A video production RFP is a short document that tells production companies what you need, when you need it and how you will choose, so the proposals that come back can be compared side by side. A good one states your audience, goal, intended uses, deadlines, budget range and a way to ask questions, then tells vendors exactly what to send back. This guide gives you the outline, the scoring method and the contract details to settle before you hit send.
TL;DR
- Use an RFP when the project is complex, outside your team's current skills, or you want several vendors to compete on approach, price and turnaround.
- Cover the audience, goal, intended uses, fixed deadlines, known quantities, budget, review time and a question process.
- Tell vendors what to include: approach, schedule, work samples, references and pricing.
- Score proposals against criteria you publish in advance, and weight them before you read the first bid.
- Settle rights, licensing and deliverables in the RFP, not after you have picked a vendor.
Table of Contents
- What a video production RFP does, and when to use one
- Open-ended or defined scope: pick your RFP style first
- What to put in your video production RFP
- A video RFP template you can adapt
- Distribution and submission rules
- How to evaluate video production proposals
- Rights, licensing and accessibility: settle them in the RFP
- Mistakes that weaken a video RFP
- Perspective
- Working with Glenwood Media on your video project
- FAQ
- Sources
What a video production RFP does, and when to use one
An RFP helps you find and evaluate vendors for a video project, including teams that can carry out your creative vision within your timeline and budget, according to IABC DC Metro's guidance on writing a video RFP. The same guidance describes comparing proposals on creative and technical approach, a preliminary schedule, budget, work samples and references.
An RFP is not always the right tool. It earns its time in these situations:
- The project is complex or outside your team's skills. Adobe's overview of RFPs points to complex projects needing specific skills, especially when they exceed current internal resources.
- You want an objective comparison. Setting predetermined criteria lets you compare vendors on experience, pricing and turnaround times, and the competition between bidders works in your favor.
- You need a creative partner, not just a crew. IABC DC Metro notes that an open-ended RFP can suit an organization that wants a partner to help shape the project.
- Your organization requires it. Public agencies, universities and many larger nonprofits have procurement rules that call for a formal process above a certain spend.
If you need one simple edit of footage you already have, a brief and a quote request will do. If you are commissioning a brand film, a fundraising campaign, a multi-video series or a summit's worth of coverage, an RFP saves you from comparing bids that are not really comparable.
Open-ended or defined scope: pick your RFP style first
Before you write anything, decide which kind of RFP you are issuing. This choice shapes every section after it.
| Open-ended RFP | Defined-scope RFP | |
|---|---|---|
| Best for | Brand stories, campaigns, projects where you want ideas | Recap videos, training modules, a set number of deliverables |
| What you give vendors | Goal, audience, budget range, constraints | Exact quantities, formats, run times, schedule |
| What you ask for back | Creative concept, approach, sample treatments | Production plan, line-item pricing, schedule |
| How you compare | Quality of thinking and fit | Price, reliability and speed, alongside fit |
Most organizations land in the middle: a clear goal and budget with room for the vendor to propose how to get there. That is fine. Say which parts are fixed and which are open, and vendors will respond to the right questions.
What to put in your video production RFP
The core information IABC DC Metro recommends is the video's audience, the project goal, the intended uses, fixed deadlines and a method for vendors to ask questions. Here is how to turn that into sections.
1. Background and goal
Start with two or three sentences on who you are and what the video must accomplish. The IABC DC Metro article suggests writing the objective as one sentence. A fundraising film might say its job is to move viewers to give at an annual gala. A corporate promo might say its job is to explain a service to buyers in under two minutes. Vendors who read a sharp objective write sharper proposals.
2. Audience and intended uses
Name who will watch and where. A video for a gala screening, a website hero, a LinkedIn campaign and a donor email need different lengths, aspect ratios and edits. If you plan to cut social versions from a master film, say so now. Our notes on promo video length and LinkedIn video specs help you decide what to request.
3. Known quantities and creative requirements
The IABC DC Metro guidance recommends stating what you already know, such as one three-minute video versus five one-minute videos, and whether you expect interviews, animation or actors. Specifics make proposals easier to compare and help vendors choose more relevant work samples. List:
- Number of videos and approximate run times
- Shoot locations and number of shoot days, if known
- Interviews, voiceover, music, motion graphics or animation
- Captions and other accessibility requirements
- Photography or livestream needs alongside the video
4. Deadlines and review time
Give the fixed dates: proposal due date, decision date, and the date the finished video must be live or screened. Then budget your own review time. Delays on a client's side are a common reason a schedule slips, so tell vendors how many rounds of feedback you expect and how quickly your team can respond. Our guide to video turnaround time shows what a realistic schedule looks like.
5. Budget
Include a budget or a range whenever you can. A number lets vendors propose what is achievable instead of guessing, and it keeps you from receiving one bid at a fraction of the cost of another for a different scope. If you are still working out what to allocate, our breakdown of corporate video costs is a starting point.
