| Things to know: |
| 1. Identify the right industry and digital skills – It’s essential to focus on fields that welcome remote work and to sharpen skills that translate well online. 2. Market research and application preparation – Explore available roles, tailor your CV, and craft compelling cover letters. 3. Navigate job sites and communities – Knowing where to look (and how to present yourself) makes landing a remote job much easier. |
If you’re here, it’s likely because you’re ready to start working remotely, but you’re not quite sure where to dive in. Well sit tight! In this article, eNomad dives into everything you need to know about getting a remote job: from the skills you need, to preparing for your application, to the interview itself.
Ready to work remotely? Let’s jump in.
Before you get a remote job
Before you start on your digital nomad journey, you’ll need to have a remote job, and before you get a remote job, you’ll need two key things: a remote skill and a chosen industry. Let’s explore both of these necessities:
1. Have a digital skill
Wanting to work remotely is all well and good, but before you get your first remote job, you’re going to need a skill you can monetize digitally.
Administrative Skills
Remote companies need admin. Remote roles using admin skills include virtual assistants, data entry, and scheduling coordinators.
Finance and law skills
If you’re an accountant or lawyer, there are all sorts of remote roles for you to choose from. Lots of remote companies need accountants and lawyers specialized in certain topics or from particular areas too.
Design skills
Brand design, graphic design and video editing are all great examples of skills you can monetize digitally. Today, a lot of product designers also have the choice to work at least semi-remotely.
Programming
Front end, backend, full stack, blockchain tech: whatever you do in the programming world, it’s likely you can do it remotely. Remote developer jobs are plentiful, and also some of the best paid roles in the industry. If you don’t yet have a digital skill, learning to code could be extremely valuable.
People Skills
Customer service, community or HR roles are worth considering if you’re personable and enjoy helping people. While getting your first remote role with no experience in these areas can be tricky, it’s not impossible. With such competitive roles, specializing is always recommended.
If you don’t already have a digital skill, consider starting with some online courses or free resources. If you have a specific role in mind, list the skills you need and spend time improving those skills until you’re ready for the next step!
2. Choose an industry
Certain industries are more remote-friendly than others. Here are five popular fields that often offer remote roles:
Tech: SaaS, crypto, hardware and more
The tech industry can include the obvious options like software engineering, data analysis, and QA testing. However, even tech companies require communications department employees, design creatives and much more. The tech industry offers a range of remote jobs of all types, and tends to pay better than many others.
Marketing: Digital marketing, product marketing and more
Marketing is a huge banner Digital marketing can include SEO, social media management, blogging, and content strategy. But it can also include product marketing and affiliate marketing: two opposite ends of the spectrum. Marketing is a huge category in the remote job market, so if you have any writing skills, it’s definitely an industry to consider.
Customer Service & Support
Customer service, support and solutions roles can be done remotely pretty easily these days; and many of the biggest telemarketing companies now offer options to work from home. However, a lot of the customer service industry’s roles operate on a work-from-home basis, meaning you can work remotely, but only within one country from a home base. That said, there are remote customer service jobs out there that do offer full remote packages but they are typically quite competitive. If you want to get into a fully remote customer service role, consider specializing so you can offer something to a niche industry.
Education & E-Learning
A lot of online workers opt to teach! If you speak languages or have experience with certain tools or skills you think could be useful, consider teaching. Remote teaching roles tend to be flexible, meaning you can work as much or as little as you want (which also means teaching isn’t necessarily for the more disorganized of us). That said, there are lots of different approaches to e-learning. Perhaps you want to work on an e-book for your course and release it to users all at once—with remote teaching roles, often the curriculum is up to you.
Of course, this is just the beginning. There are countless industries you could get into, such as; fashion, logistics, environmental science, pharmaceuticals and so on. Increasingly, new industries are adopting remote working for its proven benefits for employees and companies.
How to find a remote job
So now you know all about the kinds of skills you’ll need and the industries you should be looking at, let’s get down to the meaty bit: how you can start finding remote jobs to apply to! Of course, don’t take this list as Gospel. While the most popular remote jobs can be found in the following places, don’t underestimate your own networking power. eNomad’s founder Jem found her first remote job through an advert on Discord!
But for those of you just starting out, here are some of top places to find remote jobs:
Traditional Job Websites Filtered by Remote Locations
Major job sites like LinkedIn, Indeed, and Glassdoor have options to filter for remote roles. Take advantage of these filters to find remote positions without sifting through on-site jobs.
Remote-First Websites
Here are some of the dedicated remote job websites to help you in your search:
We Work Remotely: One of the largest platforms for remote job listings in various industries.
Remote.co: Offers a range of remote jobs, from entry-level to executive positions.
FlexJobs: A subscription-based site known for its high-quality remote job listings.
Working Nomads: This site curates remote job opportunities for people who want to work from anywhere.
For a more comprehensive list, check out the full article on where to find remote jobs.
Choose Industry-Relevant Sites
Specific industries have their own platforms that offer specific filters for remote roles.
For example, if you’re interested in the crypto industry, try Web3.career. For multilingual roles in Europe, EuropeLanguageJobs is a great choice.
If you have your favorite remote sites for your industry, email us at info@enomad.xyz to tell us what we’re missing!
Get Involved in Remote Hiring Communities
Websites are not your only option. These days you can find all sorts of remote hiring communities on social media platforms.
For example, take Metaintro, a discord community started specifically for web3 and crypto jobs. It has now branched out to include other tech and saas roles—many of them fully remote!
These sorts of communities help address a challenge all remote jobs sites face: scammers and spammers. Since they verify recruiters, you can rest assured that verified job posts are legitimate.
