Nonprofit Video Production: 8 Steps to Make Your Own Fundraising Videos

Hire a production company or make it yourself?

Some studios that specialize in nonprofit work publish their prices. These are the figures on their own pages as of November 2026.

That money pays for a crew, directed interviews, location shoots and rounds of editing. Our guide to video production cost breaks down what sits inside a quote and what moves the number.

Decide video by video: some need a studio’s craft, others need speed.

If you do hire a studio, compare quotes on more than the price:

• Deliverables: how many cuts you get (for example, a full version, a 60-second social cut and a vertical version), and whether captions are included.
• Usage rights: where and for how long you may use the finished video, and who keeps the raw footage.
• Permissions: who collects signed releases from the people on camera, and who keeps them.
• Schedule: how the timeline fits your campaign or grant deadline. Demo Duck notes that grantor reviews can stretch its 6–12 week timeline, and recommends scheduling testimonial participants at the start of the project.
• Revisions: how many rounds of changes the price includes.

How to make a nonprofit video yourself in 8 steps

Decide the ask first and collect facts and permissions before you write, so the script never depends on a number or a face you cannot use. Then gather visuals, edit, publish and measure.

1. Pick one goal, one viewer and one ask

Before anything else, finish this sentence: “This video asks [who] to [do what] by [when].” For the example later in this guide, it reads: “This video asks neighbors and past donors to fund a Winter Pantry Box by January 31.”

If you cannot finish the sentence, the video is not ready to script. If you also want volunteers or followers, keep the one that matters most for this campaign as the main ask, and put the others after it, in the closing seconds or in the post around the video.

2. Gather the facts you can stand behind

Donors respond to specifics: what happens, where, when, and what their gift pays for. Collect these on one page before you write a word of script.

• What you do, in one sentence, with the place and the schedule.
• The campaign: its name, start and end dates.
• What one gift pays for, as a unit with a price.
• The goal, as a number of units and an amount.
• How to give: one short web address.
• Who does the work.

Take every number from your own records, such as receipts, sign-in sheets or the campaign budget, and note where each one came from. If a donor asks “where does $35 come from?”, you should be able to answer in one sentence. Leave out anything you cannot show.

Here is the fact sheet behind the example video in this guide. Larkwood Community Pantry is a sample organization created for this example, and the example video later in this guide was made from this fact sheet.

3. Get written permission from everyone on camera

The people you serve owe you nothing for appearing in your fundraising videos. Treat their permission as part of the production, not an afterthought.

• Get a signed media release from anyone who can be identified, whether by face, voice, name or location. For a minor, a parent or guardian signs.
• Say on the form where the video will appear (your website, social media, paid ads, events) and for how long you plan to use it.
• State in writing that saying no will not affect the services the person receives.
• For people at risk, such as survivors of violence or people without stable housing, show hands, backs, the work being done, or illustrations instead of faces and recognizable places.
• Let people describe their situation in their own words, and avoid scenes that show someone only at their lowest moment.

Keep the signed forms with the project files, so that whoever reuses the footage next year can check what was agreed.

4. Write a script that opens on the need

Open on the tension your campaign answers, in words a viewer can feel, rather than on your mission statement. Then follow this order, and write each line for the ear: short sentences, one idea at a time.

Every fact in those lines comes from the fact sheet. If a line needs a fact you do not have, go back to step 2 rather than filling the gap with an estimate.

As for length, make the video long enough for one ask and no longer. GoFundMe suggests keeping fundraiser videos between 20 seconds and three minutes. Read your script aloud with a timer before you record anything. For social feeds, plan a shorter cut of the same script.

5. Collect the visuals and sound

A phone camera is enough for most nonprofit videos. Work from a shot list made from the script, so every line has something to show.

• Shot list: for the example script, that means a thermostat and a kitchen cupboard for the opening, the Saturday pickup at the community center, each of the six staples, volunteers packing boxes, and the web address on screen.
• Orientation: horizontal for your website and YouTube, vertical for Reels, Shorts and TikTok. If you need both, shoot horizontal with room around the subject, or shoot the key moments twice.
• Photos you already have: event and program photos count, as long as you have releases for the people in them.
• Narration: record in a small, quiet room with the phone close to the speaker, or use AI narration if no one on staff wants to be the voice.
• Music: use only tracks you have the right to use, such as licensed music or a library that allows it.

6. Edit for silent viewing and a clear ending

Some people will meet your video in a muted feed, so it has to make sense without sound.

• Turn on captions. Kickstarter’s Creator Handbook recommends captions and subtitles so that more people can follow, whatever their language or hearing.
• Keep on-screen text to one idea per screen, large enough to read on a phone.
• End on a card with the web address, the deadline and your logo, and hold it long enough to type the address.
• Watch the whole video once with the sound off, and once on a phone, before you publish.

7. Publish where your donors already are

Put the video where a viewer can act on the ask in the next click.

