Planning is rampant this time of year as we look ahead and dream of what’s to come. This fresh start can be seen as ripe with opportunity or daunting, packed with endless possibilities. No matter how you feel, we’re here to help guide you through creating a video production plan and budget for the new year!
Reflect on your marketing plan
Review your marketing plan and consider which strategies can best be supported by video content. For example, a hype video could emphasize your live event, personal video messages could enhance your monthly email newsletter, and frequent video posts on social media could increase your reach and engagement. Decide how much of your marketing budget you’re comfortable spending on video content and then divvy up that amount across all video projects, allocating more or less per project depending on the scope, complexity, and significance.
It’s also a good idea to dig deeper into your marketing plan and research your target audience’s online video habits. Depending on their age, occupation, location, and interests, you might find that one platform or type of video appeals more to them. Ensure you’re putting your money into projects that will be seen by the right people—because if your audience can’t find your videos, your campaign will be much less effective.
Prioritize the most valuable assets
Make sure you lay out your priorities—what videos are “need-to-have” versus “nice-to-have”? You likely know your annual appeal or national sales meeting needs a video, but what about other important communications? Think about your frequency while budgeting, as more exposure with your audience will increase impact. Knowing that video content makes up a majority of all consumer internet traffic, it’s worth considering how many videos you can create for the year without sacrificing quality. Balancing your budget for all your “need-to-haves” as well as some “nice-to-haves” might be the strongest strategy. Check with your video partner, too—it’s possible the “nice-to-have” videos can be executed during the “need-to-have” video’s production with little added expense.
Anticipate additional spending
Identify all fixed costs for your video and account for those in your budget first. For example, you may decide your videos need paid placement—whether it’s preroll advertising, boosted social, or over the top (OTT), you want to make sure these costs aren’t an afterthought. Other fixed costs might include market research or focus groups that will impact the final outcome of your video.
Stretch your video budget
According to a HubSpot survey, 30% of marketers allocate roughly half of their marketing budget to video, so to get the most out of your budget, you need to leverage your video content to its full extent. This starts well before filming, in the preproduction phase. If you aren’t planning efficient shoot days, you’re missing out on the opportunity to capture versatile assets that can add value to your marketing plan, which ultimately drains the budget.
Before your shoots, consider how you could accomplish the following:
Repurposing footage: In advance of your shoot day, think about how you could repurpose the footage you’re capturing into various pieces of video content. It only takes a few seconds to get an on-camera participant to rephrase a sentence to ensure it can be lifted into a soundbite for social media—something that can’t always be edited together in postproduction.
Series: Consider creating a video series that can be shot during one session with your production crew. This is a great way to create enough content to keep up a frequent posting schedule without racking up a large video production bill. Consistent posts can increase impressions, boost rankings in social media algorithms, and build brand recognition—all contributing to a greater ROI.
Non-video assets: Photos and transcripts are two great examples of non-video assets that can come from a shoot. Photos—such as headshots or behind-the-scenes images—can be posted on social media or used on websites. Transcripts can be used to easily pull out quotes for blog posts, testimonials, and more.
As you plan for the year ahead, a good video production partner can show you what to avoid and what to embrace. They can even help you take some calculated risks that lead to great payoffs!