NYSE:YELP Yelp Q1 2024 Earnings Report $35.28 +0.12 (+0.34%) Closing price 05/2/2025 03:59 PM EasternExtended Trading$34.52 -0.76 (-2.15%) As of 07:00 AM Eastern Extended trading is trading that happens on electronic markets outside of regular trading hours. This is a fair market value extended hours price provided by Polygon.io. Learn more. Earnings HistoryForecast Yelp EPS ResultsActual EPS$0.20Consensus EPS $0.04Beat/MissBeat by +$0.16One Year Ago EPSN/AYelp Revenue ResultsActual Revenue$332.75 millionExpected Revenue$333.66 millionBeat/MissMissed by -$910.00 thousandYoY Revenue GrowthN/AYelp Announcement DetailsQuarterQ1 2024Date5/9/2024TimeN/AConference Call DateThursday, May 9, 2024Conference Call Time5:00PM ETUpcoming EarningsYelp's Q1 2025 earnings is scheduled for Thursday, May 8, 2025, with a conference call scheduled at 5:00 PM ET. Check back for transcripts, audio, and key financial metrics as they become available.Q1 2025 Earnings ReportConference Call ResourcesConference Call AudioConference Call TranscriptPress Release (8-K)Quarterly Report (10-Q)SEC FilingEarnings HistoryCompany ProfilePowered by Yelp Q1 2024 Earnings Call TranscriptProvided by QuartrMay 9, 2024 ShareLink copied to clipboard.There are 11 speakers on the call. Operator00:00:00Good afternoon. My name is Brianna, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Yelp Inc. Q1 2024 Earnings Conference Call. Please note that this call is being recorded. Operator00:00:14All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speakers' remarks, there will be a question and answer session. I will now turn today's call over to Josh Willis, Yelp Investor Relations. Please go ahead. Speaker 100:00:37Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us on Yelp's Q1 2024 earnings conference call. Joining me today are Yelp's Chief Executive Officer, Jeremy Stoppelman Chief Financial Officer, David Schwarzbach and Chief Operating Officer, Jed Nachman. We published a shareholder letter on our Investor Relations website and with the SEC and hope everyone had a chance to read it. We'll provide some brief opening comments and then turn to your questions. Now, I'll read our Safe Harbor statement. Speaker 100:01:09We'll make certain statements today that are forward looking and involve a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially. Please note that these forward looking statements reflect our opinions only as of the date of this call and we undertake no obligation to revise or publicly release the results of any revision to these forward looking statements in light of new information or future events. In addition, we are subject to a number of risks that may significantly impact our business and financial results. Please refer to our SEC filings as well as our shareholder letter for a more detailed description of the risk factors that may affect our results. During our call today, we may discuss adjusted EBITDA, adjusted EBITDA margin and free cash flow, which are non GAAP financial measures. Speaker 100:01:56These measures should not be considered in isolation from or as a substitute for financial information prepared in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles. In our shareholder letter released this afternoon and our filings with the SEC, each of which is posted on our Investor Relations website, you will find additional disclosures regarding these non GAAP financial measures as well as historical reconciliations of GAAP net income loss to both adjusted EBITDA and adjusted EBITDA margin and a historical reconciliation of GAAP cash flow from operating activities to free cash flow. And with that, I will turn the call over to Jeremy. Speaker 200:02:35Thanks, Josh, and welcome everyone. As we approach 20 years of helping people connect with great local businesses, I am proud of the impact Yelp has had on the many communities we serve. We continue to lean into our strategic focus on services categories and we have already seen momentum in our efforts to deliver the best home services experience for consumers and pros. In the Q1, net revenue increased by 7% year over year to $333,000,000 Net income was $14,000,000 reflecting a 4% margin and adjusted EBITDA increased by 19% year over year to $64,000,000 representing a 19% margin. These results reflect our efforts to improve profitability even as we continue to invest in our strategic growth initiatives. Speaker 200:03:25While businesses in our restaurant, retail and other categories continue to face a challenging operating environment in the Q1, home services was again a standout performer with approximately 15% year over year revenue growth. Advertising revenue in our services categories grew 11% year over year. Request to quote projects increased by approximately 20% year over year in the Q1, reflecting early positive results from our acquisition of services projects through search engine marketing, as well as continued strength from organic consumer demand. In key categories like movers, we have seen significant increases in request to quote projects and ad clicks as well as a meaningful decline in average CPCs. These promising results were largely driven by our paid project acquisition efforts and as a result, we plan to continue investing to capture more of the large market opportunity in services. Speaker 200:04:23As we continue to execute against our robust product roadmap, we introduced more than 15 new features and updates in April. One standout in services is