through a forum that the microtask website has provided.
In exchange for this platform, this website will have a cut of the payment. In some task sites, a crowdsourcing platform is used to contract the microjobs to interested individuals on behalf of the client or seller.
What Microtasking Involves
The basic concept of microtasking is getting a small payment for doing any small task. This means that there are many possible types of tasks involved.
These include online jobs like data entry, shopping, answering survey questions, online research, checking of prices online and more.
Real - world tasks may include store shopping, repairing, cleaning, singing, or greeting someone in person.
There are also crowdsourcing projects available wherein a client divides a larger project into smaller tasks that it assigns to various individuals.
These individuals are contractors who may need to log in to the company website and choose any of the tasks from a list.
Technical Requirements
Each company have requirements different from other companies offering short task services.
Skills and Attributes
Patience is an important attribute necessary when performing microjobs. These are short tasks you may complete with minimal time and effort.
However, when you think about the payment, have abundant patience to complete more tasks until you can get a decent amount of earnings.
Patience is also crucial when you need to look for other microjobs to perform.
Age Requirement
For (possibly) all short task sites, the age requirement is legal working age.
How To Apply
Microtasking jobs are available on microtasking websites. You need to sign up to these individual sites to do microtasks.
Take care in choosing the sites you will join because there are also scam microtasking websites out there. To be safe, always sign up to websites that collect no payment from interested workers.
There are some similarities in the signing up process, such as a working email address and password. Keep in mind that companies require valid and working emails.
Disposable emails will not get accepted in most websites.
Availability of information or the FAQ page is another factor that will make you feel certain whether a website is trustworthy.
As you browse through these microtasking websites, you'll definitely find that some have such features, while others don’t.
When you cannot readily find the information you need, especially the payment details, it should make you think twice in signing up to that platform.
Potential Income
As already mentioned a few times, doing micro jobs will also pay you a small amount of money. You could get payment from 1 cent to about $50, depending on the task.
To make more money, you need to work fast and take on as many short tasks as possible. Do not expect to even get a minimum wage from performing such tasks for a whole day.
There are different ways and methods of sending payments like PayPal and bitcoins. Others offer gift cards, services, and rewards points.
Discover the payment rate, method, and plan from individual sites.
Work Schedule
One of the best things when taking on microtasking jobs is flexibility in the work schedule. You can work anytime you want or anytime you feel like completing tasks.
Benefits
The benefits you can get from microtasking are not the same as the benefits for traditional employees.
Traditional employees who are office-based and even some very lucky home-based virtual workers may enjoy benefits such as medical, health, retirement and food benefits.
When working on micro jobs, your benefits are practical advantages of working online.
For jobs that are very easy and short, the client might not offer training. There are microtasks, however, such as web search evaluation that requires training so the company that hires you could provide training.
Conclusion
PROS:
CONS:
If I will consider the potential income from doing these jobs, I feel that I could put my abilities and skills to something better and do other things that can pay more.
However, you can make use of your side income from these small jobs to fund your blogging start-up costs.
Blogging, when done right, yields more than you can imagine!