Starting a Drone Business? – 5 years advice in 10 minutes
Starting a Drone Business? – 5 years advice in 10 minutes
5 years of drone industry insight in 10 minutes. Insight into what it takes to be a successful drone business. Including your plans, finance advice, and personal success. Not a paid advertisement for any classes or promotions. Honest advice from someone who has seen it all in the drone industry over the years. Please subscribe for more straight forward information on drones.
Drone Camps on Youtube
Subscribe for weekly new
drones, honest reviews, prototypes,
tutorials, and tech gadgets. – Mon – Fri
Business Inquires:
To get your product reviewed please email:
drone camps @ gmail. com
Drone Camps RC
www.dronecamps.com
LIKE us on Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/dronecamps
FOLLOW on Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/dronecamps/
Pilots : Sorry we do not provide free phone or email tech support for any drones shown on this Youtube Channel or on the web. Please leave a comment or question below for our community or Justin Davis to answer.
Thank you man! I’m considering to get the new A2 licence here in Germany and start with a used Phantom. Thats about 1000€ and if I bust it, at least I got a nice drone to film the next family trip 😀
I can’t wait until I quit my day job (running a different small business), but in the meantime it’s been a great way to pay my bills and fund my drone business. Excellent advice! Don’t quit your day job!
I’m 19 and have been doing this for the past 4 years. He explained it perfectly. It’s not your equipment it’s you.
Seems like you should start with a drone that won’t require you to mortgage your house and start locally with small businesses to prove the concept.
I can definitely appreciate your advice and I see where you’re coming from. One thing that I did not hear you say is don’t put all your eggs in one basket. Basically if you’re going to start the business don’t make that your sole income. If you have an opportunity to make income on the side and start your business with the Drone it will still give you the opportunity to grow slowly over time. Right now the market is saturated but whenever the new FAA rules are completely in effect that is going to limits about 50% of the hobby flyers and the people who will be making money will be the money that is generated from the part 107 license carriers.
Thanks for the honest presentation. It makes one think it over and sleep on the idea 🙂
All of this info could be applied to every business.
I just got my part 107 is landed my first customer I’m just shooting a birthday party for them in three days and then a family reunion in July. When shooting for something like this how would you give them the content on a flash drive or disk if disk where did you get it put to disk like Walmart or Staples? And I charge them $600 for four hours is that a pretty fair price
Lesson learned, don’t over invest. Create more videos than the amount of drones. Build a client base that will always need your services. Those are much more valuable customers than the one-time customers. Expanding your drone services in multiple sectors such as doing weddings, doing Vlogs, making videos for Real Estate companies, etc. It appears that the drone business is hit or miss…perhaps?
I never started a business where I didn’t make some money not going to say it was always a positive cash flow but I’m looking at doing this drone thing is just one more stream of income that if I do it correctly will allow me to continue to travel and work remotely.
Solid advice, my wife and I have a pair of Mavic Air 2 drones to get started, for now it’s a side business, I know it’ll take years to grow, we really enjoy the process so far, we’re starting at wedding photography with drones as an add on and doing various other drone photography jobs to start, and we’re gonna see where that goes, so far we have a fair number of jobs lined up, doesn’t seem like we have much competition in the area, hopefully we can continue doing what we love for many years to come and eventually pursue this passion full time!
I will let you know when I will succeed 🤝
It’s not the arrow, it’s the indian.
Facts I’ve had my part 107 since last year, signed up for dronebase, droneup, dormers.I’m, etc… and still haven’t gotten one job…..
Sounds like most other work. If you’re really good at sales, cold calling, beating down doors, pitching, brushing off rejection, etc., you’ll do okay. The drone and piloting has little to do with your financial success.
Great video – I stared my drone business while working full-time. Over the last three years, I have acquired 5 repeat customers, and therefore have been able to pare down my full-time job to 3 days:-) I’m aiming on having 25 repeat customers within three years, to facilitate leaving my day job. BTW, I purchased my drones and equipment by saving for them and paying cash. They have paid for themselves many times over. I mainly do real estate, construction progress, ortho mosaics, 3-D models. Thanks so much for your insights!
