Outsourcing Instagram reels Per reel, per shoot day, or as a monthly system.

What does making a reel involve?

Making a reel involves five steps, and you can buy each one separately.

1. The idea and the hook. What it is about, and why someone stays after the first three seconds.
2. The recording. You in front of a camera, with image and sound that do not distract.
3. The edit. Cuts, captions, cover and pacing.
4. Publishing. Caption, timing, testing, and a link to where you sell something.
5. Reading the numbers. Which hooks hold, what brought profile visits and conversations, and what to make more of.

When someone says they make reels for you, ask which of these five they do. Most of the time the answer is the edit. That is fine, as long as you know the other four stay with you.

What does an editor per reel cover?

An editor per reel covers the edit and nothing else: you record on your phone or camera, send the files and get a finished reel back. It is fast, flexible and the cheapest route per piece.

What you do not buy are the ideas, the hooks and the rhythm. That is a good deal if you already know which topics work and there is enough footage. It falls over the moment you have a busy month, because then there is nothing to edit.

What does a videographer per shoot day cover?

A videographer per shoot day covers the recording and usually a batch of edits: someone comes over with light and sound, you film for a day, and you get several weeks of reels in one go.

What you do not buy is publishing and optimisation. The batch runs out after five or six weeks, and then you are back where you started.

What does a monthly system with a team cover?

A monthly system covers all five steps: you talk about your field on about one shoot day a month, and the team pulls out the ideas and hooks, edits, writes captions, makes covers, posts, tests and reads the numbers every month.

Here you are not buying reels but an engine. With us, retainers start in the low four figures per month, month to month, no lock-in. When you compare offers, check the term, because many agencies work with a fixed minimum period. How our reel team works.

How do the three routes compare?

The three routes differ less in price per reel than in how much of the work stays with you.

For market prices per route in dollars, pounds and euros, see what personal branding costs for founders.

Why do loose reels rarely work?

Loose reels rarely work because a reel wins on a hook that lands, a format that comes back and enough repetition to see which of the two to change, and you can only read that after a few dozen reels, not after five.

That is exactly where buying per piece goes wrong: people stop just before it becomes measurable. Not because it does not work, but because month two shows nothing yet and that month happened to be busy. Why founders quit content after six weeks.

In our own case, two e-commerce founders went from $12.5K to $80K per month in 7 months, from about 50 to about 320 community members at $250, almost all of it organic, mostly through YouTube and Instagram. There was no viral reel in it, just the same engine every month.

What do you send in each route?

In every route you are the source, so what you send decides how good the reels get.

• To an editor: raw footage, the length you want, a caption style, and per reel one sentence on what the viewer should remember. Without that last part you get nice edits without a point.
• To a videographer: a location, a list of topics and someone who asks you questions while the camera runs. Talking to a lens without a question makes for stiff takes.
• To a monthly system: mostly time. About a shoot day a month on camera, plus short feedback moments. The rest is the team's work.

How to set up a recording block so a month of content comes out of it: the batch system for founders.

Which questions should you ask before you hire?

Ask to see work for people like you, who writes the hook, what happens when a format fails, what the term is, and which number they steer on.

• Can I see reels for clients in a field like mine? Not a showreel with drone shots and weddings, but talking-head reels of founders and experts.
• Who writes the hook? If the answer is you, you are buying editing.
• What happens when a format does not work? You want to hear that they change it after a few weeks based on the numbers.
• What is the term, and the notice period? Knowing matters more than liking the answer.
• Which number do you steer on? Views and inquiries are not the same question, and the answer decides what you get.

When should you not outsource reels yet?

Do not outsource reels yet when you are not sure what you sell and to whom, because outsourcing amplifies what is already there and does not create an offer.

And if you have never stood in front of a camera, make ten reels on your phone first. Not to grow, but to find out how it feels to explain your field out loud.