our new LLM powered Yelp assistant. This conversational AI can more accurately interpret a consumer's needs, collect relevant project information in a user friendly way and deliver an even more targeted lead to service pros. We also see a broad set of opportunities to bring our trusted content to consumers in new ways. This includes our Yelp Fusion AI API, a new LLM powered solution enabling partners to tap into Yelp's trusted content. Speaker 200:05:05This tool enhances discovery on third party platforms through natural language search across our broad range of categories, including both services and RR and O, expanding Yelp's reach and utility across the web. We believe these new offerings, along with dozens of other AI powered initiatives on our roadmap, will transform how consumers and businesses connect on Yelp. In summary, Yelp's Q1 results marked a solid start to the year and I continue to be excited about the depth and breadth of our robust product roadmap, particularly in services. Overall, we remain confident in our strategy to drive long term profitable growth and shareholder value. With that, I'll turn it over to David. Speaker 300:05:48Thanks, Jeremy. In the Q1 of 2024, we saw net revenue increase by 7% year over year to $333,000,000 Our net income for the quarter was $14,000,000 or $0.20 per share, improving from a net loss of $1,000,000 in the Q1 of 2023 and reflecting a 4% margin. Adjusted EBITDA increased by 19% year over year to $64,000,000 which was $12,000,000 above the high end of our outlook range, representing a 19% margin. This growth was driven by solid performance in our services categories. Advertising revenue and services increased by 11% year over year to $203,000,000 led by strength in home services, where revenue grew by approximately 15% year over year. Speaker 300:06:35Investments in Request A Quote drove an approximately 20% year over year increase in Request A Quote projects, underscoring the effectiveness of our product led strategy and early progress in our efforts to acquire projects through paid search. Advertisers also responded positively to our improved matching services in the Q1 as reflected by a 6% year over year increase in paying advertising locations in these categories, even as our overall paying advertising locations decreased by 4% year over year. Advertising revenue from our restaurants, retail and other categories grew a modest 1% year over year to $114,000,000 in the quarter. This reflects the challenging operating environment facing businesses in these categories characterized by elevated input costs, inflationary pressures and an inability to pass along higher cost to consumers. Additionally, we may be seeing impacts from trends associated with off premise dining and delivery. Speaker 300:07:34Multi location revenue increased by approximately 5% year over year in the Q1 also attributable to softness in our R and M. We are actively working on enhancing the request a quote experience to enable more multi location services businesses to benefit from this valuable feature. For example, we are in the process of launching an API that aims to streamline the tracking of leads and enhance conversion rates for enterprise customers by connecting directly to their customer relationship software. Our ad system continued to deliver valuable clicks to advertisers in the Q1. We saw an 8% year over year increase in ad clicks across all categories, while average cost per click declined by 1% with more substantial decreases in services, reflecting the increased value we delivered to these advertisers in the quarter. Speaker 300:08:24We believe our improved ad formats and lower CPCs contributed to year over year increases in our retention rate for non term advertisers budgets in the Q1. Improvements to the ad purchase flow, along with enhancements in our advertiser marketing, drove another record quarter for customer acquisition in our self serve channel. Self serve channel revenue has increased at a compound annual growth rate of approximately 25% since the Q1 of 2021. We also continue to identify opportunities to work with other platforms like Facebook and Firefox to tap into searches with local intent that start off of Yelp with the goal of matching our advertisers with an even larger high intent audience. Turning to expenses, in our Q1, we continued to be disciplined in our allocation of resources, while focusing on opportunities that have the potential to drive incremental returns. Speaker 300:09:21This resulted in an improvement of our adjusted EBITDA margin by 2 percentage points year over year. We also reduced stock based compensation expense to 13% of revenue, a 2 percentage point decrease from last year and believe we are on track to reduce it below 8% by the end of 2025. We continue to expect the number of shares subject to employee equity awards granted in 2024 to be approximately 65% lower than in 2023. Returning capital to shareholders through share repurchases continues to be a key element of our capital allocation strategy. In the Q1, we repurchased $62,500,000 worth of shares at an average purchase price of $40.95 per share. Speaker 300:10:05As of March 31, 2024, we had $519,000,000 remaining under our existing repurchase authorization. We plan to continue repurchasing shares in 2024, subject to market and economic conditions. Turning to our outlook, as Jeremy shared, we are confident in our strong portfolio of initiatives to drive long term growth. We expect