How to choose a clipping agency: the questions to ask before you sign

Most clipping agencies look the same from their homepage. Vertical clips, bold captions, a view count in large type.

The differences turn up after you sign, in the questions nobody asked before.

This is the list I would run on any vendor, including VALORAE Arc. Eight checks, each one a question you can put to a sales call and expect a straight answer to.

If you are still deciding between an agency, an in-house editor and a freelancer, settle that first. This post assumes you picked an agency and now have a shortlist.

One problem before we start. I planned to print our own answer under every check, and for most of them I could not. I will come back to why at the end.

Check 1: Who owns the footage and the project files

Your episode is yours. The clips cut from it should be too, and the contract should say so in plain words.

The trap is the layer underneath. Project files, caption files and templates can stay with the agency even when every export is yours.

Ask two things. When does ownership of a delivered clip pass to you? What happens to the project files and caption data?

Our answer: I will not print a blanket one here. Ask us on the call and get it in writing. The long version of this check is who owns your podcast clips.

Check 2: What counts as a delivered clip

Two agencies can both promise clips per episode and mean different products.

One means a trimmed excerpt with auto captions. The other means a moment someone chose after watching the whole episode, with a hook built for it and captions checked by hand.

Ask who picks the moments. If the answer is "send us timestamps", you are doing the hardest half yourself, which is the whole argument of if your clipper needs timestamps.

Then ask what happens when an episode is thin. A fixed count forces weak moments into your feed, and what we do when the episode is not good is the question in full.

Our answer: the definition gets set against your show. Ask us on the call, and ask us to write it down.

Check 3: Revisions, and where they stop

A caption typo is a revision. A different moment is a new clip.

Most agencies never say where that line sits, so it gets drawn in the first disagreement. That is the worst place to draw it.

Ask what counts as a revision, how many rounds are included, and who decides when a note has turned into new work. The breakdown is in the revision question nobody answers.

Our answer: ask on the call. I would rather you hear it against your own footage than read a general rule here.

Check 4: Who posts, and from which account

Some agencies drop files in a folder. Others schedule and post. Those are two different jobs at two different prices, laid out in clip delivery vs managed distribution.

If they post, ask which account the clips go out on and whose name sits on it. Which account should post your clips walks through that choice.

Then ask how they get access. The rule is short: delegated roles, never your password. VALORAE Media wrote it up for whole channels in never give your agency your password, and it holds for clips too.

Our answer: uploading is part of the work we count, with 1000+ posts uploaded so far. Which account yours go out on is a call conversation.

Check 5: Reporting you can read per clip

A monthly total is the easiest number to send and the least useful to receive.

Ask for a sample report before you sign. You want one row per clip: the platform, the views that platform reported, and what the agency would make more of next month. The format is in what a clipping report should show.

Ask which numbers they treat as signal. Views move for reasons unrelated to the clip, which is why the metrics that matter sit elsewhere.

Our answer: our published receipts are totals, and I would rather say that plainly. Ask us on the call what your report will contain.

Check 6: Pricing model and minimums

Clipping is sold per clip, per episode, on retainer, or against views. Each model rewards a different behaviour.

Per clip rewards volume. A retainer rewards staying. Per view rewards whatever gets watched, which is not always what your show needs, and paying clippers per view covers where that model fits.

Ask for the floor, the minimum commitment, and what moves the price up from there.

Our answer, in print: no public price list, but an in-house campaign starts from $1,000 and a public campaign has a $2,000 minimum. Why we print those floors is its own post, and the wider market is in what podcast clipping costs.

Check 7: Exit terms

The cheapest time to agree how you leave is before you start.

Ask for the notice period and the handover list. Exported clips, caption files, the sheet mapping each clip to its episode and timecode, and the posting history, in a named format by a named date.

The checklist is in what you should get back when you leave. VALORAE Media covers the same ground for whole channels in contract clauses worth asking for.

Our answer: ask on the call, then put the answer in the contract.

Check 8: Receipts you can verify

Every agency has a big number. Ask where you can check it.

A receipt is a figure with a place to look: public profiles with the work on them, and a named person running the company.

Ours are 500+ videos delivered, 10M+ views generated, 65%+ retention, 1000+ posts uploaded and $10K+ in revenue. The work is on youtube.com/@ValoraeArc and x.com/VALORAEARC, and the company page is linkedin.com/company/valoraearc.

Now, the problem I opened with.

Out of eight checks, I printed our answer to three: the price floors, the receipts, and the fact that we upload. The other five went back to the call.

Those five depend on the show, and a general paragraph on a blog is exactly what gets quoted back in the first disagreement. The fix is the same for every vendor on your list, us included: every answer you hear on a call goes into the contract before you sign.

An agency that answers out loud and will not write it down has answered the question for you.

The short version

• Get ownership of clips, project files and caption data in writing.
• Ask who picks the moments and what a delivered clip includes.
• Define a revision before the first episode.
• Confirm who posts, from which account, through delegated access.
• Ask for a sample per-clip report before you sign.
• Get the floor, the minimum and the exit terms on paper.
• Check every receipt against a public profile.

VALORAE Arc takes these questions on a starter call, booked through valoraearc.com.