Freelance Video Production: Getting Your First Client

1. Freelance Video Production: Introduction: Hey guys, my name is Peter. I am a video content specialists and for the past five years, I made video content for entrepreneurs, influencers, and more importantly, myself as a freelance videographer and a video editor. In this class, you'll expect to learn all the general approaches of what it is that you need, the education, the skills, set, the background, and how exactly do you get your first video client? And what is the importance of a demo reel and why you need to have one to get your first video client, especially if you are looking into freelancing in video production. This class is specifically for complete beginners who have no idea where to start if they wanted to start this entrepreneurial journey of being a freelance videographer. This means editing and making video content for businesses, influencers, entrepreneurs, or digital marketing agencies. What you'll need is a computer, as well as a working knowledge of how to edit videos, as well as some marketing experience of learning how to budget yourself. So the whole purpose of this class is to walk you through point a to Z, but JumpStart and fastest way to understand what it actually takes to learn how to be a syllable freelance videographer, video editor when it comes to video production. So you too can actually learn how to make content as well as become a freelancer at this skill set. So ask the class project for this video. What I expect you guys to do and learn is how to understand and create a really crafty demo reel, highlight reel. So you can start selling yourself and actually become a freelance video editor, video production, videographer. So you can start creating awesome content. Let's get started and I'll see you guys in the first lesson. 2. Do you need a formal Education?: So let's talk a little bit about education. Do you actually need to go to university or college to learn video production? The TLD, DR. the too long didn't read is that no, you do not? I myself personally did not go to school or have any sort of formal education. Would it hurt if you actually went to, let's say a four years and get a bachelor's and film. It doesn't hurt you actually make connections, but only do it if you are having within that means that your budget, you're not overspending thousands of hundreds of thousand dollars to get into film school. And what actually recommend is, before you actually jump into any of these educational institutions, is you go yourself and think and ask yourself, do you have fun making videos? There's a spark, joy into your eyes. And can you see yourself doing this for more than just a year? Because truth be told is, I am a little biased because I am a self-taught, self-learning, a veal production videographer, video editor. But I'm sure there's types of people that you might actually benefit from going to school and understanding this from a university perspective. But what you can do is you can go on YouTube, Skillshare, whatever platform that you want to consume, videos and education. You can simply do a search on any of these classes and you can learn from industry leading experts, for example, in this Skillshare class, where they can lead you through an half hour, a 20 minute class. And you can figure out whether or not you find interest in it in comparison to spending lots of more money in something that's like four to five years of your video production career, where in reality you can start at this a long time ago. So that is my $0.02 on education. You do not need to go to a formal education to learn film. We're going to jump into the next part is what exactly if I don't need school and I don't need a college degree, a bachelor's and master's in film. Then what are the skill sets that I actually need to be successful in this realm? 3. The Skills and Knowledge You Need: So the exact skills that you need to be a content creator, specifically for video, the most important of them all is can you tell a compelling story from beginning point a to point B, being able to take raw footage and compile that and tell some sort of message with that is that 30-second ad for some kind of online content. Or you create a 15 minute short film for a client to sell a product. For example, storytelling is the basis of video content. It spans across all types of content. But storytelling specifically when it comes to video, is your bread and butter. So you need to be a good storyteller. Now that we've gotten that out of the way, you need to also understand the basics of the technicalities of video production. So are you a good editor? What program do you use? I specifically in use, Adobe Cloud has things like aftereffects, mirror, Lightroom, Photoshop. But you have to, you can also specifically edit on things such as Final Cut Pro. And that will also someplace having some sort of knowledge and education of where you can take a full raw video clip as well as be able to chop that up and tell a compelling story that is video content creator. It also comes in tunes of whether or not the technicalities of can you use a camera, understanding your exposure triangles, knowing how to set up your proper lighting, right? So if I turn this off, I still have one light here. But if you're watching this, you might have not known that I have actually two lights that up right now on top of do you know audio women. So do you know how to sync up allow Do you know how to high lab if a client requested that, hey, actually, I don't want to use a lab. You can use something like a shotgun or boom pole Mike. There's different things that you need to learn. The very specific technicalities of video production, right? The visuals, what lens you want to use, what's the look? How tight you want the shot to be. All right. This is much more different and more intimate than, let's say, something a little bit more. Why? But that is just my preference. And this comes with time and education and experimenting, experimenting things like lightning, audio, and visual. That is the trinity of all video production. But that was a brief overview of video production. Now we're going to go into how I'm going to assume that you get all these skills already understand the basics. And we're going to go to the next part, which is more along the lines of how do you sell yourself to people and how do you get your foot in the door? 4. Why This Is So Important: So the easiest way to get your foot in the door and freelance and video production, even if you have 0 experience, we're talking about 0 here guys, is that you need to have some sort of social proof. Social proof is the concept of that other people have already vetted for you or say, Hey, this is what you can do. So the secret is it doesn't need to be paid or not paid. You can pay a thousand dollars or $0. You need to have some sort of highlight reel or demo reel showing a previous past of all your current or past work. And you're like, Okay, I haven't gotten a client. Yeah. What do I do? You go yourself out and about and maybe you film your own little short film, your film, your own commercial. You don't need anyone's approval. You can take a mouse, a computer, and do cool cinematic shots that appeal to you. You can also go in to little mom and pop shops and ask, Hey, would you like a free video 3 video? Let me repeat that again. Free. So you can build your own portfolio. And the more that you do this, the more you'll start to be like, Hey, I have three to four video projects. I have under my belt now. I have ten, I have 