At what point should you engage your video production company?

The short answer.... as soon as freaking possible.

(Well, that was an interesting article)

It doesn't stop there. I'd like to go into a little more detail and explain this properly as there's often a misconception that engaging us early will cost more money.

We have two typical customers that come to us for video production services. We have 'creative agencies' or 'in-house brand teams' and I'm going to explain the journey they usually go through when working with us.

Creative Agency

A creative agency is one that is usually part of a much wider marketing campaign working on behalf of a brand. This could involve a new product launch, web design and branding where video slots in as one key deliverable.

That's where we come in.

The creative concept and core messaging is set, and an account director needs an experienced production partner to bring everything to life on screen. We can take that concept and handle all the planning, organisation and delivery of the final project.

This could include, but not limited to:

• Casting,
• Budgeting,
• Location scouting,
• Health and safety,
• Organising specialist crew (if they don't already work full time at Dead Pixel)
• Permits and permissions,
• Shooting,
• Post production and approvals.

We find that a creative agency looking to deliver a TV advert or piece of high-end social content should engage with their production partner as early as possible to make sure their concept can technically be delivered on the suggested budget.

It's all well and good pitching an idea that takes place on Mars but if you have a budget of ￡500 then it's unlikely to be the Hollywood scene you imagined.

We often jump on calls with creative partners to give insights and ball park costs ahead of a pitch to make sure we can deliver on the idea. Something we do as collaboration and not charged for at this stage.

Working with a creative team to deliver on brief, on budget and on time makes for a very happy client. It also makes the collaborative process a really enjoyable one for everyone involved having creative input throughout the whole customer journey.

Direct to brand

We've noticed that some brands already have internal marketing teams that handle the branding and overall key messaging for their company. They tend to be more closely aligned with the business and more familiar with their particular industry.

In that sense they may come to us with a top level idea and trajectory for the brand but have no idea how to achieve this creatively. They know what they want a video to do, they're just not 100% sure on how to do it.

This is where we jump in.

We have skilled creatives in-house with years of experience that can develop concepts, scripts and storyboards to effectively share a clients vision. We often share multiple ideas with budget brackets and a brand team can decide the best route for them.

Once a creative route has been decided it's onto pre-production, production and post production to deliver the content.

It's still a highly collaborative process and we believe there's no such thing as a bad idea. The real skill comes in the execution.

Summary

To answer my own question.

At what point should you engage your production company?

Hopefully you now understand why I said as early as freaking possible. It's always the best way to deliver the highest value content to the most accurate budget whilst having the most fun.