Choosing a video production company comes down to four things: who will actually work on your project, how they handle feedback and approvals, whether they ask good questions about your goals before they quote, and what other marketing teams say about working with them. A strong portfolio shows what a company can make. References and a few honest conversations show what the project will feel like. We've been on the other side of this decision since 2014, making video for marketing teams at Sun Life, TD, Linamar, Equitable, and more. This guide covers what we've seen make the difference between a good fit and a great one.
What does a video production company do?
A video production company plans, films, and edits video for other businesses. The ones worth hiring get involved before the camera comes out. They help work out what the video needs to say, who it's for, and where it's going to run, then handle the shoot, the edit, and every version you need for each channel.
That range is wide. Some companies are essentially a crew for hire: you bring the script and the plan, they bring the cameras and lights. Others handle the whole thing, from strategy and scripting through to the final cutdowns. Both have their place, and knowing which one you need is the first step to choosing the right video production company.
If you're still deciding whether to hire outside help at all, our in-house vs. agency decision matrix walks through when each makes sense.
What to figure out before you reach out
The more you know going in, the easier it is to compare companies fairly, and the better your first calls will be. A good production company will ask about all of this anyway, so you might as well have answers ready.
What the video is for.
Will it play on a screen at a conference, live on a landing page, or run on LinkedIn? How it's watched shapes everything from the sound design to the call to action.Who it's for.
Investors, customers, advisors, engineers, cats, dogs? Maybe not the last two. A technical product explained to a non-technical buyer needs a very different video than the same product explained to experts in the field.How you want people to feel.
Reassured, excited, curious, confident? The tone you're after drives the music, the pacing, and who ends up on camera.What they should do next.
Book a demo, call an advisor, apply for a job. If you can't name the next step, it's hard to tell whether the video worked.Your constraints.
We know, we know, nobody likes talking about money. But a budget range helps a production company recommend how to stretch it. Launch dates and hard deadlines belong here too.A few examples you like.
Links to videos you love (plus a line on why you love them) say more than a page of adjectives.
Who needs to sign off
Before you talk to anyone, map out who has to approve the video: your manager, brand, legal, compliance, leadership, and any subject-matter experts who'll appear on camera. Share that list with the companies you're considering. It changes the timeline, and a good production company will build your review rounds into the schedule from the start instead of discovering them in week six.
Questions to ask before hiring a video production company
Once you have a shortlist, these are the questions to ask a video production company on your first calls. Keep asking until you feel comfortable. You're choosing a team you'll trust to put your brand in front of your leadership, so the extra half hour is worth it.
Who will actually work on our project?
A website and a demo reel won't tell you everything about a video production company. Video is a team game, and the people behind the scenes decide how your project goes. Ask how big the team is, who you'll talk to week to week, who directs the shoot, and who edits. Then ask whether those are the same people you're meeting on the sales call. If the senior team pitches and a different team shows up, that's worth knowing now.
A company that can explain its process in detail, and clearly cares about it, is a good sign. A few questions to try:
Tell us about your team. Who would be working on this project?
Walk us through your process.
What types of videos do you specialize in?
Can you show us work like ours?
This is the big one: how good are they? You don't need to be a video expert to watch a few pieces from their portfolio and get a feel for whether their style fits your company. Start paying closer attention to the videos you see every day. Notice what hooks you, and what makes you click away.
Then ask for something close to what you need. If you're planning a video of your CEO addressing the whole company, ask to see something similar they've made. Ask about the story behind the work, too: what the brief was, who had to approve it, and what happened after it launched. A beautiful video with no context only tells you half of it. (And the last thing you want is someone showing up with a camcorder from the 90s and a green screen.)
Can you show us your best work?
What companies like ours have you worked with?
What gear do you shoot on?
How long will it take, and how does feedback work?
Timelines vary from company to company, and a bigger team doesn't automatically mean a faster or better video. Our custom one-off projects usually take 8 to 10 weeks, and a good chunk of that time is built in for your team's review rounds. Some times of year are busier than others, so be upfront about your deadline. There's no sense starting with a company that can't get the video into your hands on time.
This is also a good moment to dig into workflow. Ask how they collect feedback, how long you'll have at each stage, and how many rounds of changes are included. We plan for revisions within reason, and if changes start to move outside the original scope, we flag it early and talk it through. For a stage-by-stage look at how this runs with us, see our video production process.
How will this video get used?
You're putting real time and budget into this video, so it's worth thinking about where it'll live before anyone picks up a camera. Ask what they'd recommend for hosting, formats, and aspect ratios on each channel. A good production company will have opinions on all of it.
Ask how they plan shoots to get more out of them, too. One shoot day can produce a main video plus shorter cutdowns for social, email, and sales, as long as it's planned that way from the start. And ask how they'd help you track how the video performs. Because if a video launches and nobody sees it, did it really happen?
What's in the contract?
An experienced company will have a contract and a statement of work ready, so you and the production team agree on exactly what's being made. These documents also cover things like who owns the footage, and whether the company can show the finished video in its own portfolio. That might be completely fine with you, but it's good to know the policy up front.