• Your donation page: place the video at the top of the campaign page.
• Email: link a still image from the video to the page where it plays, and put the ask in the email text as well.
• Social posts: upload the video directly to each platform rather than posting a link, and use the vertical cut for Reels, Shorts and TikTok.
• YouTube: if your organization qualifies, join the YouTube Nonprofit Program (see the table below).
• Facebook and Instagram: Meta’s fundraising tools add donation features to your Page and posts (see the table below).

To join the YouTube Nonprofit Program, you activate it from your Google for Nonprofits account, and Google reviews the request within 2–14 business days. In the US, a Google for Nonprofits account requires 501(c)(3) status with the IRS (or a group exemption under a 501(c)(3) parent), according to Google’s eligibility guidelines. Fiscally sponsored projects without their own 501(c)(3) status are not eligible, and neither are government entities, hospitals or schools, although their charitable foundations are.

With YouTube Giving, a channel adds a Donate button that raises money for your organization. Your organization must be a US 501(c)(3) public charity, a Google for Nonprofits member and opted into online fundraising via GuideStar. The channel that runs the fundraiser needs at least 10,000 subscribers and membership in the YouTube Partner Program, and cannot be set as made for kids.

On Instagram, your organization must be approved for Facebook fundraising tools, switch to a professional account, and link its Instagram business account to its verified Facebook Page.

8. Measure the ask, not the views

Views tell you whether people started watching. Gifts and sign-ups tell you whether the video worked.

• Give each placement its own link to the donation page, with tracking parameters such as utm_source=email and utm_source=instagram, so your analytics show which placement brought each gift.
• Count what the ask asked for: gifts and amounts, volunteer sign-ups, replies to the email.
• Use watch time to decide what to change next time. If most viewers leave before the ask, move the ask earlier or shorten the opening.
• Keep a one-line log per video: where it ran, for how long, and what it brought in. Next campaign, compare against it.

Crowdfunding videos for nonprofits

Crowdfunding platforms differ in what a campaign is for, and that changes what your video has to say. On GoFundMe, people give to a fundraiser for a person or a cause. On Kickstarter, people back a project that creates something new.

Sources: GoFundMe’s Adding videos to your fundraiser, Choosing a fundraiser type and video tips; Kickstarter’s project video help article and rules.

For a donation drive, GoFundMe’s nonprofit fundraiser is built for the purpose. On the fundraiser creation page, a nonprofit fundraiser is set up by choosing “Charity” and filling in the organization’s details, and GoFundMe asks staff creating one for the organization they work for to sign up for a GoFundMe charity account. Funds on a nonprofit fundraiser go to the organization through PayPal Giving Fund, or through GoFundMe Pay for enrolled US nonprofits, and donors can claim tax benefits.

Kickstarter’s rules require every project to create something new to share with others. They allow up to 10% of campaign funds to be donated to charity, provided this is disclosed when the project is submitted. Read those rules before you plan a nonprofit campaign there.

The script order from step 4 works on both platforms. Add these beats for a crowdfunding page:

• A real person asking. For the vertical video in its apps, Kickstarter suggests real people holding or talking about the project instead of a highly produced edit or voiceover. A staff member or volunteer can open and close the video.
• The use of funds, in amounts. Say exactly what the goal pays for, line by line if you can.
• Rewards. If your Kickstarter project offers rewards, show the main ones.
• The deadline. If the campaign has an end date, say it.

Example: a winter appeal made from a one-page fact sheet

This is the appeal we made in NoLang from the fact sheet in step 2, for the sample organization Larkwood Community Pantry. It runs 64 seconds, with English narration and captions.

The video opens on “Heat… or eat?” and sets a heating bill beside a grocery bill. It then introduces the pantry with its Saturday hours and place, names the Winter Pantry Boxes campaign and its dates, shows what $35 buys item by item, and builds to the goal of 400 boxes and $14,000 by January 31. It closes on the volunteers who pack the boxes, the main ask to give a box at example.org/winter, and a second, smaller ask to sign up for a packing shift.

Select Create a Video with This Template to open this video in NoLang as a model, then replace the facts with your own campaign’s: the organization, the dates, what one gift pays for, the goal and the web address.

Making a nonprofit video in NoLang

NoLang is an AI video generator from Mavericks, Inc. It builds a narrated video from material you already have: photos, a document, footage, a script or a short description. Choose Generate in the left menu, and the How will you create it? window lists the starting points.

If you are starting from phone photos, choose From image, add the photos in the order you want them shown, and keep Use the image as is selected.

If your campaign facts already live in a PDF or a PowerPoint deck, start from From document and choose how much of it to explain.

Once the video is finished, open it and choose Other to find two options that help a nonprofit reach more people with the same video. Convert language produces a version in another language, such as Spanish, and Change aspect ratio gives you a vertical 9:16 version for Reels, Shorts and TikTok.

Organizations that make videos across several teams, such as development, programs and volunteer coordination, can use NoLang to turn their own documents, photos and footage into appeals, thank-you videos and program explainers. To talk about using it across your organization, use our contact form, or download an overview below.