5 General Transcription Jobs You Can Do From Home

5 General Transcription Jobs You Can Do From Home

In today’s economy, finding ways to earn a little extra income has become big business. There are literally thousands of sites that offer you “make money from home” options. But once you get to reading what they offer, it often costs money. If you’re looking for a way to make money from home, consider these 5 easy general transcription jobs you can do from home.

YouTube Video Transcriptions

There are many freelance sites that allow you to bid on jobs. These sites are free to join. One of the easiest general transcription jobs you can do from home is the YouTube video transcription. Just as the name implies, you will transcribe a video (per your client’s instructions). Often, these are posted underneath the video for the hearing impaired or translated into other languages.

General Webinars

Another easy general transcription job is the webinars. If you don’t know what a webinar is, it is a seminar that is held over the internet. Depending on your client’s wishes, you will signify each speaker separately along with what they are saying.

These are often offered by subcontractors, so make sure that they are willing to pay your prices and that they have a good reputation for paying on time.

Interviews

These general transcription jobs can have 2 or more people speaking, so you will need to know how to signify who the speaker is with your client. Whether it’s a question and answer format or a conversation between people, you will need to know the formatting instructions to effectively put this together.

DVD’s

I know this may sound weird, but sometimes, some clients want a DVD transcribed. This could be for school purposes, reformatting or even for offline captioning. Whatever the reason, you want to make sure that you have a good and clear copy to play for your transcription.

Lectures

The hearing impaired have a right to an education and another type of general transcription is that of the classroom lecture. The biggest issue with these audio files is that they are often unclear or there is a lot of what’s called cross talk-when more than one person is talking at the same time. Couple that with poor recording, it can become quite challenging, but is great for the beginner to learn how to listen carefully.

Some things to consider before you start looking for general transcription jobs you can do from home. First, you want to make sure that you have at least a good audio player like Windows Media Player or VLC. These will play mp3 and mp4 audio formats and have keyboard shortcuts that can allow you to listen, pause, rewind and fast forward.

You will also want to practice your typing skills. While freelance general transcription jobs often don’t require a certain typing speed, you are paid by the project or audio hour, an audio hour being the time of the recording, not your working time. The faster you can get them done, the more you can make.

A quiet space to work is almost a necessity. There is nothing more distracting than the TV, kids or other noises when you’re trying to transcribe a hard to hear audio. Along with that, you want a good pair of headphones and if they are noise canceling all the better.

For freelance jobs, you may have to download a timer that is provided by the site. The thing with these is that you must remember to start and stop the timer as needed. You will want Microsoft Word as most clients use this program and others just don’t translate over well.

Whether it’s a start into a new career or a way to make extra money, the world of transcription is exploding. These 5 general transcription jobs that you can do from home are the very place to start.