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YouTube producer vs video editor
A YouTube producer owns the whole video: the idea, the format, the shoot, the edit, the packaging and the release. A video editor owns the edit. Hire an editor when your ideas and packaging already work. Hire a producer when the videos are not landing and you need someone to own why. The same goes for a founder's podcast or personal brand channel.
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How do they compare?
| YouTube producer | Video editor | |
|---|---|---|
| What they own | Commissioning, shoot, edit, packaging and release, end to end | The cut, the pacing, graphics and sound |
| Where they start | The idea and the format | The footage |
| Title and thumbnail | Owns them | Usually given them |
| For a founder or personal brand | Turns the founder's expertise into a format the team can run | Cuts what the founder records |
| How they are paid | Per project, per series or as part of the team | Often per video |
| Best when | Views have stalled, or the channel is new | The format works and you need more edits |
What does editing cost?
Editing services often publish a price per video. Tasty Edits, for example, lists long form at $327 per video, short form at $94 and management from $1,490 a month, as listed on their site, October 2026. See tastyedits.com.
When should you hire which?
- Hire an editor when you already know what to make and the bottleneck is turning footage into finished videos.
- Hire a producer when you are launching a channel, a series or a format, or when the views have stopped growing.
- Hire a producer when you are a founder and your camera time has to become a show, such as a podcast relaunched as video first.
- Hire both once a format works: the producer runs the format, the editors cut it.
Where does Tom fit?
Tom is a producer. At New Waves, Who Dis?, the company he co-founded, he produced I Pranked America's Most Racist Man end to end, 47,563,094 views, and produced The Biggest Menace, 78,000,000 views across seven episodes and the trailer.
He produced 27 long form videos for TheBurntChip, including formats he created such as YouTuber Come Dine With Me. Together they hold 52,004,088 views.
For founders, he relaunched Secret Leaders, a founder interview podcast, as a video-first show. It reached number 2 in the UK Business podcast charts, behind The Diary of a CEO, and he closed Wise, Vanta, Hewlett Packard and Dubai Tourism as sponsors.
Today he brings that thinking to creators, founders and brands as a strategist and fractional Head of Content:
- Power hour session, £600. 60 minute video call. The fundamentals, applied to you. What to make, for whom and in which format.
- The three month sprint, by application (2 spots left). 6 fortnightly 60 minute calls. A seat in your team. The 3 month plan. Fortnightly accountability.
- Fractional Head of Content, £3,000 to £7,500 a month, 6 month minimum, then monthly (1 spot left). Fractional head of content, or fractional COO, for creator and founder-led businesses. I run your content function end to end. Strategy, cadence, team, hiring, tooling and reporting. A senior seat in the business for the cost of a fraction of a full time hire. Worldwide and remote.
Questions
Does a YouTube producer edit the video?
Sometimes, on a small channel. On a bigger one the producer runs the edit and an editor cuts it. The producer decides what the video is, and the editor makes the cut work.
Does a founder need a producer or an editor?
An editor, if the founder already knows what to say and the format works. A producer, if the content has to be built from the founder's expertise. At Secret Leaders Tom judged episodes by who watched as well as how many: one episode did 2,000 views on YouTube and was worth more commercially than videos with a hundred times the audience, because the viewers were founders with budgets.
Is Tom available to produce a single video?
Tom works through the Power hour session (£600), the three month sprint and the Fractional Head of Content role. Each one covers the format and the packaging. Email contact@tomsharman.com if you have a production in mind.
What does Tom mean by a format?
A repeatable shape for a video, so the audience can guess what comes next. Repeat it until it becomes a show. One-off videos are a lottery, and repeatable formats are a business.
Read next
Work with Tom
The same thinking, applied to you: an hour on what to make and for whom, or Tom in the business.