Pricing a marketing video?

July 5, 2006 5:01 PM

What is a reasonable price for a 3-5 minute marketing video?

I work at a large private school. Our department has recently been given the go-ahead to produce a short 3-5 marketing video for the purpose of seeking grants and recruiting students. The task of getting quotes from local producers has fallen on me.

Obviously, I want to make sure that I bring accurate and useful information back to my bosses. I should have three quotes coming in by the end of the week, but I don't have any idea what would be considered a reasonable price for this sort of video.

We have not been given a budget. My bosses will determine, based on the quotes, whether we are going to go forward with this or not.

I recognize that there are dozens (if not hundreds) of factors that contribute to the cost of a any film. That being said, what would be a reasonable cost for this film or - barring that - what would be a logical way of calculating whether the various quotes are reasonable?

posted by Joey Michaels to work & money (6 answers total)

draw up your own list of rough guesses for people and equipment required: will you need someone to write your content? will that person need to spend time interviewing and researching? if yes, budget a writer for, say, five days at $500/day. it's possible that your director is also a great camera person and project manager. budget that person at $800/day for ten days. someone will be doing sound. say $500 day for three days. say the same for lights. there's some equipment budget. some recordable media budget. some random other stuff that comes up during the shoot (transportation, food, whatever). then there's the editing process. budget an editor for two weeks. you may need to license music to include in the video. etc. depending how detailed you get in your guesses, you may find yourself surprised when the estimates come in much lower.

there are lots of ways to do this very inexpensively and lots of ways to do this expensively - and that doesn't necessarily correlate with quality. definitely watch samples of their work, check references and make sure the working experience will be pleasant, and don't rely on the lowest cost option.
posted by judith at 5:19 PM on July 5, 2006

This page has a couple thoughts on the subject.

It really depends on what the script calls for (is it all just shot in front of a green screen? or is it all location shoots with lots of dolly shots?) and how professional you want it to look, but at a minimum probably $100 per finished minute.
posted by starman at 5:19 PM on July 5, 2006

Previously.
posted by disillusioned at 6:49 PM on July 5, 2006

I'm currently working on a marketing video for the company I'm interning for here in Shanghai. We've settled on having a CCTV crew film it, to the tune of 4000RMB ($500 USD) per minute of finished footage. This includes digital effects and animated title sequences, etc.
posted by roomwithaview at 6:53 PM on July 5, 2006

The quote by the finished minute works so-so for the one man band, and the ambitiousness of the projects.

Ahh hell. Just go read what I wrote in the thread that disillusioned quoted.
posted by filmgeek at 7:40 PM on July 5, 2006

My bosses will determine, based on the quotes, whether we are going to go forward with this or not.

Do you want to make this project happen? i.e. is it something that you are personally interested in doing? If so you should get a ball-park [or exact] figure of what your bosses will pay and then make the video for that money. I know that sounds a bit simplistic but you could make the video for $5 or $500,000 or anywhere inbetween.
posted by meech at 11:35 PM on July 5, 2006