6. Questions and communication
For formal RFPs, IABC DC Metro recommends setting a question-and-answer period and sharing the questions and answers with everyone who has shown interest. That keeps the field level. Name one contact person and one email address, and set a cutoff date for questions.
7. What vendors must send back
Give respondents a checklist. Missing items are the most common reason proposals are hard to compare. Ask for:
- Understanding of the project and proposed creative approach
- Technical approach and equipment or crew plan
- A preliminary schedule with milestones
- Work samples relevant to your project type
- Two or three references you can call
- Itemized pricing, including what is and is not included
- Team members who will actually work on the project
- Terms for revisions, usage rights and file delivery
A video RFP template you can adapt
Use this outline and trim what your project does not need. Open-ended projects can keep the creative sections longer. Defined projects can expand the deliverables and pricing sections.
- Cover details: organization name, RFP title, issue date, contact person
- About us: two or three sentences
- Project goal: one sentence, then a short paragraph
- Audience and intended uses: who, where, in which formats
- Scope and deliverables: quantities, run times, creative elements
- Timeline: question deadline, proposal due date, selection date, production window, final delivery date, review periods
- Budget: a figure or range, and what it must cover
- Proposal requirements: the checklist above, plus page limits and file format
- Evaluation criteria: the categories and weights you will use
- Rights and contract terms: ownership, licensing, raw footage, music and talent releases
- Submission instructions: how, to whom, by when
On the first page, put the proposal due date and the submission method. Vendors skim, and a buried deadline costs you good bids.
Distribution and submission rules
Send the RFP to a short list of vendors whose work you have already seen, and consider posting it where your sector looks for opportunities. Five to eight invitations is a manageable number for most mid-sized projects, because every bid has to be read and scored. Check your organization's procurement policy first, since public bodies and some funders require open posting.
Set submission rules that are easy to follow and easy to enforce. The New Mexico Administrative Office of the Courts' 2026 video RFP requires electronic submission and says non-responsive proposals will be eliminated from further consideration. You may not need that level of formality, but the principle holds: tell vendors the format, the address and the cutoff, and apply the rules equally to everyone.
Formal RFPs often add paperwork. Wayne State University's 2025 athletics video RFP asks for a non-collusion affidavit, insurance documentation, cost schedules and vendor service plans in the submission package. If you are a public body or a university, ask your procurement office which forms apply before you publish.
How to evaluate video production proposals
Decide how you will score before the bids arrive. A selection committee of three to five people, drawn from marketing, leadership and whoever will manage the project, works well. Publish the criteria in the RFP so vendors know what matters.
A Connecticut state promotional video RFP uses a committee to evaluate proposals on relevant experience, price, portfolio quality and customer satisfaction shown by references, and it allows shortlisted firms to be invited for presentations or interviews. The Bay Area Air Quality Management District's 2025 video production RFQ looks at methodology, experience with similar agencies, quality and diversity of work, innovation and ability to work with agency staff.
Weighting the criteria
Weights tell vendors, and your own committee, what you value. The Washington Student Achievement Council's 2019 RFQQ assigned 25% to the technical proposal, 60% to the management proposal and 15% to cost. Cost carried the smallest share there. You do not have to copy that split, but it shows that price need not be the largest factor.
A simple scorecard for a nonprofit or corporate project might look like this:
| Criterion | What you look for | Suggested weight |
|---|---|---|
| Creative approach | A clear idea tied to your goal and audience | 30% |
| Relevant experience | Samples from similar projects and sectors | 25% |
| Process and schedule | Milestones, review rounds, realistic timing | 20% |
| References | Consistent comments on communication and delivery | 10% |
| Price | Clear, itemized, within budget | 15% |
These weights are an example, not a rule. Adjust them to your project, write them down, and fix them before you open any proposal.
Look past the pitch
When you read proposals, check a few things the scorecard can miss:
- Do the samples match your project? A polished sizzle reel is not proof of a donor-story film or a multi-camera event.
- Who is on the team? Ask who will direct, shoot and edit, not only who will attend the pitch.
- Is the price itemized? You want to see what covers pre-production, shoot days, editing, revisions, music licensing and delivery formats.
- Do the references say the same thing? Ask each one about communication, deadlines and how the vendor handled changes.
If you also need ongoing content, ask how each vendor handles retainers, or how it would extend the project into social clips. For general guidance on assessing an agency's fit, choosing a marketing agency covers questions worth asking any creative partner.
Rights, licensing and accessibility: settle them in the RFP
Ownership is where video projects most often get tangled after the fact. Say in the RFP who owns the final video, the raw footage, the project files and any music, stock footage or talent performances, and ask vendors to state any restrictions in their proposals.
