Ever wondered how much a corporate video costs? Or ever been asked to come up with a budget for a video and ended up caught off-guard or downright confused by the diverse price quotes you get?
Well, I'm not amazed.
As with most artistic disciplines, the range of cost varies drastically. However, the answer to “How much does corporate video production cost?” can be frustratingly vague.
Often, the answer you’ll get is “it depends!”
I am pretty sure this is not the answer you were looking for but hear me out first!
But before digging into the pricing of corporate video production, let’s first understand what corporate videos are and why your business needs them.
What are corporate videos?
A corporate video is any video produced by a business or organization. Though often used to promote and raise awareness about a brand as a whole, corporate videos can also be used in a business environment and serve countless purposes, like:
Why do we need corporate videos?
There are multiple possible reasons why a business may need a corporate video.
How much does a corporate video cost?
Pricing out video production can be tricky. Ask someone from the video industry, and you’ll possibly get the standard answer, “it depends.” Well, that's not very helpful when you’re planning a budget and trying to estimate your video production costs.
When a client approaches a company for a quote, this is a common question they ask. However, because each project is unique and varies in length, size, and complexity, there is no simple solution to this question.
The most prevalent question is how much a 3-minute video, a 2-minute video, or a 60-second video costs. Whatever the duration of the film, again the response is, “it depends, ” and here's why:
As an example, consider a 3-minute video. Although the final video will be three minutes long, the time it takes to create it will vary greatly. We've produced 3-minute videos that cost about $4,000 and took just a few days to make. A few other 3-minute videos cost over $10,000 and took nearly two weeks to complete.
You must be wondering why the price variation? Well, it all depends on what needs to be shot and how much time we'll need in post-production. Basically, we calculate the overall cost by determining how much time will be spent on a project (how many days) and then applying the day rate.
To help you understand how we break down our time, let me guide you through the process.
How to breakdown the production time?
Time, talent, and tools are three primary factors that drive corporate video production costs. These factors ultimately get reflected in small budget decisions that do impact the quality of the final outcome.
Our customers' prices are often agreed upon in advance, so they know what to expect before development starts. We've had a few instances where a project took longer than expected, and the price shifted along the way. The client increased the number of footage or other elements in both cases and agreed to a higher price.
The easiest way to prevent any problems is to communicate. One of the most important things is that quality can get compromised if the video budget is low. Then, after all this settlement, we start the production of the video.
Let’s get an inside look at what the video production cost breakdown looks like.
Concept planning
The first and foremost requirement is to get on the same page as the client to ensure we produce what they require to meet their goals. This concept planning meeting can be done over a call and takes about 30-minutes to an hour. We can ask for reference videos to understand the client's vision and concept.
Keep in mind that your film's screenplay, content, and objective are the leading variables in determining how much you may spend on different components of video production. In fact, this is the most crucial component of corporate video production, and any mistakes in this phase may be pretty costly if your team isn't diligent.
Scriptwriting
You’ll have to write the script/concept, everything that should be there in the video or that is to be narrated. While this job can also be done in-house if you have the right team, you might want to get in touch with a video production company that has worked on corporate videos to help you nail down the overall concept and message.
Depending on their experience level, this may cost somewhere between $60 and $200 per hour. In the end, you should have an excellent blueprint for the rest of your project.
Pre-production
Here we start to gather all the things we’ll require during the shoot. This may take anywhere from 1-2 hours. The pre-production phase includes:
Professional voiceover
Next, we come to the voiceover if you need any. We can hire them on various freelancing portals like Fiverr, Upwork, freelancer, etc. Every artist has their own rates depending on their experience. The range can start from $10 to 475 and even higher.
And, to let you know, several artists don’t even give free revisions after recording the script. So, here's an advice, please confirm the script once with the client before giving it to the voiceover artist.
Post-production
This is where a lot of the time is consumed. It's an “it depends” variable that the customer never gets to see. How much time goes into post-production varies depending on how much raw video is there to edit and how complicated the story narration.
This includes sifting through raw video, editing, wrapping, color grading, etc.
These are the basic steps for creating corporate videos, and they are pretty much universal across professional video production companies. However, what ultimately matters is that the final video should not feel like a snooze fest for anyone who watches your corporate video.
Wrapping Up
If you have never been involved in video production before, it’s natural to feel a little intimidated by the process.
Besides, one of the most common reasons a project fails is that sometimes the client can’t decide what they want and keeps pushing the target, which adds to the cost and erodes quality. So, be sure about what you are trying to achieve.
Also, choose a corporate video production company carefully. Have a look at different types of corporate videos and their past work, especially the ones with a budget similar to yours. What matters the most is that they know your industry and understand marketing, not merely video production, because your product may miss the point in a video without any broader context.
For a personalized video production cost estimate, do get in touch with us now!
