A video brief is a one- to two-page document that tells a production team why the video exists, who it is for, what it must say, what you need delivered and who approves it. The template below has twelve sections. Copy it, fill it in before you contact a producer, and you will get tighter quotes, fewer revision rounds and a video that does the job you bought it for.
TL;DR
- Start with one sentence: what should the viewer think, feel or do after watching? Everything else serves that sentence.
- A solid brief covers overview, goal, audience, call to action, message, tone, deliverables, production details, timeline, approvals and success metrics.
- Replace vague words like "fun" or "premium" with references, examples and do-not-wants.
- Name one approver and cap the revision rounds before production starts.
- Plan the distribution channel up front, because it decides length, aspect ratio and captions.
Table of Contents
- What a video brief does
- The video brief template
- How to fill in each section
- Replace vague instructions with specifics
- A completed example brief
- What a real brief can teach
- Plan format, distribution and measurement
- Budget and timeline in the brief
- Seven mistakes that weaken a brief
- Bring your brief to Glenwood Media
- FAQ
- Sources
What a video brief does
The brief is the roadmap for the project. It sits before the script and the production plan, and it answers the who, what, why and how in plain language. Storyblocks describes it as a way to align teams, clarify expectations, define scope and avoid revisions that waste time and money. That matches what we see on real projects: most revision cycles trace back to something that was never written down.
A brief is not a script, a storyboard or a shot list. It is the thinking that makes those documents easy to produce. You write it, the production team reads it, asks questions, and then turns it into a creative treatment and a schedule.
It also protects you internally. When a stakeholder asks for a new angle in week four, the brief is the document you point to. Either the request fits the agreed goal, or it is a change in scope that needs a conversation about time and budget.
The video brief template
Copy everything in this section into a document. Each line is a prompt, and the next section explains how to answer it.
1. Project overview Project name, organization, a two-to-three sentence summary of what the video is and why you are making it now.
2. Objective One sentence: after watching, the viewer should ______. Add one measurable target if you have one.
3. Target audience Who exactly? Role, relationship to you, what they already know, what they care about, where they will watch.
4. Call to action The single next step you want viewers to take, and where it appears (end card, caption, link in description, live host).
5. Key message and supporting points One sentence the viewer should remember. Up to three proof points: a statistic, a story, a quote, a result.
6. Tone and style Three adjectives, two or three reference videos you like, and at least two do-not-wants.
7. Deliverables and format Master video length, cut-downs, aspect ratios per platform, captions, file formats, still images or photography if needed.
8. Production details Locations, people on camera, interviews, b-roll, existing footage or assets, music, voiceover, accessibility needs.
9. Mandatories Logo rules, brand fonts and colors, legal lines, releases, music licensing, anything that must or must not appear.
10. Budget and timeline Budget range, final delivery date, any fixed event or launch date, review windows.
11. Stakeholders and approvals One final approver by name, who else gives feedback, how many revision rounds are included.
12. Success metrics and distribution Channels, how the video will be shared, who will help amplify it, and how you will judge whether it worked.
That list is deliberately close to what institutional creative brief forms ask for. The videography brief used at St. John's University includes a project overview, main goal, audience, call to action, key message, tone and style, deliverables, production details, timeline, approvals and success metrics. Our version simply adds mandatories and distribution as their own lines, because those are where surprises tend to hide.
How to fill in each section
Start with the objective, not the format
People open a brief with "we need a two-minute video." That is a format. The objective is what the video should accomplish. Write what the audience should think, feel or do afterward, then let length, style and channel follow from it.
Compare two objectives:
- Weak: "Make a video about our annual gala."
- Strong: "Persuade past donors who skipped this year's gala to register for next year's by showing the room, the mission moment and the impact of last year's funds."
The second tells the producer who to talk to, what to show and how to end.
Define the audience in one paragraph
"Everyone" is not an audience. Describe one primary viewer. A nonprofit might write: "Mid-level donors aged 40 to 65 who gave once in the last two years, watch on a phone, and know our name but not our programs." A corporate team might write: "Regional sales managers who will watch this in a Monday meeting and need to repeat the three key changes to their teams."
If you have a secondary audience, name it, but make clear which one wins when their needs conflict.
Pick one call to action
Every extra ask dilutes the first. Choose one: donate, register, book a demo, share with a colleague, visit a page. Say where it will appear. A call to action spoken by a person on camera works differently from a button under a video, and the producer needs to know which you are planning.
