Day 19.1: Data Entry

Yesterday, as I continued my ongoing exploration of ways to make money online, something caught my attention: get paid to process e-mails. This was good pay, too--$15-25 for every e-mail, as many as you want. You're getting serious pay for copying and pasting and then clicking send! Of course, a deal that good is also likely a scam, so I began my research. Sure enough, you have to pay $15-25 just to sign up for one of these jobs, and I found reviews saying that they were pure scams. Looking closely, you can even see on the sites themselves that whoever wrote it does not know English very well and did not bother to put a lot of work into putting the site together. Very fishy! But is there really a job like that? Can you get paid money for processing e-mails without having to pay for it first?

It took some searching before I could figure out just what I was looking for: an online data entry job. "Data entry" encompasses a lot of miscellaneous jobs, such as processing e-mails, taking surveys, and filling out forms. It doesn't sound as glamourous as "Get paid to copy and paste!" but data entry jobs are very real, and there are a lot of legitimate countries that will pay for you to assist in small tasks. However, there are also a lot of scams that claim to be good data entry companies. How can you tell the difference?

• You shouldn't have to pay up front. If they're really going to pay you, then why do they need your money?
• Look at the site. Does it feel legitimate and professional? Can you find all of the answers to any questions you have, and is it free of typos and bad grammar?
• Ask why they need you. Is it a job that they really need humans to do, or is there a computer service that could do the same thing for less? If they really just need you to copy and paste e-mails, why don't they just use an auto-responder instead?

If you want to know for sure what some good companies are, I've joined a few that have proven to be legitimate. Amazon Turk, while not exclusively a data entry company, does include a lot of that same work. Different employers have different reputations, but in my experience I've always gotten paid for my work. Protypers.com is another good data entry service. Though the pay is not much, the job is very simple: fill in captchas to help provide options for the visually impaired. 

Lastly, I have recently joined Onlinejobsfree.com, a fabulous organization that provides you with multiple streams of income by doing data entry work. I've only been a member for about a day, and so I can't offer a full report, but it appears to be legitimate and a great option for people who want to earn some cash on the side but don't want to trouble with possible scams.

Hopefully these tips are useful to you, and remember to follow me on Twitter for tips and updates! You can also join me on Clixsense (my best moneymaker so far!) or freeinternetmoney.com.