Costs and pricing
Part of Budget for short form video costs and pricing with a working model
Why a short form video cost guide needs dated sources
A short form video cost guide is only as good as its sources. Here is why dated data from LinkedIn, the ICO and the ONS matters for budgeting in England.
What to take away
- The ONS release Internet access, households and individuals2023, published 7 August 2023, reported that 96% of UK adults had used the internet in the three months before interview.
- LinkedIn publishes its advertising costs and pricing page, checked 9 May 2026, so budget lines for video ads can be anchored to a dated source rather than a supplier claim.
- Data protection duties sit with the ICO, and they apply to every pound you spend on audience targeting.
- From April 2026 the National Living Wage is £12.71 an hour for workers aged 21 and over (GOV.UK). That is a dated floor for editing time, not a market rate.
Why do sources change the number?
A short form video cost guide is a chain of assumptions. Break one link and the total shifts. A day rate from 2024 may not reflect 2026 freelance rates. A cost per thousand impressions quoted by a platform can change with auction pressure.
Every figure needs three things
- Source named
- Date recorded
- Currency labelled
- No source, date, currencyillustrative example only
- £400 a month editinglabelled example, not benchmark
The short form video costs and budget guide for England starts with the model rather than the prices. Read it before you build your own spreadsheet.
Where should the audience numbers come from?
The Office for National Statistics publishes home internet and social media usage data. Its 2023 release, published 7 August 2023, gives you a defensible base for how many people in the UK are actually online and using social platforms.
Which audience base to use
Is your campaign UK-wide or England-only?
UK-wide -> use ONS UK internet and social media usage
England-only -> state England, do not present UK figures as English
Use it as the denominator. If you claim a reach figure, show the audience it is drawn from. A percentage without a base is not a budget line.
Note the geography. The ONS release covers the UK. If your campaign runs only in England, say so, and do not present UK figures as English ones.
How do platform costs get estimated?
LinkedIn does not publish a date on its advertising costs and pricing page, so record the date you check it. I checked it on 9 May 2026. That page is the primary documentation for the platform, so it beats a second-hand summary in a pitch deck.
Use it to set a planning range for paid video ads. Then separate that from production costs, which no platform publishes. Production is a market rate, and market rates need a named supplier quote or a labelled example.
Keep the two columns apart in your model. Blended figures hide which cost you can actually control.
What compliance costs sit alongside?
Any campaign that collects leads, retargets viewers or tracks engagement touches personal data. The UK GDPR guidance and resources from the ICO set out what that means in practice.
Budget for the time this takes. Consent banners, privacy notices and records of processing are real costs, even when no invoice arrives. A small team might spend a few hours a month on this.
If you skip it, the cost moves to legal review later. That is usually more expensive.
Does spend translate into return?
Cost data tells you what you paid. It does not tell you what came back. Pair your cost model with a return model so the two can be read together.
The short form video return on investment in England article covers how to attribute value without overclaiming.
What belongs in a source checklist?
Use this before you publish or circulate any cost estimate.
Source checklist
- Source namedwho published the figure, and on which page.
- Date recordedthe month and year the figure was published or quoted.
- Currency labelledpounds sterling, with the exchange assumption if the source is not in sterling.
- Scope statedUK, England, or a single platform's own market.
- Assumption flaggedanything you estimated is marked as an illustrative example.
- Owner assignedone person keeps the model current.
- Review date seta date to recheck every external figure.
Seven items is enough. Longer checklists get ignored.
Worked example: editing support at £400 a month. Source: supplier quote held by the team. Date: the month and year of that quote. Currency: pounds sterling. Scope: England. Assumption: illustrative example, not a benchmark. Owner: marketing lead. Review: 90 days after the quote date.
If compliance takes 4 hours a month, the April 2026 National Living Wage of £12.71 an hour for workers aged 21 and over adds £50.84. The monthly line is £450.84. That is an illustrative total, not a market rate.
Common questions
Why does the date matter so much on a cost figure?
Ad auctions, freelance rates and platform fees move. A figure without a date cannot be compared with anything, so it cannot support a decision.
Can I use UK-wide data for an England-only campaign?
The ONS release covers the UK, so it is a starting point rather than a precise match. If your campaign is England-only, scale the UK figure by England's share of the UK population, about 84% at the 2021 census, and name that adjustment.
Should I trust a supplier's cost benchmark?
Treat it as a quote, not a benchmark. Supplier figures are useful for a single line item, but they rarely show the assumptions behind them.