Ask about the payment structure as well. Ours is typically 50% up front and 50% when the finished video is delivered, usually on net 30 terms. If your company needs a different schedule, just ask. We can usually make it work. Then ask whether any costs could come up outside the quote. At Oak + Rumble, the price we quote is the price you pay, unless the scope changes and we've talked it through with you first.
Questions a good video production company should ask you
A good video production company should ask you strategic questions on your discovery call, before it sends a quote. If a company takes your brief and prices it without challenging your strategy or clarifying your goals, that tells you a lot about how the rest of the project will go. Knowing these three questions helps you prepare for that first call and size up the company at the same time.
Who is this for, and why should they care right now?
This pushes past a generic "target audience" answer and makes you think about what's actually happening in your viewer's world. If you can't say why now, the video becomes more noise in an already crowded feed, and your production budget goes with it.What needs to happen after someone watches it?
Get specific about the one action you want viewers to take when the video ends. Without it, you can't measure the return when your stakeholders ask, and the production company can't build the creative around that action.How many ways do you want to use it?
This is really a distribution question. It turns a one-off video into content that works across your channels, which matters when your budget has to stretch further: on your website, on social, in sales conversations, and at events.
Showing up with those answers makes you the most prepared person on the call. And if a company never asks them? That's useful to know too.
If your videos go through legal
If your videos need sign-off from legal, compliance, or brand, look for a video production company that has done it many times and plans for it from day one. Banks, insurers, wealth firms, healthcare companies, and engineering companies all have review steps that a typical production schedule doesn't account for, and a company that hasn't worked this way will feel it by the second round of feedback.
What that experience looks like in practice:
Scripts written with review in mind, so lines likely to get a closer look are sorted out before the shoot
Review time built into the schedule, including room for an approver who joins late
Consolidated feedback rounds, so notes from legal, brand, and leadership don't contradict each other
Version tracking you can trust, so the approved cut is the one that goes live
Multiple language versions planned at the start, when you need them
One question tells you a lot here: "Tell us about a project where legal sent something back. What happened next?" A confident answer with real detail is a great sign.
This is the world we work in most. We've made video for marketing teams at Sun Life, RBC, TD, InvestorCOM, BWXT, and Linamar, where every video had a room full of stakeholders to win over.
Taylor Stavenjord, Equitable's Brand Lead and one of our clients, put it well:
"Of all the decisions you make as a brand leader, video has the highest stakes."
Taylor Stavenjord, Brand Lead, Equitable
Red flags and green flags
The clearest signals show up in how a company communicates, usually well before you see any footage.
Red flags
A bait and switch. The senior team pitches, then a different team does the work. Or the scope you were sold quietly shrinks.
Surprise overages. Costs that land outside the quote without a conversation first.
Going quiet. Days without an update in the middle of a project.
Missed deadlines, especially when you only hear about them after the fact.
Dodging hard questions. A company that can't talk about a project that went sideways probably hasn't learned much from one.
Green flags
They overcommunicate. You always know where the project stands.
They make problems go away. When something comes up, they arrive with a fix along with the news.
They listen. They ask what your audience needs and build the video around it.
You can trust them to run with it. Ask people who hire production companies for a living what they value most, and reliability comes up again and again. A team that can handle a shoot without you hovering gives you your time back, and that's often worth more than a lower quote.
That kind of trust is what one of our clients, Patrick Belliveau at Gambit Technologies, pointed to when he talked about working with us:
"I felt comfortable in them making micro decisions day to day because they were vision-aligned and mission-aligned."
Patrick Belliveau, Managing Partner, Gambit Technologies
References tell you more than a reel. Ask for two or three from marketing teams like yours, and actually call them. A reel shows a company's best day. A reference tells you about the rest of them.
Frequently asked questions
Should we hire a freelancer or a video production company?
A freelancer can be a great fit for a single, simple shoot with a clear plan. A video production company makes more sense when the project needs a script, a crew, several stakeholders, or multiple versions, because one team owns the plan from start to finish and you're not managing the handoffs yourself.
How much does it cost to hire a video production company?
As of October 2026, Oak + Rumble's one-off projects start at $15,000 CAD, most land between $40,000 and $70,000, and larger campaigns run $70,000 to $100,000+. Our guide to what B2B video actually costs breaks down what moves the price.
Does a video production company need to be local?
Not necessarily. For most corporate projects, planning, scripting, and review all happen over video calls, and the crew travels to wherever your people are for the shoot. Oak + Rumble is based in Kitchener–Waterloo and works with marketing teams across Canada and the United States.
Should we hire for one project or for ongoing video?
If video comes up once or twice a year, a one-off project is usually the right call. If requests keep landing on your desk, ongoing support saves you from scoping every video from scratch. Our Acorn + Rumble video production partnership is built for that, with plans from $3,600 CAD/month on a 12-month term (as of October 2026).
If you're putting together a shortlist, we'd like to be on it. Tell us what you're working on, and we'll bring a few questions of our own to the first call.
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