How a marketing agency sells animated explainer videos as a revenue stream
Add video to your service list without hiring an animator, buying kit or quoting four figures for every job.
A marketing agency can add animated explainer video to its service list today, with no animator, no camera and no software licence per seat. You write or paste the words, AutoScribble draws and narrates the film, and it comes back in minutes. A 60-second video costs 100 credits — around £4.90 on a Pro plan — and agencies typically sell the same film for £300 to £1,500. This hub explains the whole model: how to package it, how to price it, how to win work with it, and how the money reaches your bank account.
Free to write and rewrite. Credits are only used when you generate.
The model in one paragraph
You make the video first and sell it second. Instead of pitching an idea a prospect has to imagine, you send them a finished, watermarked film about their own business. They watch it, they buy it in one click, and the money lands in your Stripe account. The same tooling also serves your existing retainer clients: add a client, make videos under their brand, send them for approval, collect comments, sign off.
- Add a client (an existing account) or a lead (someone you want as a client).
- Write the brief, choose length and orientation, set the brand colours and logo.
- Send it — clients get an approval link, leads get a buy-it link.
- Get paid: retainer invoicing for clients, one-click card payment for leads.
What it actually costs you
AutoScribble is credit-based. 100 credits is one finished minute. New accounts start with 100 free credits, so your first video costs nothing. After that the per-video cost depends on which plan you are on, and it falls as volume rises.
| Plan | Monthly price | Credits | Minutes of video | Cost per 60-second video |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| One-off pack | £9 | 100 | 1 | £9.00 |
| Starter | £19 | 300 | 3 | £6.33 |
| Pro | £49 | 1,000 | 10 | £4.90 |
| Business | £99 | 2,500 | 25 | £3.96 |
| Studio | £299 | 10,000 | 100 | £2.99 |
What agencies charge for the same video
Explainer video is one of the few deliverables where the client price has nothing to do with the production cost — it is priced on the value of the explanation. Traditional studios quote £2,000 to £8,000 for a 60-second animated explainer and take four to six weeks. You can undercut that heavily, deliver in a day, and still make a very large margin.
These are illustrative price points, not survey data. Set your own against your market.
| What you sell | Typical agency price | Your cost at Pro | Margin |
|---|---|---|---|
| One 60-second explainer | £350 | £4.90 | £345 |
| Explainer plus two format cuts | £600 | £14.70 | £585 |
| Monthly video retainer, 4 videos | £1,200 | £19.60 | £1,180 |
| Cold-outreach sample video | Free to make, £250 to buy | £4.90 | £245 on conversion |
Clients and leads are handled separately
Inside AutoScribble an agency account keeps two lists. Clients are people you already work with: you make videos in their workspace, save their brand, send for approval and collect change requests. Leads are people you want to work with: you make the video unasked, send it, and they pay for it on the spot through your own Stripe account. AutoScribble takes 5% of a lead sale to cover card processing; retainer work with clients has no commission at all.
The nine pages in this section
Each one goes deep on a part of the model.
- Sell explainer videos as an agency service — the packaging.
- Video as a new revenue stream — the numbers at 5, 20 and 50 videos a month.
- Cold outreach with video — the send-first play, with the email wording.
- How to price explainer videos — tiers, revisions, retainers, rush fees.
- Get more clients with sample videos — opening doors that ignore normal outreach.
- White-label video production — your brand, your client''s brand, quiet AutoScribble.
- The client approval workflow — comments, changes, sign-off, an audit trail.
- Video services to sell existing clients — five offers that fit any retainer.
- Start a video side business — first month, first ten clients, from nothing.
How to start
Create an account and choose Agency when you sign up. That switches on the Clients page, the Leads page, the client switcher and the brand panel. Your first 100 credits are free, which is one finished minute — enough to make a real sample video for a real prospect before you spend anything.
Make a sample video for a real prospect
Free to write and rewrite. Credits are only used when you generate.
Common questions
- Do I need to be an animator to sell these videos?
- No. You write the brief or paste a script. The drawing, the timing and the narration are produced for you. The skill you are selling is knowing what the client should say, not how to draw it.
- How long does one video take?
- Minutes, not weeks. You spend most of your time on the script; the render itself comes back while you are still on your first coffee.
- Can the video carry my client''s branding rather than AutoScribble''s?
- Yes. The brand panel takes up to three hex colours, a logo, fonts, a guidelines document and any extra images or clips, and those are used in the film. Nothing in the finished MP4 advertises AutoScribble.
- How do I get paid when I sell a video to a cold lead?
- Through Stripe Connect, in your own account. The lead pays by card or Apple/Google Pay on the video page, the money goes to you, and AutoScribble keeps 5% to cover card fees.
- What if the client wants changes?
- They leave a change request on the video page. You see it in your Clients or Leads list, move it through Seen, Working on it and Done, and they get emailed at each step. For leads you can charge for revisions and set the price yourself.
- What does it cost to try?
- Nothing. New accounts get 100 free credits, which is one finished minute of video — a complete sample for a real prospect.