How much does a video cost?

Episode 1: Money Talk Mastering Budget Conversation

Yeah, so how much does a video cost? In this episode of Cut Through, we talk about mastering budget conversations in creative work, learning how you can build trust and navigate the awkwardness of money talk.

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"How do you have that conversation? It's taboo, right?"

Budget discussions in creative video production are often seen as uncomfortable or even confrontational.

However, when approached correctly, they become a crucial part of the process that ensures alignment between expectations, resources, and final output.

Want a real number for your project? Submit a brief and we'll come back with options at more than one price point.

Full episode transcript

Welcome to Cut Through, the podcast that helps to make video content accessible to more creators. Cut Through the noise and a wide range of topics to help you break down those barriers and to bring your ideas to life. In today's episode, we talk about mastering budget conversations and creative work, learning how you can build trust and navigate the awkwardness of money talk. Let's get started.

Morning, Mike. I assume it's morning where you are.

Are we playing that game? It is actually. Thanks for being observant.

We're going to talk about budgets and briefs and the age old issue that seems to come up, which is having that effective conversation about the cost of a creative project. And this is sort of something that often comes up, this awkward moment between a potential client and a vendor. And that first interaction, tends to always be quite awkward.

I have an idea of something I want to achieve, I've only got certain amount of money. I just want to see whether I'm on the same page. I'm not sure. It's this awkward thing that always seems to come up.

It's a taboo, right? It's akin to meeting someone at a cocktail party and saying, much money do you For whatever reason, it seems to have taken that connotation of being the forbidden topic to talk money. I think we'll dive right in, but I think the way I was kind of thinking that way, it's like, no one wants to lead that conversation. It's like the class and negotiation. one wants to start on the wrong page. And no one wants to get taken advantage of.

How do you have that conversation knowing that it's probably one of the most important conversations to have early because then it sets up all the expectations and the trust gets formed. how do you breed, who makes the first move, I guess is the question. And what are the things, guess, what are the different variables that we can talk about today to help people feel more comfortable, I guess, making that first move and feeling comfortable to talk about money sooner rather than later.

Yeah, perhaps it's not the first thing out of your mouth, but it shouldn't be the last thing in your mouth.

So why is it such an awkward conversation though? Like why does it always seem to be invariably this very awkward thing for, I'd say, 80 % of the time it is.

Well, let me, can I, I'll answer I guess maybe the first one from just the first thing that came to my head with my background is spending a lot of time on client side. think it's, there's a, there's sometimes a, I guess a fear, deep down fear that you don't want the service provider to conveniently come back with a number that you think might be the right number. And as a marketing guy, you don't want to spend too much for something. You don't want to get ripped off.

You don't want to make a bad decision. don't want your boss to basically say, you don't know how to manage a project. Cause that's what you're basically trying to prove to get promoted in your organization. So no one wants to say I got 20 grand and it costs 20 grand and it could have easily cost 10 grand if you just thought through what you really wanted versus what you think you needed. And, I think, so basically, you know, it has to be a two-sided conversation where, I guess the

There has to be level of honesty.

Let me give you a scenario though. Let's say Joe X from a medium sized business who doesn't do a lot of marketing wants to do some digital ads, but he doesn't know the first thing about how to approach that or what to do. How's he going to know what the variables are? would he approach? How do you think he should approach a vendor? So like I come to you and say, look, I want to produce some digital ads.

For Facebook, for YouTube, I'm not really sure. What's the first thing you would ask me? yeah, kind of a bit like that, isn't it? Well, what's your, what's your budget really? Isn't it?

Yeah, and think that's kind of point. think asking that early is something that the creative providers need to do, even though it's reluctant. Maybe it's more into buckets of, it high end, is it medium end? What do you have in mind? I guess the question I usually ask is, what do you have in mind? What do you envision this? How is the ad going to be used?

Who are you going to be talking to? guess, what media do you plan on using? I guess it goes back to, I think, the original topic you were saying, is the brief. What's the intended use of this piece of content? Because if it's just a quick tutorial and it's a simple how-to, does it have to have all the polish of a TVC? Does it need all the lighting? Does it need a seven-person crew? Can it be shot in your office? Is it a tutorial? think.

