A package is a set of edges
Most clipping arrangements begin as a sentence: I’ll make clips from your podcast. It sounds like an offer and it is actually an open question, because it says nothing about how many, how long, which formats, how many rounds of changes, who supplies the footage, or what happens the week the episode runs to three hours.
That is what packaging is for. A package is not a price list, it is a set of edges – the boundaries that turn an indefinite amount of work into a defined one. Without them you are selling unlimited labour at a fixed fee, and the situation gets worse the better you are, because good work attracts more of it.
The diagram at the top of this page is the whole problem. Every unanswered question in it eventually gets answered by somebody, and if it is not answered in your package it gets answered in your evenings.
Try it: the unit you price in
Almost everyone starts by pricing per clip, because it is the unit the client asks in. It is also the unit that hides the work. Here is the same question asked nine ways – how much source you scan for each clip you deliver.
Minutes of source you scan for each clip delivered. Click a cell.
The lightest cell and the heaviest differ by 32 times. A per-clip fee charges the same for every cell.
The spread across that grid is the argument. Delivering twenty clips from a tight half-hour episode and five clips from a four-hour stream are not the same job in any respect except the invoice, if the invoice counts clips. Per-clip pricing systematically underprices exactly the clients with the most footage – which tend to be the clients worth having.
It has a second effect that is easy to miss. A per-clip fee makes every extra clip a negotiation, so a client who wants two more asks for a favour, and you either give it away or have an awkward conversation about a small amount of money. Pricing per episode or per source hour makes the clip count a spec rather than a meter, and removes the conversation entirely.
Scanning is the work
The reason the grid looks like that is worth stating plainly, because it is the thing clipping has in common with no other editing job.
Producing a clip scales with the number of clips. Finding one scales with the length of the recording. On a short, dense episode the producing dominates and the two units roughly agree. On a long recording the scanning dominates completely, and a price that counts only clips is charging for the smaller half.
This is also why the skill being sold is selection rather than editing – choosing the best moments is the expensive part and the part clients cannot do themselves. A package that prices the finding rather than the cutting is describing the job accurately, which tends to make the rest of the conversation easier.
Anything that genuinely reduces the scanning changes the arithmetic, which is the honest case for a first-pass tool on long sources. It does not reduce the checking – corrected captions still take what they take.
What is actually in a package
Written out, a clipping package has more lines than people expect. Most disputes come from an item on this list that both sides assumed the other had decided:
- Source and its lengthWho supplies it, how, and the maximum length covered. A band – up to 90 minutes, say – is the single most valuable line in the document, and the one most often missing.
- Clip count and length rangeHow many clips, and roughly how long each runs. “Ten clips, 20 to 60 seconds” is a deliverable. “Some clips” is an argument waiting to happen.
- Formats deliveredVertical, square, wide – and how many of each. Reformatting one clip three ways is real work and belongs in the count rather than thrown in.
- CaptionsBurned in, a separate file, or both. Say whether they are corrected by hand, because that is the part that takes the time and the part a buyer assumes is included.
- What comes with each clipTitles, descriptions, hashtags, thumbnails, suggested posting order. Each is a genuine service and each is commonly given away by accident.
- TurnaroundMeasured from what – from delivery of the footage, not from the recording date. Clients are late with source material and the clock should not be running while you wait.
- Revision roundsA number. Two is normal. Unlimited revisions on subjective work is not a generous offer, it is an unbounded one.
- Who posts itDelivery to a folder is a different service from scheduling and publishing on their accounts. If you touch their accounts, say who is responsible for what.
Three of those are given away more often than anything else: extra formats, hand-corrected captions, and titles and descriptions. All three are real work, all three feel too small to mention, and all three add up across a month into a second job you are not being paid for. Naming them does not mean charging separately for each – it means they are visible, so that adding a fourth format is a change to a package rather than a favour.
Turnaround is a product
For some buyers, speed is the thing they are purchasing, and it is worth recognising when you are in that conversation.
A clip from last night’s episode, ready the next morning while the episode is still current, is worth more to a show than a slightly better clip the following week. That is a legitimate axis to package on: a standard turnaround and a faster one, priced differently, with the faster one honestly bounded – fewer clips, fewer formats, the obvious moments rather than the exhaustive pass.
Two cautions. Measure from receipt of the footage, not from the recording, or you will be held to a deadline that started while you were waiting for a file. And do not offer a turnaround you can only hit when nothing else is happening – the value of a speed commitment is that it holds in a busy week, and a missed one costs more than the slower promise would have earned.
