www.PSFmagazine.com | March-April 2018 | 39 38 | March-April 2018 | Powered Sport Flying It Isn’t the Message, It’s the Medium Much has been written about the decline in the numbers of pilots in the usa over the years. Numbers have never been that high, to tell you the truth. The current all-time high of pilots was 827,000 in 1980. In 1990 those numbers were 702,660; in 2000 the number dropped to 624,580; in 2010 the pilot population was 627,590. And the most recent numbers for 2017 are 609,310. That means we have had a drop in active pilots since 1980 of 36%. That really is significant when you take into account that current pilot numbers include sport pilots, a rating and categories of aircraft that didn’t even exist in 1980! Numbers are worse when you realize that the population of the United States has been growing during this time. In 1980, 0.365% of the 226,546,000 people in the United States were pilots. In 2017, only 0.187% of a population of 325,719,180 people are pilots. Looked at that way, we have half of the pilots per capita than we had just a few decades ago! On the bright side, those numbers do not include ultralight, hang glider, powered paraglider, or skydivers. So it isn’t like everyone is such a stranger to the sky. But why is this happening and what can we do? There are lots of forces at work here and smarter guys than me are working the issue. For example, the eaa is doing great work getting kids into airplanes. That work seems to be paying off with some Young Eagles turning into Young Pilots. But recently I attended the Wisconsin Powered Parachute Association Annual Clinic. One of the presenters there was a powered paraglider instructor named Bill Stoll. He touched on a couple of ppg topics, one of them being how he believed his sport has grown. That really did get my attention. Bill pointed out exactly howmuch social media has helped grow his sport. What has really help grow powered paragliding has been YouTube and Facebook. Those are platforms that people either love or hate. But love them or hate them, they are great tools to promote on a budget. And aviation really does show well with pictures and especially video. What successful entrepreneurs have done is promote regularly through their YouTube and other social media channels. They post their own videos and link to videos done by their students. This way prospective pilots can see the fun and excitement enjoyed by their peers and begin to consider doing the same kind of thing themselves. This is actually critical because this is the way a lot of millennials (and of course others) learn about and begin to accept new things. This kind of promotion does not have to be limited to 'professionals', of course. Any of us can buy a GoPro camera or use our cell phones to take great video that can then be posted to our own social media sites. It’s even better if you invite young people along and offer the video you take of them so that they can post it themselves. This approach requires a little bit of technical savvy, although that is becoming easier and easier. Here are a couple of steps to get started: 1. Find a channel you like. Facebook and YouTube are well known, but Instagram and Twitter are also popular formats that support video. 2. Establish your account on the platform. 3. Look at what other people are doing to get an idea of what works. 4. Find camera equipment that works for you. A smartphone (on a lanyard!) may be your starter camera. Helmet cameras, airframe mounts, cockpit mounts and wingtip mounts are all popular. If you can show you and/or your aircraft while showing the fun, so much the better. 5. Do short videos. Face it, it’s hard to have a really long and exciting flight that will be looked at end-to-end on the internet. It is better that you edit down to the highlights of your flight, or what you are trying to show, and post that. 6. Post often. Build yourself a little audience while sharing your fun! If you are in business, this will help you generate more customers. If you are a pilot simply sharing your experiences, you are helping to promote the sport. Get to promoting!
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