So I think you stop back to the basics of a brief really is I guess we've always talked about this. Who's your audience? What's the vehicle? So where they going to watch it? And how, and then that will start informing the different treatments or different approaches to the shoot that I think then will logically lead to that next conversation, which is, well, these treatments tend to be more money because of X, Y, and Z or these treatments.

are much cheaper because you only need one camera. You're gonna bring your own talent. It's you or it's the managing director or it's a sales person. We don't have to bring in anyone outside.

So thinking about that, from that point of view, I kind of just, kind of just dawned on me there are probably kind of three categories of people.

client side, three sort of broad categories. Speculative people who really don't know what they want just yet, but they know they need to do something and they have an idea. And let's say they're naive to the processes and they've just, maybe this is their first foray and they're not that comfortable with it, which would be quite a few people. Then there's probably a middle group that has a clear idea of what they want to do with and how much they want to spend. but still they're not completely sure.

So they're in that sort of just know enough, but not quite everything. And then there's a third group who really know exactly what they want to do, how much they're going to spend and who their audience is. And they're quite developed. So they're kind of like, I'd say three categories really.

I would say, I would even go far as to say, would reckon most people in the middle category.

People were probably like, but Hey, let's just try this out. Let's take the first category, the speculative person who's trying to get a feel for what they should be doing. And they know they want to do something. They've got an idea. So how might they want to approach it with the vendor?

Yeah, well, I was going to say for that, think it's more about it's taking a, I think it's taking a further step back and listen and really try to understand what they're trying to accomplish because they stand to come to you with a, want to make a video, right? But have they really thought that through? that really make sense? Maybe you thought about why you want to make a video. Like I said, in the other ones, I think the middle categories know they want to make a video, but they're then figuring out what's the most.

efficient or most value I can get in making video or could we do it this way versus this way? They have enough knowledge to know that they know why they're doing the video. They just don't want to get, that's, think the category I introduce with, is they don't want to go down the wrong path. They don't want to do poor job. They don't want to get ripped off. That's the category I tend to over-focus on. But you're right. In the very beginning, I think it's just a real honest conversation.

tease out the why and the reasons, the marketing objective, the communication objective. And it's interesting, at least in my experience, when you have that conversation, you just basically help them think through their own brief. It's almost like you help them write the brief by discussing them. It starts becoming self-evident. And I've noticed, and this is where I think it's useful, is

That's when the budget conversation starts to reveal itself kind of organically, as opposed to saying, Hey, how much money you got? Cause maybe that's too confrontational. It's like, feel like you're being put on the spot. It's like, I don't know how much money I have. much go, well, guess is a response to that as often, well, how much do I need? And that's the classic, I think, you know, how long is a piece of string, which, which, look, it always happens in this industry of there's, there's various and the variance of so why.

So to help them is, mean, is a case study or a cost range with examples of different, once you sort of, fleshed out kind of what they, what their goal is and what they want to achieve, providing examples with cost ranges or case studies. that a good way to, or is that something they should ask for?

Well, it would be great if they had something in mind. But to your point, if they're pretty new at it, they may not have a bunch of things at their fingertips that they're thinking of, or even be in the right mind space. think, obviously, ideally, you'd have examples in your existing work or your portfolio that you can then point them to.

Yeah, gotcha. need to, you, you, you really, so if I'm that, cause like, I'm going to put this as a, something more helpful to a person who's looking to get something done and they may not know. Your first probably port of call is having a conversation to try and get a better understanding of what you want to achieve.

Yeah. And to your point about being comfortable with it, I think just an honest conversation back and forth. I think any, any creative provider, I think it's best served to be just as open and honest as it is opposed to trying to walk them towards an outcome that you're looking for. Really listening to what they're looking for. Cause I think no one wants to feel like they're being pulled in a direction. It's like, you don't want to pull them to a direction that's more profitable for you at the expense of not.

truly listening to what they want. Meaning if someone really just wants a simple video, don't try to sell them on a complex video because you want to get some extra, an extra job that month. That's a high risk.

developing a common understanding with them about what they want.

Well, that's it actually, that's probably the big, one of the takeaways is, is, is how do you develop a common understanding is pretty much an obvious, but very important place. And I think what we're teasing out here is how do you get to a common understanding? And I think for the, for the, guess the, what is the naive or the, one group, it's about, I guess, not making them feel uncomfortable about not knowing what they want. I think that's part of the intimidation for, so let me just comment on that. Cause it's, I think there's an element of.

