Introduction
Our team recognized flying drones as a technological achievement that would disrupt several industries. During the course of our project, we tested the viability and profitability of drone services in several verticals including consumer, enterprise, agriculture, and government services. Both my team and I firmly believe drones will disrupt several markets and provide an opportunity to make some money.
As far as market disruption goes, the technology afforded to drones have many strategic advantages. Drones can help save time, money and lives. They can travel from one place to another very quickly and efficiently. Drones can complete aerial inspections very quickly, thus can be deployed by emergency service workers and farmers alike. These drones can help keep inspectors out of harm's way, thus saving lives. Another big reason drones have seen so much progression in recent years is the advancement of algorithms that make piloting and autonomous drones much more reliable and safer to operate. Advances in battery technology as well as tethers, allow drones to safely hover above. Popular add-on accessories for drones are retractable cords for delivery, sensors, data storage, transmitters, spotlights for rescue, and cameras to name a few. Drones are so versatile and can be used in many different circumstances, which presents plenty of business opportunities in the space.
Background
Over the past half decade, drone hardware has become cheaper and more readily available. The United States military has been using overhead flying drones in several different capacities. Over time, manufacturers have been able to substantially lower the production costs for drones.
In 2010, the FAA grossly underestimated the scope of the drone revolution, estimating only 15k drones in consumer use by 2020. Today, more than 30k drones are sold each month. One could make a comparison to the personal computer revolution of the late 1980’s. Many critics believed these personal computers were just a fad, for hobbyists, and would not go mainstream. Today, nearly every American consumer owns a computer and uses one at his or her job.
User Research
During the user research process, our team learned that we did not have access to enterprise level clients, to learn about their needs and interest in drone technology. Thus, we decided to stick to the consumer market, where we could speak to many different individuals to learn about their willingness to pay, and their preferences. Because of the relatively high costs of drone application to consumers, we assumed that many of our potential customers had dispensable income. Like many new high technology gadgets, it begins with many hobbyists willing to spend more money. During this process, our team needed to better understand which services for our customers these drones could provide. For our target customer, we proposed the following ideas of application: food and grocery delivery, dry cleaning and laundry delivery, overwatch security, internet services, and rush-package delivery, to name a few. Our questions were created to help discover what the true pain-points for these customers were. We needed to find which was the best service to provide using drone technology.
Landing page
Our initial landing page was geared towards understanding what our future customers may be interested in, regarding drone services. There were pictures of different services that could be provided by drones such as food and grocery delivery, dry-cleaning and laundry delivery, and overwatch security. When the user clicked on the picture of the service, they were taken to a page describing what that may be like, and how it would operate. There was a space where users could write questions and comments regarding the specific service. This helped us understand the interest level in specific services, and most importantly their willingness to pay. The whole goal of these landing pages was to understand which services were most viable and generated the most interest. We tweaked the landing page two more times, with small cosmetic changes, as well as updated information regarding services that could be provided
Survey
For our survey, we wanted to understand which services would be most beneficial and valuable for our customers. We needed to find the most lucrative market in which we could use drone technology. The survey was incorporated into the landing page, so we could adequately understand our target market, and what they may be looking for.