Federal procurement offers a useful model. Acquisition.gov's guidance on developing the RFP says the RFP should communicate intellectual property and data-rights priorities, identify required data deliverables and associated license rights, and require offerors to state restrictions. It also advises legal review because clause selection depends on the effort. The eCFR's rules on rights in data add that when a contract requires data to be produced or furnished, it must delineate each party's rights to use, reproduce and disclose that data, and must separately specify what is delivered. Those rules govern U.S. federal contracts, so your organization's rules may differ. The habit still applies to any project: define the deliverables and the rights to them as two separate things.
For most nonprofit and corporate projects, have your counsel or contract reviewer look at these points before issuing the RFP:
- Ownership of the final video and the right to edit or cut it down later
- Licensing term, territory and media for music, stock and archival clips
- Releases for people who appear on camera
- Whether raw footage is delivered and in what format
- Captions, transcripts and other accessibility requirements
- Insurance requirements for shoots at your location or at events
If a video features customers, donors or beneficiaries, think about consent and where the video will be hosted too. A privacy compliant video hosting checklist helps you think through where the finished video will live and who sees it.
Mistakes that weaken a video RFP
The IABC DC Metro guidance points to a familiar set of omissions. Avoid these:
- Leaving out the audience or goal. Vendors then pitch generic ideas, and you cannot compare them.
- Skipping intended uses. A film for a gala screen and one for a mobile feed are different jobs.
- Hiding the budget. Without a range, bids can differ wildly in scope and price.
- Vague quantities. One three-minute film and five one-minute films are different projects.
- No fixed deadlines or review time. Your own approvals are part of the schedule.
- No way to ask questions. Unanswered assumptions turn into mismatched proposals.
- No checklist for respondents. Tell vendors what to send, or you will receive twelve different formats.
Two more habits help. First, write for the people who will respond: short, plain and organized, with the due date on the first page. Second, make the content itself audience-first. Our approach to video content strategy starts from one outcome, and guidance on audience-centric content makes the same point about building around readers' needs, which is a good test for the goal section of your RFP.
Perspective
Most of the best projects we see start with an RFP that is honest about the goal and the budget. When an organization tells us who the video is for, where it will run and what success looks like, we can spend our proposal on ideas instead of guesses.
Our approach at Glenwood Media is to pair professional guidance with artistic flair, and to build each story around the organization's own objectives. That is true whether the film supports fundraising, explains a corporate service or covers a summit. We have worked with organizations such as KVC and NorthPoint Development on outreach and fundraising visuals, and the pattern repeats: clear inputs make beautiful results arrive on time.
If you are drafting an RFP, our advice is to invite questions. A good production partner will ask about your audience, your approvals and your distribution plan, and those answers belong in the document. Ask for relevant samples, call the references, and choose the team you would want in the room on shoot day.
Bo
Working with Glenwood Media on your video project
If you are preparing an RFP, or already have one ready, we would like to read it. Glenwood Media produces videos and photography for nonprofits, corporate teams, event organizers and small businesses, with livestreaming, event coverage and optional content retainer packages for organizations that need ongoing work. Our video production services cover recap videos, corporate promotional videos, branding assets and highlight reels.
If your project includes a conference, gala or summit, our media event coverage and livestream production can sit in the same proposal as the film. Send us your RFP or a short brief through glenwood.media and we will respond with an approach, a schedule and pricing built around your goal.
FAQ
How long should a video production RFP be?
For most nonprofit and corporate projects, two to five pages is enough. Give the goal, audience, uses, quantities, deadlines, budget and submission checklist. Formal public procurements run longer because they add forms and legal terms, so check your organization's policy.
Should I include my budget in the RFP?
Yes, whenever you can. IABC DC Metro recommends including a budget when possible, because it lets vendors propose what is realistic instead of guessing. If you cannot share a figure, give a range and say what it must cover.
How many vendors should I invite?
Five to eight is a manageable number for many projects, since every proposal needs a careful read and a reference check. Choose vendors whose past work resembles yours, and shortlist two or three for presentations or interviews.
When should I use an RFP instead of asking for a quote?
Use an RFP when the project is complex, outside your team's skills, or when you want to compare creative approach, experience, pricing and turnaround across several vendors. For one simple edit with a known scope, a quote request is usually enough.
Who owns the video when the project is finished?
It depends on the contract, which is why the RFP should address it. Ask vendors to state ownership, licensing terms for music and stock, and any restrictions on use, then have your counsel review the final agreement.
Sources
- IABC DC Metro: How to write an RFP for video production
- Adobe: What does RFP mean
- Wayne State University: Video Production for the Athletics Department RFP, 2025
- New Mexico Administrative Office of the Courts: RFP 2026-AOC-006
- State of Connecticut: Interactive Promotional Video Production RFP
- Bay Area Air Quality Management District: RFQ 2025-004 Video Production Services
- Washington Student Achievement Council: RFQQ 19-165
- Acquisition.gov: E-2.3 Develop the Request for Proposals
- eCFR: 48 CFR Part 27 Subpart 27.4, Rights in Data
- Choosing a marketing agency: a small business guide
- Privacy compliant video hosting checklist
- Creating audience-centric content