net revenue will be in the range of $350,000,000 to $355,000,000 for the Q2. For the full year, we are reaffirming our guidance and expect net revenue to be in the range of $1,420,000,000 to $1,440,000,000 as our services initiatives gain traction. Speaker 300:10:43Turning to margin, we expect 2nd quarter cash expenses to increase from the Q1, largely driven by incremental marketing investments, particularly in paid project acquisition. The early positive results from our paid search program have given us the confidence to expand our investments in this area, which we believe can drive project growth over the long term. We now expect to spend $40,000,000 or more on Services project acquisition in 2024. As a result, we anticipate 2nd quarter adjusted EBITDA will be in the range of $70,000,000 to $75,000,000 We are also narrowing our 2024 adjusted EBITDA guidance to $315,000,000 to $325,000,000 to reflect this increased investment. Prices in our cost per click model are set through an auction as compared to the cost per lead model. Speaker 300:11:34In the past, we have found that when we deliver more clicks for a given amount of advertising budget, average CPCs decline. In turn, as advertisers see more value, they generally increase spend over time. However, there is typically a significant lag between a decline in CPC and an increase in ad budget. Given the dynamics of this interaction as well as the fact that we remain at an early stage in our paid project acquisition initiative, we have not reflected any potential related revenue in our guidance for 2024. In closing, Yelp's Q1 results reflect our multiyear focus on product innovation and the application of AI across our business. Speaker 300:12:15We are proud of our team's ability to execute against our strategic initiatives, particularly the work being done to unlock even greater value for consumers and service pros. We have continuing confidence in our ability to innovate, grow and drive shareholder value over the long term. With that operator, please open up the line for questions. Operator00:12:36Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer Our first question comes from Jason Kreyer with Craig Hallum. Please go ahead. Speaker 400:13:10Thank you. This is Cal on for Jason. First question from me. I'm just wondering any learnings, anything new in Q1 that you saw as you continue to ramp that paid search budget? And what opportunities do you see for further efficiencies as you continue to ramp up? Speaker 200:13:30Hey there, Cal. This is Jeremy. I think I can take that. We were really pleased as we expanded our paid budget there. This is a moment we've been building towards over a multiyear period, really leaning into services and in particular request to quote. Speaker 200:13:49And it seems like it's paying off. Q4, we had some test budget and Q1 was really about getting that to more significant scale. And I think if you look at our project volume, you could see that the needle has been moved. And I would say a portion of that is our paid efforts. And then of course a portion of that is leading into product and engineering enhancements and features. Speaker 200:14:15And I think the results, the early results are really looking great. 20% year over year project volume, clicks, ad clicks are up, CPCs are down, especially in these categories where we've added paid budget. And I think from a headroom standpoint, we're just getting started. It's still early for us. There's a lot of optimizations that we can continue to make friction that we can take out. Speaker 200:14:40And then of course there's the amount of budget that we can put into it. So I think we're on the offense on this one and really excited to see how it plays out across the year and in the years ahead. Speaker 400:14:52Great. And then last one for me. Just wanted to touch on the Yelp assistant. Could you provide some more color on what you're seeing as far as reducing that consumer friction? I know it's early, but just curious what you're seeing in terms of reducing that friction point and increasing those conversion rates? Speaker 200:15:09Sure. I can take that one too. LOMs are really important part of what we're doing. And we've been of course incorporating AI capabilities for many, many years. I think Yelp Assistant reflects something that just frankly wasn't possible a few years ago. Speaker 200:15:26It's a really exciting way for consumers to interact with Yelp. When they have a project in mind, they can talk to a friendly assistant that guides them through the process, collects all the relevant information and then ultimately ask them if they'd like to submit that project and get multiple quotes on it. We've added it to the project tab as a first step within the app and we're seeing great results there. It does seem to resonate with consumers and we'll be evaluating and testing different entry points all over the mobile web, desktop web as well as app to make sure that we're able to leverage it to maximum. Speaker 400:16:05Perfect. Very appreciated. Thank you. Operator00:16:09Our next question comes from Eric Sheridan with Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead. Speaker 500:16:14Thanks so much for taking the questions. Maybe 2 if I could. We saw the announcement with perplexity and just kind of curious if you could give us some sense of how that relationship might evolve and grow and what the scope might be for additional type partnerships when you think about the