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Online Listers such as Droners.io and others? What works?

mccubbinaerial

mccubbinaerial

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I have approval at one or two of these. But I dont know what others are out there. Droners.io shoots me leads but being in Texas they are all over the map. I got a few decent mapping gigs but RE stuff the bids are also insanely low and want sole RAW images. For an upstart like myself if there any decent national sites that send quality type leads of this nature? Any help,, helps. lol. Happy Flying
 
Where are you located in Texas?

I haven't found there to be too much from Droners.io or Droneup in my area in Northern Texas. I am slowly making myself a market share here. It's a slow and painful process sometimes.
 
Roger that. I am about 8 months old after licensing. Got in the pocket with a few realtor companies and builders but waiting for the 1st to launch mail campaigns to offices and construction companies. Direct mail was good advice I got from this forum they said most offices you will be the ONLY drone mail coming through which makes since and got a good deal from vistaprint on their cyberdeals and outsource my graphic designs. Any other ideas would be appreciated. Hello from South Texas btw.
 
mccubbinaerial said:
I have approval at one or two of these. But I dont know what others are out there. Droners.io shoots me leads but being in Texas they are all over the map. I got a few decent mapping gigs but RE stuff the bids are also insanely low and want sole RAW images. For an upstart like myself if there any decent national sites that send quality type leads of this nature? Any help,, helps. lol. Happy Flying
Click to expand...

You need to go independent. Being in Texas, I bet there are a lot of industrial jobs with good contracts.

I got into doing archaeological and environmental jobs through old contacts, and commercial work in industry pays well.
 
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Direct Mail Marketing is good advise. I’ve had decent success with it. I have 2 Lists: Real Estate and Construction. I send an envelope sized flyer, business card and fridge magnet. The hardest part is building your List. Your List will become one of, if not THE, most valuable asset you have. Mine is up to 900, and I work on it almost every day. This business is more about marketing than it is actually flying your drone.

I even had one contact me as I was “on their list of approved vendors”.....how I got there I don’t know. I’m thinking someone was suitably impressed with a mailer and put me in......
 
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AMann said:
You need to go independent. Being in Texas, I bet there are a lot of industrial jobs with good contracts.

I got into doing archaeological and environmental jobs through old contacts, and commercial work in industry pays well.
Click to expand...
Archaelogical, sorry had to make an Indy Jones comment. Didnt even think of that one among the plethora of things our drones can do. You are right Texas is got a lot of that. How do you market or get into that? I know you said contacts but any ideas on pitching to new sources?

I used to be a mortgage Broker so I know the ropes and sometimes the distaste with marketing but ONCE AGAIN thanks to everyones responses they are all GREAT!
 
Fred Garvin said:
Direct Mail Marketing is good advise. I’ve had decent success with it. I have 2 Lists: Real Estate and Construction. I send an envelope sized flyer, business card and fridge magnet. The hardest part is building your List. Your List will become one of, if not THE, most valuable asset you have. Mine is up to 900, and I work on it almost every day. This business is more about marketing than it is actually flying your drone.

I even had one contact me as I was “on their list of approved vendors”.....how I got there I don’t know. I’m thinking someone was suitably impressed with a mailer and put me in......
Click to expand...
Could I MSG you my flyers/postcards for a once over? Seems you got a pretty good lock on what entices people. Thanks again for your response.
 
JDS said:
Where are you located in Texas?

I haven't found there to be too much from Droners.io or Droneup in my area in Northern Texas. I am slowly making myself a market share here. It's a slow and painful process sometimes.
Click to expand...
San Antonio Area, Bulverde to be precise
 
mccubbinaerial said:
Archaelogical, sorry had to make an Indy Jones comment. Didnt even think of that one among the plethora of things our drones can do. You are right Texas is got a lot of that. How do you market or get into that? I know you said contacts but any ideas on pitching to new sources?

I used to be a mortgage Broker so I know the ropes and sometimes the distaste with marketing but ONCE AGAIN thanks to everyones responses they are all GREAT!
Click to expand...

I’ll get back to you soon but you should read threads like this:

Time line Construction

I have been working on this time-line construction project since summer. Though I'm showing a few images there are hundreds of pictures and countless hours of video between the initial phase and current phase. I'm also currently working on a fast food restaurant time-line. I have learned it is...
commercialdronepilots.com commercialdronepilots.com
 
I am also signed up with a few national sites, but the pool of work is shallow and you almost need to be sitting at your computer 24/7 to be first to snag a job. I am using my 9-5 as my launch platform as many municipalities don't have a budget to support a full time staff and gear. I could see in Texas, where there should be a stronger need of drone work. The changes and more severe weather events aftermath, only shows the need of drone use to keep first responder safe, help in locating victims, accessing damaged infrastructure and personal property. I will admit, doing work for government agency's is more on on the backend when it comes to payment payoff. You most often have to produce an approved product before the funds flow, which means out of pocket expense on your end first, so make sure you have some working capital until the pay offs come through.
 
I’m signed up for drones.io and I find it largely a waste of time because the project “budgets” are unrealistically low.

I also suspect that there are a few “middlemen,” who have no resources themselves, finding and advertising projects on the website. Whoever is advertising seems to have no idea of how long it takes to plan, travel to/from a site, and do the work safely, not to mention the financial risk a PIC is taking by flying a project. The middlemen typically assume that a project is only 15 to 30-minutes of work, which is BS. The budgets are so low that there is no way that you can make money on a project. So the risk of losing money due to a mishap, etc. is high and the potential to make money is low or non-existent.

Lowball ‘clients” on droner’s.io are also negatively influencing other potential clients who are trying to secure the services of a pilot. Unknowledgeable clients see the unrealistically low “budgets” and assume that’s the going rate. This is reinforced by pilots desperate or inexperienced enough to work for nothing.

The only benefit of doing a few such projects from drones.io may be to help build a portfolio of work, but it was easier for me to find my own low-risk, local, portfolio-building opportunities.

I would say 1 out of 100 requests for service on drones.io aren’t insulting to a pilot who knows what they are doing. Those projects and clients on droner.io are few and far between.

You are not likely to be able to build a client base using “services” like drontiers.io. Do the work to find your own clients.

Good luck!
 
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