Check out the options on Digital Nomad Forums
Some forums or communities offer jobs boards where digital nomads and remote workers can share job leads. Websites like NomadList have job boards you can browse (or even add to if you’re hiring for your own company).
Forget Being an Employee: Register as a Freelancer
Freelancing can be a gateway to remote work. Sites like Upwork and Fiverr allow you to market your skills, build up a client base, and enjoy a more flexible, self-directed work model. Although it can make applying for Visas more complicated (particularly if you’re planning to travel as a non-EU citizen in the EU), being a freelancer gives you more control over your money and in which country you pay tax.
How to Land remote job interviews
So, now you know about which remote job role you want, you have the skills and you’re ready to apply. But how do you actually land the remote job when you apply?
Let’s look at the most important things to do during your remote job application process:
Write a really good CV and Cover Letter
In your cover letter, demonstrate your aptitude to remote work by discussing your time-management skills, motivation, and ability to work independently. Show that you understand the demands and benefits of remote work and highlight any relevant experience, digital skills, and tools you’ve used, especially if they’re common in remote roles (like Asana, Zoom, or Slack).
Emphasize your digital literacy
Getting a remote job also means understanding technology. To explain, a remote recruiter considering those without any remote working experience will usually ask whether you have the digital literacy required to work remotely. For some remote jobs, you must comfortable with using multiple tools such as Notion, Jira, WordPress, Salesforce and more. Other jobs may focus more on your typing speed or accuracy. Make sure you check the type of digital literacy required for your role and emphasize it!
Highlight your work ethic
Some people simply struggle to stay motivated whilst working remotely. That means that, often, a recruiter will be trying to find out if you have the motivation to work remotely. Since working hours in remote teams can be more flexible, it’s important that you show self-motivation. Convincing the person interviewing you that you have a good work ethic will definitely help you land your first remote job.
Showcase your talents
Everyone has a special talent or skill! Perhaps it’s your languages or maybe it’s your photography skills. If that’s your skill, don’t let a remote recruiter miss it. Often an interviewer or recruiter will skim your CV. Yes—as heartbreaking as it is: people don’t read properly. If you put your skills front and center, and show multiple instances of using those skills, you’re much more likely to get the remote job you want. It’s all about making that information easy for an interviewer to find so picking you for the job seems like the most obvious option!
Personalize your application
If you’re sending out CVs and cover letters for different roles, amend them slightly for each role.
For example, say you are applying for a role as a virtual assistant and another role as a transcriber, you’ll want to highlight your digital literacy on both applications. However, for your virtual assistant application, you’ll likely want to mention your experience with google sheets/excel, and your communication and organization skills. For the transcriber role, you’d likely want to highlight your typing experience and accuracy, plus knowledge of other languages.
Nail the interview itself
Practice interview questions
People are not that imaginative, and the truth is there’s only a list of 10 questions any interviewer will really ask you. If they are feeling spicy, or you’re interviewing for Google, perhaps they will throw you a curveball. But on average, remote recruiters will ask you the same thing any interviewer would.
You can expect to hear the interview questions on this generic list:
- Why do you want this job?
- Why should we hire you?
- What relevant previous experience do you have
- where do you see yourself in 1, 3 and 5 years?
- Tell us about time you found challenging. How did you overcome it?
- Do you have experience in <tool name here>?
Don’t say anything stupid
One of the easiest ways to say goodbye to a remote role is by saying something stupid. It’s the elephant in the room, and something that most sites won’t mention, but at enomad, we know that it’s one of the most common things that can go wrong in your interview process. In fact, as someone who has hired people, I can tell you that often the hiring process is about choosing who said less stupid things.
So what constitutes stupid, you may ask?
There are a whole bunch of stupid things to say in an interview for a remote role, enough for an entire article, but as a brief list you should always avoid :
- showing incompetence in a topic area (answering a question in a way that shows they don’t understand the industry)
- showing lack of digital literacy
- focusing on time-off or holidays
- only asking questions about Pay or benefits
- speaking about Politics → Your views are not necessarily the interviewer’s views
- being overly familiar or casual → Swearing, oversharing, late or disrespectful
With all of those pieces in place, you should have no problem nailing your interview and standing out from the crowd when applying for remote roles.
After the Interview
Did you think we were finished? Sorry! Even after the interview, there’s still work to be done. Here’s what you can do to maximize your chances of a positive application response:
Follow Up
A polite follow-up email reiterates your interest and shows that you’re serious about the position. It’s a simple but important gesture that many applicants overlook. If you don’t hear back in over a week, sending a polite follow up email can also show you’re still actively interested in the position. Hiring is often left by the wayside while staff handle lots of other tasks, so sometimes just emailing whoever interviewed you can help remind them who to hire (hopefully you!)
Ask for Feedback
If you don’t get that dream remote job you were looking for, ask the recruiter if they can provide any feedback. If it’s your first time applying to remote job roles, this can give you some kind of idea of the skills you’re missing and what it might take to get the next one! Plus a lot of the time, recruiters are very positive about helping unsuccessful candidates improve, and may even request that you reapply after learning a certain skill.
Try the Whole Process Again Until You Get Your First Remote Role!
Persistence is key when looking for remote work, especially if you’re just starting out. Use each application and interview as a learning experience, refining your approach each time. Eventually, with patience and preparation, you’ll find the right remote role for you.
Which Remote Job You Get is Down To You
At the end of the day, only you are in control of your future! Not everyone will be successful with every remote job interview the first time they try, but by following the steps we’ve outlined in this article, you’ll be well on your way to bagging your first remote role in no time!
Got any tips for other remote workers who want to bag their first role? Or perhaps you have questions about applying for specific roles? Send us an email at info@enomad.xyz and we’ll include your information the next time we update this article!