They don't want to feel silly talking to a creative agency because they don't know what they want. And there's, think there's, can be an inherent embarrassment, even though there shouldn't be, there's no reason to be embarrassed. think that's the, I think that's the mindset shift that you want to get is go look. I don't know. just know. You go back to basics of marketing, right? I know what my brand is. I know what I want the brand to achieve. I know what my competitive set is. I know what my differentiating point is. And I know how I want to position myself.

potential buyers. I just don't know what I can do with what I got.

So when should you start talking numbers? Because we seem to be dancing around the topic. I don't really know. Like when should I start talking?

think you've done it right there, because as part of manning the expectations, once you've established, I think, these buckets of of ranges of options, those ranges have to have a number. You can achieve this from x to y. You can achieve this from a to b.

Well, you're talking managing expectations there. And I think that's, that's, that's initially going to be sorted out pretty quickly. There's that third group though. That's kind of interesting, which is the more, I'm more seasoned operator who knows a little bit about their marketing and their video marketing needs and what they want to achieve. They've got a very clear budget. got a very clear outcome in mind. They've got a very clear audience. it, are they people that should

Like if they're meeting a vendor for the first time, should they be coming out with their numbers straight away or is it the same sort of process?

it's a similar process. I think it's just rather along the process. I think it's more about getting a range and contextualizing that as well. think when you're talking about that third group, I think the most important, this is when, let's just put it out there, the importance of your brief. I think briefs, they're generally still under appreciated and undervalued as a tool. I think in the early,

If you're looking at the buckets, I would say then, by you get to that third bucket, the expectation of a polished brief is higher and expected and necessary. Because at that stage, the people involved should know that then, because I guess there's still always a risk of subjectivity without a good written brief. If it's what I think, because you should, I mean, it's creative 101.

You never evaluate a brief on whether you, sorry, you never should never evaluate a creative execution on a qualitative measure. It's always should be against the brief that that brings in as much objectivity as possible. You're you're dealing with creative process. So I would expect if there was a spectrum or a graph, you know, the farther along you are in the experience category, the expectation of a more polished brief and following the brief more religiously.

I think becomes expected and necessary.

Does that mean, here's the brief. I'm going to give you an estimate based on the brief specifically.

It can be substantial.

What you're saying is that you're saying you've provided me a brief and what you should expect from me is a number that honors that brief or I think will achieve the brief. And that's what you should expect from me. Yes. Okay. I have a slightly different perspective on that because I still think that because I think it is still there. I still think common understanding is important. There is a lot of variance in the world. There's a lot of different ways to approach things. I think common understanding is

What's this?

Going back to what we said in all three categories, that common understanding needs to be there. So I always think it's important to establish a very clear understanding of kind of capabilities, cost ranges, case studies, so that you can really hone in on what they want. But also what you want to do with the client and as a vendor, you want to make sure you're on the same page together. Cause if they're wildly off the mark in terms of what they think they should be paying.

And if you're wildly off the mark in terms of what the market really should be charging, you're kind of both wasting each other's time. And that's my, as a vendor, that's the biggest fear I have is my time being wasted. And as a client, you don't want to look silly and you don't want to...

So I think you know that on the head. fact, just to reiterate, I completely agree with everything. And in fact, I think establishing a common understanding is the goal always. I think what I'm getting at is the farther along you are the sophistication spectrum in the brief, there should be less risk of a disconnect. It should be.

It should be, you should be on the same page. more times than not, there should be less, less risk of failing in that endeavor. If that makes sense. Cause there, cause sometimes you can get a brief that's listen, we all admit it. It's, it's, it's substandard, but you know what they want. You kind of know what they mean. And you still want to do the project. Cause you don't want to, you don't want the project to go away. Cause they feel like, I don't know how to write a proper brief. And you don't want to discourage them. So you kind of, mean,

this is potentially another topic we haven't even discussed bringing up, but the beauty of the reverse brief.

before you get there, what is a reverse brief? It's probably a too big a topic but just in case anyone wanted to know what a reverse brief is.

