Aerial image-based target object detection has several glitches such as low accuracy in multi-scale target detection locations, slow detection, missed targets, and misprediction of targets. To solve this problem, this paper proposes an improved You Only Look Once (YOLO) algorithm from the viewpoint of model efficiency using target box dimension clustering, classification of the pre-trained network, multi-scale detection training, and changing the screening rules of the candidate box. This modified approach has the potential to be better adapted to the positioning task. The aerial image of the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) can be positioned to the target area in real-time, and the projection relation can convert the latitude and longitude of the UAV. The results proved to be more effective; notably, the average accuracy of the detection network in the aerial image of the target area detection tasks increased to 79.5%. The aerial images containing the target area are considered to experiment with the flight simulation to verify its network positioning accuracy rate and were found to be greater than 84%. This proposed model can be effectively used for real-time target detection for multi-scale targets with reduced misprediction rate due to its superior accuracy.