Hail Damage Roof Leads Project: I Built a Customer List with Satellite Data, Tested It, and Why I Shelved It

Hey Indie Hackers,

A few days ago I had a cool project idea: Use satellite data to find areas hit by storms and hail, then create a report with all the addresses in those zones. The goal was to sell “hot leads” to roof repair companies.

Following the “fake it till you make it” mindset, I quickly wrote a simple script. It pulled storm and hail data from satellites and turned it into ready-to-use address lists. That first report became the core of the product.

I created a separate Gmail account for the project. Using my own tool LeadAtlasApp.com, I pulled contact details for 30 roof repair companies in the Dallas area. I attached the report to an email and asked: “Would a list like this be useful for you?” My plan was to send about 100 emails over a few days and decide whether to keep going based on the replies.

I sent the first 30 emails on Friday. Monday morning, zero responses. I still didn’t have enough feedback, so I sent follow-up emails to everyone.

A few more days passed and still nothing. I expanded the test: 60 companies by email + 10 more via direct messages on social media. Total replies? Zero.

At that point I realized: “Cold outreach isn’t working.” Maybe organic growth could save it? I checked search volumes for possible SEO keywords:

“hail roof leads”
“hail damage roof leads”
“roofing hail leads”

The numbers were way too low. Organic traffic didn’t look realistic either.

My decision: Technically, building this is super easy with AI (thank you AI!). But the marketing side is hard. Neither cold emails/DMs nor SEO made sense. So I decided to put the project on the shelf.

Now I’m looking for new ideas that are more creative and easier to market, especially anything related to space and satellite data. That’s where I feel strong technically and where the customers seem more open.

This was another classic “build in public” experiment. Great idea, MVP built in 1-2 hours, real-world test done, and a data-driven decision made. Sometimes the smartest move is to stop.

What do you think? Would you try a different cold outreach tactic? Drop your thoughts in the comments, maybe we’ll spark a new idea together.