Write one message and up to three proofs
If the viewer remembers one sentence, which is it? Write it. Then list up to three supporting points. These might be a number from your annual report, a short story about one person, or a result from a program. If you are still shaping what you want to say to this particular audience, these visual storytelling tips are a handy way to test whether your story is built around the viewer rather than around your organization.
If you are making a company introduction, our guide to what to include in a company overview video shows how messages and proofs map to scenes.
Describe tone with references and do-not-wants
This is the section where briefs most often go vague. See the next section for how to fix it.
Spell out deliverables
List every version you expect, not just the hero video. A typical list looks like this:
- One master video, 90 seconds, 16:9, 1080p or higher
- Two 30-second cut-downs, 1:1 and 9:16
- One 15-second teaser for social
- Burned-in captions plus a separate caption file
- Five still frames or photographs for use on your website
If LinkedIn is a primary channel, check our LinkedIn video specs checklist before you finalize the list so files upload cleanly the first time.
Name the approver and the revision rounds
One person signs off. Others can comment, but the brief says who has the final word. State how many revision rounds the project includes, for example one round on the rough cut and one on the fine cut. This single line prevents a surprise third and fourth round from a stakeholder who first sees the video at the end.
Replace vague instructions with specifics
"Make it cool," "keep it fun" and "premium feel" mean different things to everyone who reads them. Storyblocks makes the same point: vague directions are not useful, so use specific references or descriptions of the look you want.
Here is how to convert common vague phrases:
| Vague phrase | Specific replacement |
|---|---|
| Fun and energetic | Fast cuts under three seconds, handheld camera, upbeat acoustic track, real laughter, no stock footage |
| Professional | Locked-off tripod shots, neutral color grade, executive interviews against a plain office background, no on-screen effects |
| Emotional | One donor story told in her own words, natural light, no music until the final 20 seconds |
| Modern | Clean sans-serif titles, white space, muted palette, smooth slider and gimbal movement |
| Like our competitor's video | Link to the video and write the two things you like and the one thing you would change |
The do-not-wants matter as much as the references. "No stock footage of handshakes" and "no voiceover, only people in their own words" save hours of rework.
A good reference is also an example from outside your category. A marketing team can learn from how video ads for museum exhibits turn a physical experience into a short, clear visual pitch, then borrow the structure for a nonprofit open house or a product demo.
A completed example brief
The following is an illustrative sample for a fictional regional food bank, written to show the level of detail that works. It is not a real client project.
Project overview: Harvest Table Food Bank is producing a donor appeal video for its fall giving campaign.
Objective: Persuade lapsed donors (gave 12 to 36 months ago) to make a gift during the campaign by showing what a single week of distribution looks like.
Audience: Lapsed donors, 40 to 65, who know the organization but have not seen the warehouse. They mostly watch on phones, in email and on Facebook.
Call to action: Give at the campaign page. The link appears on the end card, in the email and in the post caption.
Key message: Your gift becomes meals the same week.
Proof points: The number of households served last month (from our own report), a volunteer who started as a client, a short moment of a family receiving a box.
Tone and style: Warm, honest, unhurried. References: two linked donor-story videos from other nonprofits. Do-not-wants: no sad piano music, no pity framing, no stock footage.
Deliverables: One 90-second master (16:9), one 30-second cut (1:1), one 15-second cut (9:16), captions on all, three stills.
Production details: One half-day shoot at the warehouse, two interviews, b-roll of packing and distribution, releases for everyone on camera.
Mandatories: Logo in the final frame, legal line for tax-deductibility from our finance director, licensed music only.
Budget and timeline: Budget range confirmed with the agency. Final files needed two weeks before the campaign email goes out.
Approvals: Executive director is the final approver. Development director and program manager give comments. Two revision rounds.
Success metrics: Completion rate, link clicks, gifts attributed to the campaign page, compared with last year's appeal.
Notice what the example does. It never says "make it emotional." It names the audience, the single ask and the guardrails, so the producer can start with confidence.
What a real brief can teach
An awarded project shows the same thinking at larger scale. CASE's profile of TCU's ReWire project describes a video effort that took a human angle and removed technical jargon to raise the university's academic reputation among a peer audience. The lesson for your brief: write the audience and the language rule down. If your viewers are not specialists, say "no jargon" and name a person whose story carries the idea.