Now, a reverse brief is a little, it's kind of a, I wouldn't say a trick, but it's a nice technique to help a client be a better client and to help them get themselves across the line by literally writing, hearing, having a conversation like this about what are you trying to accomplish? Tell me about your business. What are we doing? And with the experience of doing this a few times, you basically, you feed it back to them.

you basically feed yourself the brief using what you think they were trying to achieve. Why I find that useful is, especially being on this side of it now, I find that really helps me understand their brand needs or their project needs more than I do when I just listen. Because if you have to, it's the classic, if you can, just like classic tutoring, right, with math problems, you could do a math problem, that's great. But if you can explain to someone,

It's a good ride together.

have to do the math problem, then you're a master of it. So if I'm avid to explain to them what they meant to explain to me, I'm very confident I have a very good feel of what needs to happen next. And then that's where I think you can confidently have the conversation and talk budgets and talk numbers and say, hey, I basically told you what I think you told me. Does that still make sense? And when it does, you could say, OK, based on that,

I think here are your options. I think you have a low budget option, you have a medium budget option, but what you thought you had is that's off the table because you've asked for this. And it's interesting at that stage, you're either getting that common understanding that you're searching for, or perhaps you're starting over again and you're recalibrating.

Let me throw a scenario to you based on a lot of this conversation, because this is the one I personally dislike the most, is, all right. All right. Let's say zero to 10. The one person is the speculative, doesn't really know a hell of a lot, but they're trying to get things done. And the 10 or the nine person is somebody who's got a lot of experience. So I'm going to be around the six or the seven. Okay.

I want a TVC, a 30 seconder. want a 15 seconder and I want to shoot at my location. Can you give me a budget?

Yeah, that's always the fun part. I usually, and I think we usually do that, you, that's generally not, that's enough to have a good conversation, probably not enough to get enough.

So me, I'm going, I'm going to you, but I'm also going to go for other people and I'm going to get some numbers. Cause that's for me. And the reason I pose it is I find that very difficult to do. I find it's, and, I find I don't want to do it, even though I, I have a very clear process, but, and I don't make numbers up out of thin air, but I find it very difficult to do. and it does come up from time to time where it's like,

It's like an auction or a tendering process. It's very difficult.

That's a whole nother topic about the role. Actually, let's show that the role of how much spec work is fair for any job. And I think that's a whole topic you should take on itself, which is the of pitching.

As a client, personally, I wouldn't recommend doing that. Going to a vendor with that sort of process, unless it was a very, very well established brief, even then, I think it's hard to do.

Yes.

So I think I'll do my reverse briefing. What you're saying is that kicking tires can be, I think you're calling it kicking tires, it can be dangerous because it can draw on resources unfairly.

Why do I care? It's your company, not mine.

Right, right.

I think long-term, it's one of those things that if you build a reputation for taking advantage of people, I don't think that'll pay off.

Yeah, I don't think it's a great way to operate personally, and...

There can be, I think there's the distinction between, I think intent, like a lot of things in life, intent matters. And could you be wrong on the intention? Yeah. Have I been wrong? Yes. Meaning some people are literally saying, hey, I just need help here. I think to answer that question more directly though, I think I feel better. And I guess you don't know at the time, but it feels like if you do a pretty heavy

If the project goes forward, expect them to hire you. I think where it becomes, and.

That's happened many times to us though.

I know, I tried to be diplomatic here, yeah, when you, when you go too far, when you go too far, asking someone to kind of help you frame in your project. And I think I know where you're going. And then they use that to then refine their brief and then pitch it out to get a lower price. Well, that's, that, that has a ethical connotation that is, was difficult.

think that you, look, I think you would do it for two reasons. One, you want to, you want to, you want competition. And two, you want to, you want to unearth different levels of skills and capabilities. And you want to sort of marry those things off against each other to get the best outcome.

If that's the goal and that's a valid goal, then you better have a better brief. You can't be kicking tires.

Okay, so if you have a good brief and you're very clear about what you're trying to do.

I'm talking to three or four vendors. Here's my relative budget. It's a one-off project or it's an ongoing retainer. Because that will inform any created brew. And to be quite blunt is how much should I invest in this opportunity?

Which is actually, which is actually a really, there's a lot of integrity in that approach, which is great. And in fact, I think I've seen many of those approaches where they actually give you a budget as well. And they're actually saying, can you make it work for this number? And how would you make it work for this number and show me what your levels of capabilities are?

That's fair. That's a fair and transparent process. And to that, it's something you've brought up to me. I won't name off the back of where that happened, but what about feedback if you're not successful? How important is that? Now, again, I guess we're getting off the topic of budget, but it's all related because it's all about what's a reasonable approach to get to the project parameters that a client wants to spend to create a video goal.

