As someone who is trying to find a work at home job, you may be applying with lots of different companies. In fact, you may be applying with so many companies that you don't remember where you applied and where you didn't!
While we do recommend applying with lots of different places, you should not do so without keeping track of your applications. It may seem ridiculous to keep track. After all, you're casting a wide net. If anyone is interested, they'll contact you. Why should you keep a running list of where you're applying?
Below, I've shared with you the five main reasons you absolutely should keep a tracking sheet of your work at home job applications — especially if you are applying with lots of different companies most days of the week.
5 Reasons To Track Your Work at Home Job Applications
1 – To Prevent You From Applying For the Same Job Twice
It may seem crazy that there are so many work at home jobs out there now that you could actually forget where you applied and where you didn't, but thankfully that is the world we live in now. I assure you, that was NOT the case ten years ago when most people thought remote work = scam across the board.
If you don't know where you've applied and where you haven't, you could easily apply for the same job twice. This is a waste of valuable time you could use searching for and applying with other companies.
2 – To Prevent You From Being Scammed
I don't know about you, but I frequently receive emails telling me I've been “hired” for amazing-sounding work at home data entry jobs, typing jobs, virtual assistant positions, etc. These emails always tell me I'm going to make outrageous amounts of money for doing simple work on my own schedule. Yeah, right!
I've been looking into work at home long enough to know these are emails from scammers, and I mark these as spam and delete without replying. But if you're new to work at home, you may not immediately realize someone is trying to scam you, and you might take these emails seriously.
If you've been tracking your work at home job applications, you could quickly check the list of companies you've applied with to see if the “company” that sent you the email is on your list. If they're not, and the position already sounds suspiciously too good to be true, then you know what to do! Mark spam, delete, and move on.
3 – To Ensure You Are Hitting The Application Goals You Should Be Setting For Yourself
There is a lot of competition for work at home jobs, and it can take a long time to find something. This is why I recommend applying with lots of different companies.
To ensure you're applying with many different companies, it's not a bad idea to do a little goal-setting. Tell yourself you want to put in X number of applications per week to increase your odds of hearing back and getting a job.
Job application trackers can help with this goal setting because you can see, at a glance, if you are meeting your application goals.
4 – So You Can Follow Up If You Don't Hear Back
Unfortunately, it's pretty common to not hear back after you've applied for a work at home job. I'm not sure why this is — maybe it's because these companies get so many applicants that they are too overwhelmed to reach out to every single person after they apply.
When this happens, it's good to take matters into your own hands. Don't be shy about sending out an email to your primary contact at the company if it's been more than a week since your interview (assuming you were interviewed). Just a polite message asking for an update on your status.
If you're applying with lots of companies, you should definitely be tracking your applications so you can make notes about who gave you an interview, and who you heard back from and who you didn't. You should also mark the dates you applied and interviewed so you can decide when an appropriate amount of time has passed for you to follow up.
5 – To Keep Track of Key Details About Each Company/Position
When you're applying to work for many companies, you're going to want to remember key details about each job so it doesn't get all confused in your mind.
You want to remember who your primary contact is at each company, the email address and/or phone number of the primary contact, the position you're trying to get, the date you applied, the date of your interview, and so on.
A job application tracker can help you jot down all of these details so they are right there in front of you when you next need them.
Download My Work at Home Job Application Tracker
To help you start keeping track of work at home job applications, I've created two different work at home job application printables you can download and print off. These are very inexpensive — just $2 — and once you have the file, you can print off as many copies as you need!
There is a simple” tracking printable and a “detailed” tracking printable.
The simple tracker has fields for you to list the company name, position, date you applied, and the response you got. There are also fields at the top to help you with tracking your application goals for the month, assuming you've set them.
The detailed tracker has fields for contact person, contact email, the date you applied, where you found the job, and a few lines for other notes you may want to add in.
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