Starting a Drone business- Ideas?

Hello Everyone! I am looking into starting a drone business in a month or two. I have some ideas on what I would like to do such as agricultural mapping, inspection services, and real estate photography. I have many questions such as where is the most money at, how competitive the market is etc. I would love to hear some of the ideas you guys have for a drone based business. I would also like to hear from you who currently operate drone businesses. Thanks, Droneman

@Droneman
imagehttps://blog.dronedeploy.com/how-to-build-a-new-drone-business-c43ee735abe3#.wuuzzw9er

1 Like

Hey @Droneman,

So some things you are going to want to consider is what can you do; well enough to be paid, it is easy to plan a drone company but your going to need to find a market niche and keep working at it. Luckily you are already in a great place for learning the DroneDeploy side of things and can get help on the mapping aspects here. You might consider also involving yourself in some other communities as well. I have a had tremendous luck and help with the community over at Uavcoach.com, and their associate part 107 test prep site dronepilotgroundschool.com (in case your in need of the license in the us).

Its good to be aware of your regional competition (ie if everyone has a drone business that handles real estate photos and videos you might want to steer yourself in a different direction. A to what pays the best, well this depends on region, but in general the more advanced or exclusive your producible s are the higher you will be able to charge. The flip side is the more you charge, the more expertise your client is going to expect. I cant tell you how many people i talk to that are dead set on finding the highest money they can and want to do surveying, without realizing to be a surveyor requires licenses in it of itself. What you might find is to partner with existing companies to provide the services if you can and build your business out from there.

Another consideration is that flying is by and far the smallest part of operating a commercial drone operation, lets say 5% the other 95% is dedicated to producing your product and running the business. It is always good to keep this in mind when you are trying to find what you can do best.

Scott Lashmit

2 Likes

Hey @Droneman

Is your business up and running? what type of work did you go with if so? I was looking at investing in a phantom - obvs the clear winner for a drone at this moment in time just they’re so damn expensive!! I’ve been trying my hand at drone photography and have a few more ideas i would like to explore. I’ve thought about taking aerial shots of towns and cities and selling them to companies. this brought me onto thinking about promotional videos for businesses (particularly those with a lot of land for photography purposes).
I’ve also read up on starting a photography business using resources like https://www.creative-asset.co.uk/startups/photography which I found v useful. But is very different to drone photography.

anyways let me know how your business is doing