How much input do they need from potential vendors to solidify that to a point? And I think back to your scale of the three buckets, farther along the ride, they've done this many times and they know, look, here's my relative budget. I know it's a pretty big production. I know it's going to be decent media. I know it has to be a bit polished because it's going to be on paid media. have a premium brand. All that stuff has to happen. It's a very aspirational kind of ad. It's not a functional five minute.

education video. They're all very different functions of the video that will inform all this stuff.

Yeah. And I think with the example, the reason I wanted to bring up that example was because while it's a valid approach, it does bring in the whole managing expectations, looking at those variables and the cost considerations of those variables. You know, for example, you're casting, are you going to your A or are you looking at a lower tier? Because that's hugely different. I mean, as I remember that great story, I always told you where I had a particular

budget with a, with a, I think it was a crowdfunding video we working on and client was looking at, different types of models and we were trying to find the models for this particular crowd. And then I went to an agency and gave them a budget of what we were where they are. And I got told I was inconsequential.

There is something in that, which this is my feeble attempt to segue, is transparency. As much transparency as possible in the process, especially when it comes to numbers, is better than not. Meaning, yes, there could be some awkwardness, there could be some disconnects, but that's minor versus the disconnect. If you aren't transparent and there's sticker shock, I think you've used the word a lot with me. Occasionally it's like, no one wants sticker shock. And I'm like, well, I completely, a hundred percent agree.

Now, sometimes sticker shock though is important to establish, hey, do you realize what you're asking for is expensive? So sometimes they need a shock. And I mean that because the expectations are in the wrong place. So maybe you need a little shock to get them in the place.

Which is going back to what you said is your first kind of thing, which is always the common understanding. And then from there, managing expectations.

And that, and then the segue to numbers to me is, is transparency of the line items. One, it used to be my personal bugaboo. And I guess I've gotten over it more as I've gotten older, but I used to always hate the lump sum estimate. Like someone gives you a number and you just go, did you just make that up? Now what I'm, what I used to underestimate when I used to get frustrated, I underestimated the fact that these are experts. They've done this a million times.

like a plumber, they know their job, they know their industry, they know what things cost, and they've done it a million times. And that number is probably within 20 % of being right. But when I see those round numbers, I just feel like they're just guessing, and they're going to charge me that. So I think one approach that obviously we subscribe to is line items and as much line items as possible. Because I think by doing line items, and I've noticed this in practice, is

it becomes much easier to explain why things are expensive because they bake. So basically if you do a line item, which is crew costs, when it's

Expensive is probably not the right word. Why things cost what they cost.

Yes. What did I say? I didn't say that.

said expensive. think that's just, it's an assumption there.

That's an important, that's an important point of clarity. And I would agree. That's, that's, that's the kind of sloppiness you want to avoid in a brief, right? Is what I just did, which is using words like it's expensive. It's not expensive. It's a cost. So to your point, when you itemize the line herbs and those things then make up that total number that spit out, if they go, wow, that's, that's much higher than I expected back to Madison expectations, say, okay,

Let's go through the line items, which line item is getting your attention? And the reason you do it that systematically, they said, well, well, town, okay. But you asked for a season performer that could deliver a TBC and represent your brand. Well, okay.

they need royalties so you're to be paying every year for a royalty for them to use it.

Right. And that's run up by the transparent, the line. It's right. It's like, well, okay. You want us to come up with a brand new idea from scratch, not take an idea you've already written. You want us to write a script, you a storyboard and evaluate different ideas. How much time do you think that takes? So that line item is the development of the creative idea and the writing of the script, the feedback loops, the storyboarding, the concepting, the thinking time. So once you, what I didn't notice in all this is

when you give those lineups, it's not every line item, every little thing within the thing, but the big buckets of stuff, know, the creative work, the pre-work, the shooting or the acquisition, the talent, the out of pocket costs, all that can be bucketed. And what I've noticed, and this is where I guess helpful if anyone's listening to this is when you think of it in those buckets, and then you realize those are the variables you can turn to then change your budget back to where you want it. So it's not like you're stuck because it's like, well,

Okay, well that's too expensive. So what can we do because that's too expensive? Okay, let's get away from the talent. Let's talk about doing a voiceover.