Plan format, distribution and measurement
A video made for a conference screen and a video made for a feed are different videos. Put the distribution plan in the brief so the producer shoots and edits for it.
Public-sector guidance makes this explicit. The Minnesota Department of Transportation's video production guidelines say videos should be contextual and platform specific, that distribution plans should identify where the audience is likely to see the video and how it will be shared, and that videos should generally stay under two minutes. You do not need to be a government agency to apply that logic.
For each channel, write down:
- Where the viewer will be (phone feed, email, event screen, website, livestream)
- Length and aspect ratio
- Whether sound is on by default, which decides how much weight captions carry
- Who will share it beyond your own accounts
If you are deciding which channel to commit to first, our piece on one outcome and one platform walks through that choice.
Pick metrics before you shoot
Choose two or three measures tied to the objective. Awareness might mean views and reach. Engagement might mean average watch time and shares. Conversion might mean clicks on the call to action, registrations or gifts. If the objective is "persuade lapsed donors to give," then gifts from the campaign page matter more than total views.
Budget and timeline in the brief
Give a budget range. Producers can shape a plan around a number, and they cannot design around a mystery. If you are unsure what is realistic, read our overview of corporate video costs first, then set a range.
For the schedule, work backward from the date you need the video live. Include time for your own reviews, because internal approval is the most common source of delay. Two resources help here: our video production timeline templates and our guide to video turnaround time.
If the video supports a live event, add the event dates, the setup windows and who controls venue access. Our pieces on the pre-event promo video and the event recap video show how timing changes the brief.
Seven mistakes that weaken a brief
- Opening with the format. "We need a 60-second video" before you know what it must do.
- Two audiences with equal weight. Pick one primary viewer.
- Three calls to action. Viewers act on one.
- No do-not-wants. Producers guess, and guesses cost a revision round.
- Unnamed approver. Feedback arrives from everywhere at once.
- Missing assets. Logo files, existing footage and brand guidelines are not shared at kickoff.
- No success measure. The video ships and nobody can say whether it worked.
Our perspective on briefs
We have found that the strongest video projects begin with a short, honest conversation about what the video is for. The template matters less than the thinking behind it. When a nonprofit or corporate team arrives with a clear objective, a defined audience and a named approver, we can spend our time on the creative: finding the human moment, shaping the story and making something beautiful.
That is how we approach every project at Glenwood Media. We combine professional guidance with artistic flair and a customer-focused process, and we aim for reliable, on-time delivery. If your brief is rough, bring it anyway. We would rather help you sharpen it than have you wait for a perfect document.
A good brief is not paperwork. It is the first piece of storytelling in the project.
Bo
Bring your brief to Glenwood Media
If you have filled in the template and want a team to produce the video, Glenwood Media's video production services cover the full path from planning to finished files. We work with nonprofits, corporate teams, small businesses and event organizers, and we also offer content retainer packages for teams that need video on a steady schedule.
Send us your brief and we will talk through your goals, audience and timeline. For live events, see our media event coverage and our livestream production pages.
FAQ
How long should a video brief be?
One to two pages is enough for most projects. Use short answers and bullet points, and link to reference videos instead of describing them at length. A longer brief is fine for complex productions, but the objective, audience and call to action should still fit in the first half page.
Who should write the video brief?
The person who owns the outcome should write it, usually a marketing lead, development director or event organizer. Gather input from stakeholders first, then have one person finalize it. Your production partner can review the draft and point out missing details before work begins.
What is the difference between a creative brief and a video brief?
A creative brief sets direction for any creative project. A video brief is a creative brief with video-specific details added: deliverables, aspect ratios, captions, locations, interviews and distribution channels. If you already have a brand-level creative brief, use it as the starting point and add the video sections.
Do I need a script before I send a brief?
No. The brief comes before the script. It gives the writer or producer the objective, audience, message and tone to build from. Sending a script too early can lock in the wrong approach before anyone has tested whether the idea fits your goal.
What if I do not know my budget?
Give a range anyway, and say it is flexible if it is. Review published cost guidance to set realistic expectations, then ask your producer which deliverables fit inside the range and which would need more. A range lets them propose options rather than a single number.
Sources
- Videography Creative Brief (St. John's University)
- MnDOT Metro: Video Production Guidelines
- ReWire: A Movement for the Greater Good (CASE)
- Your guide to writing great video briefs (Storyblocks)