rise of AI as consumer facing to an increasing amount in the years ahead. The secondary comment you made about competition for ad dollars in the local space with some of the delivery providers and the like. Can you go a little bit deeper on what you're seeing there in terms of teasing out either the cyclicality versus maybe some of the competitive dynamic that was putting some pressure on that business? Speaker 500:16:57Thank you. Speaker 200:17:01All right. I can take a stab at the first question there. Maybe Jed can jump in on the second one. So excited to see the Perplexity partnership happen. They're obviously early innovator trying to push search forward. Speaker 200:17:16And I think the important takeaway is that when a company trying to deliver a great search experience is in need of great local content, they turn to Yelp. And so that's exciting validation for us. Certainly, there's a lot of activity in the AI space in general and the data licensing space in general. And our door remains open. We're having lots of conversations and we do as a reminder have a pretty sizable data licensing business with a whole variety of different partners in a whole wide array of different industries. Speaker 200:17:52We do see AI licensing is a potentially new area. And in fact, we just released in our spring product release the Yelp Fusion AI API, which delivers a conversational search experience essentially. So that's new to the market. Conversations are happening and we're excited to see what innovators do with that, green yield content all over the web and into interesting new AI applications. Speaker 600:18:21This is Jed. I can take the second question on competition. Certainly in the Q1, we saw some continued pressure in the restaurant that through some of the inflationary pressures to the consumer, that those days have ended. And then a marginal impact from the broader industry shifts to off premise certainly when you look at some of the delivery platforms and kind of the pay to play that happens on those platforms. At the margin, we believe there's some of those dollars going over to those platforms. Speaker 600:19:02But largely, it's a macro impact. At some point, we do believe that R and O will come back. We don't really have the conviction as to the specific timing given the market conditions. Timing is hard to tell. We are well positioned, however, to take advantage when some of the underlying economic drivers improve. Speaker 600:19:22We're staffing against the opportunity, as well as continuing to innovate via the product side. And in the meantime, stepping back broadly, we're laser focused on the opportunity and services and believe that we're in a really strong position to take share. Specifically around the enterprise, we believe that we're somewhat under penetrated and have really started to implement initiatives and invest in services for the enterprise, including better ways to integrate with the CRM and lead management systems on the client side in order to drive more RAQ adoption and that's certainly going to be impacted by our new services project acquisition strategy as well. Speaker 300:20:06Thank you. Operator00:20:09Our next question comes from Sergio Segura with KeyBanc. Please go ahead. Speaker 700:20:16Great. Thanks for taking the questions. We had 2. So the high end of the EBITDA guide was lowered after EBITDA this quarter was above expectation and then the revenue outlook for the year was also unchanged. I guess can you just walk us through what gives you confidence in stepping up the investment for this year without seeing those revenue returns that is contemplating your outlook for 2024? Speaker 700:20:42That's the first question. And then second on R and R and O, you talked about some weakness you saw last quarter. I guess how did the softness play out versus your expectations? And then a month into this quarter, how are trends in that segment relative to what you saw in the Q1? Thank you. Speaker 300:21:02Hey, Sergio, it's David. Thanks for the question. So first, obviously, we have the increased spend in Q1. We went from $2,000,000 at the end of Q4 to $7,000,000 dollars And what we saw in the categories where we are buying projects with Movers as an example is that we saw significant increases in projects. We saw significant increases in clicks and we saw meaningful declines in cost per click. Speaker 300:21:37Now in the past, when we have been able to deliver more value in the way that we think about values, more clicks at better pricing, which is what we are seeing in movers in the Q1, In time, we see that ad budget increases, but it takes time because the mechanism for us is very much through the auction system where we're adding consumers and then those advertisers seeing higher quality leads, more valuable leads for the price that they're paying and then they adjust their budget over time. Now obviously, we want to drive good economic returns, but the timeframe between when you actually spend and when that shows up in budget has been elongated in the past. But I just want to underscore broadly when we've done this in the past, we have seen it show up in ad budget. So we'll look forward to sharing with you updates obviously when we get to the Q2 call and the Q3 call. In terms of the guidance, because of the strong early results that we saw in the Q1, we wanted to provide insight into how we were going spend through the year and the fact that we did intend to absorb some of the