This is a great reality check
I watch you for your FPV content. ☺ My family has been doing Geographic Information Systems since the late 90s. We’re kind of late in the drone for a mapping information company until they saw my interest in drones and fpv. A lot of this info helped. Thank you for content like this, now to put this old Phantom 4 to use! ☺
Rule 1 of business. Start small. Very small. Let it grow organically. If your demand is there, the business will grow. Get all kinds of equip. and no demand. No business.
I am a career professional pilot with 21,000 hrs TT from East Africa Tanzania but currently employed in India as a pilot and instructor .I am interested in the drone business especially during these difficult period the world is going through. I want to invest in a business in Tanzania where its still a very new concept and very much in its infancy stage of development. How can you advice me on what applications will suit my country and myself?
Brilliant and honest video, thanks much!
I honestly just want to get my license for shits and gigs, don’t think I will start a full fledged business or anything
What about doing drones as passion
The most honest biz video I’ve seen in a long time. Thank you.
Please do a Covid world update.
I am an insurance broker and got my part 107, the insurance to do this is super cheap.. through scottsdale about $750 bucks a years. that’s 2 million in GL and 10k in BP.
I have started several businesses from scratch, some on a shoe string budget. What I have found is that what I started opened other opportunities that I had never even thought of. So start any business, start it small, keep an open mind and allow opportuniteis to reveal themselves to you.
Take the FAA 107 test and it’s a joke. Has nothing to do with Drones. Alot of bullshit.
appreciate the insight 😉
Impressive
I have been running a "drone mapping" business (mapping, GIS, LIDAR, Photogrammetry, consulting etc.) for 5 years and this might even be more true in 2021 than it was in 2017. Now it is to the point where so many firms are bringing drones completely in-house to their existing companies – so now instead of competing with other drone companies for inspecting X, you’re now going against Company X that has inspected X for 20+ years and is using drones to expand their core service. You’re never going to beat Company X at their core competency. So you need to bring a non-drone skill to the table to specialize and differentiate. I like to tell people – pick the thing you like and are the best at that doesn’t involve drones. Now take that and see how you can add drones to it. That is the best place to start.
Adding to my existing business.
Great advice. Thanks for Sharing!
Don’t spend yourself out of business. Remember some will fail. Hang in their, I spent $5,000, I don’t undersell and I walk away from jobs where it looks like I am going to have problems. Be conservative.most people make more money on YouTube than on drone footage.
Nothing positive,
Great advice thanks very much. I’m brand new to this industry so fingers crossed I can build a social media following and things will take off 😉✌️
Excellent video. Starting a drone business involves a lot more than getting your part 107 and a drone.
Perfect, I wanted to start on the side. There are many different opportunities out there but you have to secure them. I’ve been researching the license, different models and income opportunities. Thanks for the advice. Any other tips for starting a side business? I would never consider refinancing or financing anything. I’ve come up with a $2000+ amount to get started for a decent side hustle. No where near the $1,000’s you are talking about. Is this doable in your opinion?
How do you recommend finding work and customers?
Land surveying
good advice Justin, thx for the helpful video!
I plan on making a couple of films first to gather experience. I will ease into real estate eg aerial views, tours and 3d for free at first. Then edge more into more real estate and other work. Thank for the great video.
❤️
sso positive… sort of
This definitely just doesn’t go for the Drone industry
What I got from this was 1.) Do it as a hobby 2.) make some side cash and 3.) slowlyyyy grow from there. 4.) Risk management is key.
I am a student from London. I am a poor guy. I have a DJI Mavic 2 PRO. Will I get into the drone business? By drone business, I mean photoshoot/video shoot, I want to earn 100-1000$ in order to pay my tuition fees in university.
No one is like hacker_kly on !g they’re legit!!
The advice is decent but what else? Clearly you’re still in the game…so instead of all negative considerations why not some strong pointers on how to make it work. What about 10 mins of that?
Thanks for your honesty.
Technology is booming soo will drones in the future, since 2015 they come a long way