The two clauses that save you
If nothing else from this page makes it into your package, these two should. They are the boundaries that prevent the two ways clipping work quietly turns unprofitable.
- A length band on the source. Everything else in a clipping job scales with the length of the recording. Without a stated maximum, a client who moves from a 40-minute show to a two-hour one has tripled your work and not their invoice – usually without noticing, which makes it worse to raise afterwards.
- A fixed number of revision rounds. Clip selection is subjective, so there is always another moment someone would have preferred. Two rounds, with the second limited to changes rather than new clips, turns an infinite conversation into a finite one.
There is a third, softer one worth a sentence: the first episode costs about three times the second. It carries the learning – their vocabulary and names, the brand assets, the templates, working out what this particular client considers a good moment. Charging a setup fee is one answer and absorbing it knowingly is another. Pricing episode one as though it were episode five is how a rate that looked fine turns out not to be.
Three shapes that work
Structures rather than numbers, because the structure is the part that transfers. Each of these is a different answer to the same question: what is this client’s work actually proportional to?
- Per episode, with a length bandThe most natural fit for shows, because it matches how the client already thinks and how the work actually scales. “Up to 90 minutes of source, ten clips, three formats, next-day.” Over the band, a stated rate for the extra. Best when: a regular show, predictable length. Fails when: episode lengths swing wildly.
- Per source hourCharges the thing that actually drives the work. Harder to sell, because buyers think in clips rather than hours, so it usually needs pairing with a minimum clip count so the client knows what they get. Best when: long, irregular sources – streams, conferences, back catalogues. Fails when: the client wants a fixed number on the invoice.
- A monthly retainer with a capPredictability for both sides, which is what turns clipping from gigs into a business. The cap is not optional: a retainer without a stated ceiling is an offer of unlimited work at a fixed price. Best when: ongoing relationships and steady volume. Fails when: the cap is left out, or the client's output doubles and nobody renegotiates.
Whichever shape you use, write it down before the work starts, in something short enough that the client reads it. A page is plenty. The purpose is not legal protection so much as shared expectations – nearly every difficult conversation in this trade comes from two people holding different pictures of the same sentence, and a page prevents it at a cost of twenty minutes.
And revisit it. The commonest way a good arrangement goes bad is that the client’s output grows, the package does not, and neither side mentions it until one of them is resentful. A scheduled check every few months is easier than the conversation you get otherwise.
FAQ
What should I charge?
This page deliberately gives no figures, because rates vary by market, format, turnaround and date far too much for a number here to be anything but misleading – and a figure in an article tends to get treated as a benchmark by both sides. What generalises is the structure: price the thing that scales with the work, put a length band on the source, and cap anything open-ended.
Is per-clip pricing always wrong?
No, it is wrong for long sources. On a tight 30-minute show where you deliver twenty clips, the scanning is small next to the producing and a per-clip price is close enough. On a four-hour stream it is not, because most of the work happened before you cut anything. The grid above shows where the line falls.
How do I price a first episode?
Differently, or knowingly at a loss. The first one carries all the learning – their names and jargon, their brand, what they consider a good moment, building the templates. Some people charge a one-off setup fee; some absorb it and price the ongoing work to recover it. What does not work is pricing every episode as if it were the third.
How many revisions should I offer?
Two rounds, with the second limited to adjustments rather than new clips. Selection is subjective, so there is always another moment somebody would have preferred, and an unlimited offer converts that from a discussion into an obligation.
Should I include posting and scheduling?
Only as a named, separately priced part of the package. Touching a client’s accounts carries access, timing and responsibility that clipping does not, and it tends to be assumed free when it sits in the same sentence. Webinar clips covers why some clients care intensely about where a clip ends up.
What if they supply the footage late?
Run the turnaround clock from delivery of the source, not from the recording date, and say so in the package. This is the most common cause of a missed deadline in clipping work and it is entirely avoidable with one clause.
Do I need to show work to win work?
Usually, and the portfolio is what closes rather than what opens. Building a clipping portfolio covers how to evidence your own contribution rather than the source’s reach, which is the harder half.
Can I use an auto-clipper and still charge for the work?
Of course – you are selling an outcome and your judgement about it, not keystrokes. Two practical cautions: be plain about your workflow if asked, and remember that a tool which does the first pass does not change how long the checking takes. AI clipping versus manual editing covers where the saving is real.
Related: building a clipping portfolio, earning from clipping and the clipping route.