EBITDA into paid project acquisition. Speaker 300:22:59I do want to underscore that we think overall the broad efforts that we've made over the past several years to drive efficiency still continue. And just as a couple of important points, we obviously achieved a 25% adjusted EBITDA margin. In 2023, if you look at Q1 expenses, they're only up 1% compared to Q1 of last year. So in Q4 this year, overall expenses up just 1% compared to Q1. We think that we've given ourselves capacity to make this type of investment. Speaker 300:23:34But again, I just want to underscore that we continue to drive efficiency in order to give ourselves this type of operational flexibility. Speaker 600:23:44And this is Jed. I can take the second question. Yes, in terms of R and R, our R and O weakness in the Q1, it was a continuation from what we started to see in the Q4 and as we mentioned in the Q4 call. And in terms of moving into the Q2, our expectations are reflected in the guide. I think it's important to mention too that we're seeing the R and O impact in both local as well as on the multi look channel and obviously multi location would take the brunt of that given the revenue mix. Speaker 700:24:19Very helpful. Thank you, both. Operator00:24:22Our next question comes from John Colantoni with Jefferies. Please go ahead. Speaker 800:24:29Thanks for taking my questions. Wanted to zoom in a little bit on the SEM efforts. I think return profiles in general across SEM sort of are often dependent on repeat behavior since that initial paid click isn't profitable. For Yelp specifically, would you characterize the initial return profile and payback of SEM? Or how would you characterize the initial return profile and payback of SEM? Speaker 800:24:57And how those KPIs translate into revenue and profitability in the near and long term? Thanks. Speaker 200:25:08Hi, John. This is Jeremy. I can take that. Yes, as we're ramping projects, paid projects here, we do believe we have a unique take, a unique approach to this space. Yelp Speaker 300:25:24obviously has Speaker 200:25:24a really strong brand. We're very cross category. And so unlike other players that maybe have invested significantly in this space, we have the reason to talk to consumers for a wide variety of different use cases. And so I think that does give us a very unique advantage in continuing that conversation. And I think certainly to provide outsized economics, you're right, we're going to have to drive repeat behavior. Speaker 200:25:52Right now, it's obviously very early. We just got out of a test quarter in Q4 and we're ramping in Q1. And so what we're looking at and working with is sort of very early data. But I think we can say for sure that the early metrics are looking good with projects being up 20%, with ad clicks being up as well and CPCs being down. So that's what we wanted to see out of the gate. Speaker 200:26:17And then I guess the other thing I'd point to is that Yelp historically has been very product and engineering driven. We invest a lot in R and D. And I think that allows us to provide a consumer experience across our app, across the web, across mobile web that will be and frankly is unparalleled in the space. I think Yelp Assistant is a fantastic example of that. No one else has anything like that in the space period. Speaker 200:26:42We are the innovator there. And I think you can expect to see more goodness just like that in the future. Speaker 900:26:49Thank you. Operator00:26:52Our next question comes from Josh Beck with Raymond James. Please go ahead. Speaker 900:26:59Hi. This is Geeshan Patel on for Josh Beck. Thanks for taking our question. Any color you can share around consumer engagement and the impact around monetization of services? And what metrics are you tracking or managing towards in terms of improving lead gen results? Speaker 200:27:22This is Jeremy. From a on the services side, we've obviously been investing significantly in our product. I think a great example of that as I just talked about is Yelp Assistant, where we're trying to be really innovative there. And the response we're seeing from consumers is positive. It's within the project tab in the app. Speaker 200:27:46We continue to invest in streamlining our request to quote functionality, making that easier for folks to use. I also think it's important to reflect on the business owner side of the equation. I think there's a lot of opportunity there as well, Thinking about making it even easier for businesses to reply and provide good correspondence back to consumers, whether it's quotes or improving the responses, I think is going to be a really great opportunity for us and one that also lends itself to AI improvements as well. So we'll keep you posted as we continue to make improvements. But we've come a long way and I think that's reflected in the excellent project performance, request quote projects being up 20%, shows we're doing some things right. Speaker 200:28:33And again, part of that is the paid projects that we're driving and part of that is the continued innovation and streamlining of our services, features and functionality. Speaker 300:28:44And I can add, this is David. On the monetized connections front, there are 2 things happening. 