A retainer agreement communicates your services to your clients. It helps them understand the video production services you offer and other relevant terms and conditions to guide your contract period.
In this guide, I’ll share why you need a video production retainer agreement and how to write one.
What is a Video Production Retainer Agreement?
A retainer agreement is a contract between you (a video producer, director, videographer, editor, or production agency) and a client. It clarifies your responsibilities towards a project— marketing ads, corporate videos, short social media content— and your client's responsibility in terms of payment, indemnity, and others.
Retainers are different from one-off projects. These agreements ensure you have steady work and are paid on a recurring basis.
Why Do You Need a Video Production Retainer Agreement?
It's easy for your clients to expect more than you (intend to) offer. This happens NOT because you didn't communicate your services and responsibilities during your negotiations. It's because the terms they agreed to weren't documented, and verbal agreements aren't always reliable. Here are more reasons why you should have a contract:
- It clarifies the service you'll offer. Your job has many nuances: filming, editing, post-production, storyboarding, animation, and more. But, your agreement with your client may not cover all of this.
You may have agreed on pre-production and post-production phases without the nuances of costuming or animation effects. Anything outside the typical shooting, sounds, lightning, and basic editing is outside the scope of the agreement. A retainer agreement helps you state this to avoid any misunderstanding later.
It also helps you clarify deliverables and deadlines throughout the time of the contract.
- A retainer agreement ensures your client continues to pay for your services for as long as you offer them. This steady income allows you to plan your finances.
- It's common for clients to add new tasks outside the original agreement, especially in video production.
For example, your agreement may cover producing a monthly promotional video for a client's YouTube channel, but the client might also ask you to produce a YouTube Short for experimental purposes (even after meeting up with the month’s deliverables). You can handle this task, but you should be paid for it, and you can use your contract to communicate that.
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The Disadvantages of Not Using a Video Production Retainer Agreement
A retainer agreement may seem unnecessary at first, especially if you've already spoken to your client over a call or an organized meeting. Several things could go wrong without a retainer agreement, including:
- Unclear expectations when clients assume certain services are included (because you have the skill set), even when they weren't discussed.
- Scope creep may happen. As said, your agreement mentions the services you'll offer and states any additional tasks that will be billed separately.
ManyRequests has an add-on service feature to bill for these extra tasks. When your clients make extra requests that weren't part of the initial agreement, you can create an add-on service to let them know what the service will entail and how you'll bill for it.
This ensures you’re paid for everything you do to compensate for your skills and efforts.
- A retainer agreement makes your contract recognizable in any court of law. This means that, if necessary, issues regarding payment, work done, or any other source of misunderstanding can be tried and resolved by the court.
Key Components of a Video Production Retainer Agreement
Your agreement must include these essential clauses:
- Parties Involved: Write down the legal names of the Service Provider (you or your agency) and the client. Add other relevant information, such as email addresses and phone numbers.
- Scope of Services: Write the specific services and the deliverables you'll provide. Be as detailed as possible. For example;
- Pre-production services, which include concept development, scriptwriting, and budgeting (with budget reports submitted at the end of every month)
- Production services, which include scouting for location, crew management, and on-set direction.
- Post-production, which includes editing to spot oversights, watching rough cuts, editing the video based on feedback, and creating the final video.
- Payment Terms: Write how you want to be paid—it could be monthly or quarterly. Include the due date for your payment (the third of every month) and your preferred payment method.
Video production often has high costs, so ensure you account for those. This means you may need upfront payment or milestone-based billing to offset the financial toll of planning a video.
Document your basic needs based on the complexity of the project so your client knows what to expect and what their financial responsibilities are.
Include a clause on late payment, write that failure to pay on the agreed date is a breach of contract, and include a penalty for this breach. The penalty could be a $25 increase for every week that your money is not paid. If the client delays your payment for no reason, read this guide on what to do when a client doesn't pay.
- Deliverables and Timelines: Indicate your preferred deadlines and deliverables. If you're responsible for producing a 3-minute interview video, write when the client will receive the first draft, when you expect feedback, how long it'll take to redo the video, and when you'll submit the final video.
- Duration and Termination Clause: Write the length of the contract—it’s typically 3, 6, or 12 months.
Also, add the conditions for renewals and termination—clarify how either party can terminate the agreement and what notice period is required to terminate the contract. The notice period is usually 30 days.
- Client Responsibilities: Clarify what you need from your client during the contract period. This could be
- Availability for meetings
- Budget approvals.
- Provision of necessary materials that can help improve the outcome of every video, etc.
Communicate your expectations to help them know their role in increasing outcomes.
- Confidentiality and Non-Disclosure: During the project, your clients may trust you with proprietary information that cannot be made public, and vice versa. Include a confidentiality clause that protects both parties and ensures that sensitive business information remains secure.
- Dispute Resolution: Clarify the steps to take in case of a dispute. It could be collaboration, where you work together to solve the problem; compromise, where each party gives something up to reach a resolution; or legal actions as a last resort.
- Signatures and Date: To make the agreement legally binding, add spaces for both parties to sign and date it.
Tips and Best Practices for Creating a Video Production Retainer Agreement
These are some tips that could be useful when writing your video production retainer agreement:
- Be specific about the services: Avoid vague descriptions when you're writing your scope of service.
Rather than write, “The service provider will produce videos,.” Write, “the service provider will create and edit three 5-minute promotional videos and cater to the shooting, scriptwriting and editing phases.” Be more specific when you're writing yours to include everything you need to do.
- Always add revision limits: You’ll have to make many edits to reflect the client's complaints. Include a revision request limit to avoid cases where the client asks for consistent edits.
For instance, write that “the Service Provider will provide two rounds of edits. Any additional edit requests will incur extra fees.”
- Communicate payment structures. Some clients may prefer to pay monthly, and others might prefer to pay based on milestones. Offer flexible payment options that are easier for you and your clients.
- Write how you want to communicate with them. This can be emails, Slack DMs, or WhatsApp chats. Whatever works for you.
You can also use the chat feature on ManyRequests. This platform allows you to onboard clients, chat with them, and manage their projects and your team members on a single dashboard. See an example here:
To explore more features and how they can be helpful, sign up for a 14-day free trial here.
How to Use Our Free Video Production Retainer Agreement Template
To customize:
- Copy the content of the template to another document.
- Edit the texts to include your name, business details, and the specific services you offer.
- Add your brand elements (name and logo) and format the font and colors as necessary. Double-check if our logo is not in the document's header.
- Customize your scope of services (video deliverables, revision rounds, and any other details specific to your agreement).
- Review the agreement before sending it to your client.
Wrap-Up
A video production retainer agreement gives you a solid foundation for your relationship with clients. It helps you set clear expectations, define deliverables, and get consistent payment for your work.
If you want to manage client onboarding and workflow, use the ManyRequests client portal. It's a simple, efficient tool that other agency owners use to handle client management, project management, communications, and invoices. James Albert, the co-founder of DesignGuru, says, “One of our differentiation factors was having a dedicated client portal. It makes it simple to manage all our clients' deisgn jobs in one place“ and that they’re a big fan.
Sign up for a free 14-day trial to learn how it works. If you need help using any feature, visit our help center.
