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Bill is a Certified Drone Pilot and co-owner (with his wife, Laura) of Billy Productions, capturing the beauty of a home’s property and location, providing real estate agents, clients, and developers a more robust appreciation for each home’s unique char
Bill is a Certified Drone Pilot and co-owner (with his wife, Laura) of Billy Productions, capturing the beauty of a home’s property and location, providing real estate agents, clients, and developers a more robust appreciation for each home’s unique character.
Bill is located in ChicagoLand area, Naperville, IL. His main focus for past 20 years has been financing mortgages. The last year has been a bit more difficult in terms of compliance for the bank he works for. He needed to pick up something that would be an offshoot of that business. He picked up drones and started shooting as a hobby. After a small bit, the agents he worked with asked him to shoot a house. After a while, it was taking a lot of time from his other business. Once he got his license, that business has taken off with shoots for agents. People had seen his drone shoots and because of the synergy of the drone shoots with his previous line of work, it’s been easy to do.
Bill says if you’re looking for a business, don’t go too far off, or outside of, your knowledge base, from your current knowledge base or business. David agrees that drones are a tool that is only as good as the business you’re already familiar with. It’s best have a warm audience instead of starting from scratch. Bill has always been intrigued by photography and the technology of drones makes it more attractive—they sky is the limit. Other people are interested too; people area always coming up and asking how they work. It’s an easy in to offer so many ways to shoot something. And the topic of drones is always spurning new ideas from other people. He, though, has tried to keep his focus in the real estate business. To be successful you have to develop a specialty and build out your niche.
There is a nice learning curve to be leveraged when you’re out there shooting. Six to eight months ago, a developer contacted him to shoot several lots. Bill then had to create new pricing for him because he didn’t understand how drone shooting worked. Bill also had to learn how to price a new account with several lots, instead of houses. Also, if a developer isn’t aware of the issues with his property, he could end up owing the town, or being sued, so it’s worth it to them to pay for the drone shooting. It’s like an insurance policy for them. There’s evidence so there’s no argument of the value.
As a way to pan out a new niche in travel, Bill shot his nephew’s wedding, but that didn’t work out as well so he’s continued to stay with real estate. He’s also hired someone to edit. Bill says a key to success is to understand that time is money and you should find others to perform services, like editing, that are time-consuming. Editing and posting to social media is one of those things. For real estate, Bill charges $250 for video; photos are $125, shooting stills is 30-40 minutes. He may charge for a travel fee so he tries to stay within a local area. Bill is always thinking of those people who can bring clients into his other business. In terms of business, winter is always slow, but things really pick up in spring. He charged $750 for an interior/exterior shoot for a $2.5M home in Springfield.
“Build a signature; Create a Brand”
Bill values his connections. He’s formed one of his most important agent relationships through people he knew. He admired the photography work of one agent and that photographer didn’t work with a drone pilot. He offered to promote her business and now they work well together, helping each other grow their business(es). He learned you have to be able to turn around work quick and, ideally, make it work for you and another person. Bill’s advice for someone who may want to break into real estate drone business is:
“You have to like working with the drone and learning about drone technology. Don’t be afraid of giving a free shoot or two to someone who would like what you do and be able to use you. Give to get but be authentic.”
The most difficult part of starting his business is learning video and photography settings. You have to make things short and sweet. You don’t always know what will look good from out in the field. Find the settings that will work to produce the best results. If Bill were starting over, he doesn’t know what he’d do differently. He says it’s fun learning, and he’s still learning. But finding out what his biggest distraction is and staying away from that has been the thing to do. He says that distractions can keep him from his end goal. He’s gone into a few other areas and has had to learn how to stay focused. His advice is:
“Always have fun ... don’t be too hard on yourself with the learning. As you’re developing your skill, share with others, because they will see your enthusiasm.”
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