But just using this as an opportunity to circle back though, because this is kind of circling back to something we were talking about before about the, you know, putting out a brief to tender is what we would call it where you have a very set number and a very set of deliverables and you're going to farm it out to five companies. Just a word of warning to that approach for people, unless you're a very seasoned producer who understands the nuances of producing.

that approach, you're not going to get the nuances. There are all these nuances within that. And I think that's one thing you could possibly miss out on understanding.

But like you said, yeah, and I hope I didn't mislead that even when you have a season brief, you still discuss all the elements that lead up to it.

the farm out to tender approach you, you miss the nuances. And that's actually something I kind of just realized today, which is why I've always disliked that approach because all the nuances, which is why I struggle when I get a brief like that and I have to submit an estimate and send it out and you may not ever get feedback, but, you may have a discussion, but it's like, well, you've asked for a casting here. Did you want a tier eight casting with royalties or are you looking for somebody maybe a bit more unseasoned who's looking for an opportunity? Cause you've got a

You got this kind of range in that. And do you want crafted and, know, do you want composed music or non-composed music? And, you know,

to go with this. It's funny because what we said is once you address those variables, the transparency and the line on it, and start discussing through what those means and how those can be altered, then basically it gets to the really final concluding point is it's the scope refinement. So through that process, then you refine that scope and adjust the brief and expectations are managed. And guess what? You go back full circle, you're back to the common understanding.

And then you can actively go. I think the big picture for me in this is, it doesn't have to be, sorry, back to budgets. It doesn't have to be such a difficult conversation. I think more times than not, you bring it up early in a conversation, that's going be the first thing you say, because that can create, I some disconnect. You want to understand before you talk numbers.

But by addressing really the transparency, that's where the trust starts to get built. And that's when the value can be delivered and value gets delivered. And it's always value, right? It's never price. It's always, mean, it's consumer marketing one-on-one, it even goes for business business arrangements. It's value. It's I want to get something and I can get good value for it. So it's not just the price. It's the quality or the, you know, the performance of the output vis-a-vis.

what was paid for.

Look, how to have an effective conversation with the Costwood creative projects. I'll just go through a list of different things here. We've got the common understanding is probably your first step. step one, you probably want to find that common understanding. So common understanding in your mind is just really understanding what getting on the same page about what wants to be achieved. Yeah.

Then I think managing expectations and deliverables. mean, where in this process are you starting to talk numbers somewhere in that process?

What about here, I would say. then I would add to that, let's put the numbers out there. This is the time where the numbers should be thrown out. Because I think by then you've established a level of trust and understanding where the numbers are not part of a game, or it's part of a process of getting to the right outcome.

And as a client, it's really important, I think, also, once you've gone through that process and you start and have that trust, I think the last level of trust, I think, is ask for an itemized estimate.

Really ask for line items so you can really understand it. And that's not about just holding somebody at the calls and making sure they're an honest person. It's about really understand where things are because there are sometimes opportunities there that you can actually, if you are cost sensitive, that you can actually pull things back if you have to.

Let me throw in another thing I think didn't come up, but it's part of that as well. Sometimes you can make, and I've done this, you make the wrong assumption. I thought you wanted us to do X, Y, Z. you just need to just do a, well, that's fine. That whole line item goes away. Thanks for pointing that out. I misunderstood that. And there's honesty transparency and there's the benefit of it. Right. Cause I might've had a number in there that was completely had nothing to do what he was asking, but it's something that I thought he needed.

And that's again, without that transparency, you show up on the set and go, well, why is, why do we got this? It's like, well, that was part of the estimate. know, it's that kind of, it's scrutinizing where the variables that come to the big number.

Okay. Look, I think the big takeaway though is it doesn't have to be a difficult conversation. I mean, that's, that's the huge takeaway here is you can actually have an honest conversation, which is transparent and open and you can achieve the result that you want.

And the key is doing that early. if it means having a little bit, taking a step back to getting a little bit more conversational before you then get back to it, I think that's quite adequate.

Absolutely. look, like just to reiterate, I don't think it needs to be a difficult conversation. I think it's important to get to that common understanding and to get a sense of where you're at and what you need to have that.

money talk early on and then to go through the expectations and having those managed with variance and approaches, getting that line items sort of estimate across so that you can sort of see what's going to happen and how it's going to happen and what the costs are. And I think if you can do those things, you can actually develop a pretty good relationship and find that right fit, as you said.

So that's a wrap on this episode of Cut Through. you liked it, hit subscribe. And if you've got thoughts or questions, we'd love to hear from you. See you next time.