12, I have 20. Whether it's paid or not paid, it does not matter from there. What you can do is you splice all these chops up and you put together a solid highlight reel, and we'll talk about that in the next part. 5. Crafting A Reel: So to in order to put together a solid highlight reel, it isn't just piecing together a bunch of random flips. For me, what you want to do is you're gonna pick one song, maybe has a different pacing, high-energy, and have a different cuts to tell a story within a story. So you already have different client videos that you have. So you splice it up and you tell a story within a story. And as I'm overlaying right now is my one of my first video demo reels that I use that I showed it to my client. And we're going to talk about that in the next part is how you pitch yourself to people. And once you have your demo reel, it is going to be your bread and butter. And now you're ready to show the world that, hey, this is what I'm capable of, this is what I can do, and this is what I can do specifically for you, your business, your YouTube channel, your whatever social media platform. And I'm going to show you exactly what a candid with you. You have a vision. I'm going to turn it into a video format. And here is my social proof. 6. Getting Your First Video Client: Now that you've compiled a demo reel, understanding why that is so important, now, you're ready to go out there and pitch. And this can be face to face, old school phone, call, email, or even in anybody's direct messages, private messages on any of their social media platforms. And how I would preface it is like, Hey, my name is Peter, I came across your page, give them a compliment. Awesome stuff I believe in your product, but be genuinely, don't be fake. Really like what you're doing here. And I'm a video content creator, and this is where you pitch. This is like, hey, I would love to make a video for you for free. I would like to offer you my services for free. You link them, your demo reel. This is what I can do, what I've done in the past, and this is what I can do for you. And then that's how you get your first client. It is really that simple. After you do a lot of these pro Bono or free work, so you can build up your expertise as well as your own clientele. We can do now is you can start charging people. And there's two rates around how you charge for your production. You can do a per project, for example, a $100 for a one-minute video. Or you can do more of a bigger scale if it's like a thousand or $2 thousand for a full on video production where you are the director, you are the person that's setting up the lights and you're there filming, let's say for the whole day. And you film for the whole day, you're much better off taking that into consideration with that well as how much their own budget and work out something that is a proposal. So you get a new proposal. For example, here is a $2 thousand budget. What you get is eight hours of me filming for you day of on top of I will also be editing a hours plus on this video project. And at the end of it, what you will get your deliverables that you have paid for. So you would get, let's say one full edited, high-quality video edited, you would get a teaser version of that as well as social media platform versions of this. And you can change the different file sizes as well as different natively to any of your social media platforms. So you're giving them lots of deliverables for a bigger price or the bigger dollar, as well as, let's say for example, you also like to fly drones. You can add that into your package as well. And the way of how you price your packages is you don't really have a one set package. What you wanna do is you want to break it down and be like, Hey, I have a $200 package, I have a 400 dollar package and I have a 1500 superstar VIP package. So what you do is you let them pick what's the best for their needs. So you don't have to be like, Hey, here is my package, this rate. And most of the times going to be like, Oh, can I get a discount? Can I get some kind of negotiations over this? But if you give them options, you're less likely to run into that obstacle. 7. Rinse and Repeat: And the very last part of this jumpstart to video production overview of your own freelancing guide is that yes, there's different aspects of this. You can be a part of a crew where you have a bunch of other freelancers and you all work together as a veal production crew. But this is the skeleton of freelance video production and what it looks like that you need to have a real CAN you'd have contacts. You need to have an understanding, a basic understanding of video production, lighting, audio, as well as editing experience. And that is done at through time as well as you yourself getting better and better. Which kind of goes into the, my vast and very last final point is that you as a content creator, you're always rinsing and repeating. So the exact steps, the overview that I just outlined, you're always constantly buffering yourself. You're always getting better and improving. You're always having a better highlight reel, a better social media presence, a better visual production, and better casting. You have more and more skews skills and experience that you constantly adding and pitch to clients as you get more and more better in B0. And you understand storytelling, scripting, casting, technicalities of video production, you yourself will be able to start charging clients more and more dollars. So this was my very overview of the freelance production journey of how I started. And this is the same methodology that I still look at to this day as I myself. I'm always constantly trying to improve and get better. When it comes to different schools of thoughts, there is that very strict dichotomy of being perfect and having video production. But if you're making content for online and you have an online client, let, let's say that's an influencer. It doesn't have to be perfect. Don't worry about perfect or a war about putting your content out there. And over time, you will start to get better and better. Perfection is just an excuse for you to not put something out on the Internet. And that might turn off some people. But that is my $0.02 on understanding video content and how you get better as a video creator. That's a wrap for this class. And I hope this was able to help you out, motivate you or give you some sort of a starting point in video production in this online digital world where everything is moving so fast and so quick. And you as a viewer production person, whether you have aspirations are still doing it. You need to understand the marketing aspect. You need to understand the content creation aspect. And you also need to understand the technicalities of constantly getting better and it's only you against you. And a lot of these things I wish I knew when I first started. So I hope this was a really quick jumpstart overview so you can actually understand what it takes and whether or not it's for you when it comes to video production. So for this project, I want you guys to put together a plan of how you're going to start your video production guy. So what is it that you're going to get started? Whether you need to upgrade your video and audio visual knowledge. Whether you need to put together that demo reel, let me know. And that is the simple project and that is your homework. So I hope this was able to help you. And my name is Peter. You're watching broke visionary collective at VBC CEO. And we also was nothing but you guys can always create something. Cheers.