1 is we continue to make improvements and drive increased monetization of connections and we continue to make progress on that in the Q1. And as we acquire leads through paid search from Off Yelp traffic, you are going to see that metric move because you're adding obviously, when we bring someone in, we want to see clicks to make the economics work. So you're going to see both the numerator and the denominator increasing and that's going to increase the percentage there. Speaker 300:29:25But we are seeing strength in both. And just to say the obvious, if we get better and better at monetizing connections, that makes it all the more valuable to bring additional projects onto Yelp. So there's a positive loop there. So we'll provide more updates as we go through the year on the progress that we're making. And then, of course, we give the monetized connection number annually. Speaker 300:29:54So when we get to the Q4 call in 2025, we'll give you the numbers there, but both saw strength in the Q1 driven by those product improvements and through the projects that we were purchasing. Speaker 100:30:10Got it. Thank you very much. Operator00:30:19Our next question comes from Jan Lee with Evercore. Please go ahead. Speaker 1000:30:25Great. Thanks for taking the question. First, I want to just double click on your comment on the CPC. You're leaning into investment. You're seeing conversion, but the CPC is pretty muted. Speaker 1000:30:37Is it just the nature of kind of the current ad market condition? Or is there anything you're doing on your ad tech side that's really improving targeting? And maybe you can kind of talk about what you're seeing in the competitive intensity of this ad bidding in the services sector specifically outside of the day to day volatility? Thanks. Speaker 300:30:59Yes. Thanks for the question. This is David. So one thing one dynamic at play here is obviously we report the blended change in CPCs. Now obviously that consists broadly of services and restaurant, retail and other and then obviously there are sub categories to each of those. Speaker 300:31:24And what we have seen, I just want to start with the paid project acquisition piece. What we have seen is meaningful reductions in the subcategories where we are purchasing projects and we're very encouraged by that. But we also saw declines in CPCs greater than the minus 1% in services broadly. That's really coming from the continuous improvement in the ad matching technology, which itself is a combination of better information from the consumer as well as continued improvement in the algorithm, plus obviously having those service pros available to us. So we've made progress on that front as well and we're very pleased. Speaker 300:32:16I'd just point out overall we went from CPCs growing 4% in the Q4 to -one percent in the Q1. That's still a very meaningful move in aggregate and that is being very much driven on the services side where you have much smaller number of clicks. So super happy with that. In terms of like bidding intensity for these types of projects, obviously, we are targeting a return on those projects and we've been so far pleased by the price that we are able to acquire projects at. And to the point where we're willing to increase spend in 2024 obviously to the $40,000,000 or more. Speaker 300:33:07So very pleased overall with that. And I think just maybe to as a final comment, when we make improvements as Jeremy has talked about with something like Yelp Assistant and we really get better and better at engaging the consumer, creating a great experience for them. We obviously want to see them come back, but we're also getting more information about the specific job they have that really helps us with the matching. And that increased information translates quite directly into improved CPCs, which in turn results in better cost per lead economics for service pros. So we're happy overall with the progress that we're making. Speaker 300:33:56And I just underscore there's actually lots and lots of projects underway and a lot of room yet to go on continuing to improve that. Speaker 1000:34:04Great. That's super helpful. And maybe just a follow-up. You shared your general like share buyback expectations. That's really helpful. Speaker 1000:34:14But given you're leaning into investment and it sounds like there's still a lot of like buyback? Is there anything that we should consider in the near term cadence of share buybacks? Any, I guess, near term changes to our capital allocation? Speaker 300:34:33Thanks for that question. So in the Q1, we did buy back $62,500,000 of stock. We had been quite consistently buying in prior quarters $50,000,000 So we saw an opportunity to in the Q1 return additional capital. And we also in the Q1 generated $66,000,000 in free cash flow and we ended the quarter with $421,000,000 in cash. As you know, we're committed to returning capital in excess of our target cash balance. Speaker 300:35:10Our perspective on that has not changed and we remain committed to doing that. So I think the I just go back to a comment I made earlier. We think that we have continued to drive real efficiency at Yelp over the past several years. And again, I just point out overall expenses being only up 1% in the Q1 of 2024 compared to 2023 as a reflection of that. So we are creating the capacity to invest at the same time that we're still driving what we think are strong economics for the business. Speaker 1000:35:49Awesome. Thanks a ton. Operator00:35:53There are no further questions in the queue. This will conclude today's conference call. Thank you all for your participation and you may now disconnect.Read morePowered by Conference Call Audio Live Call not available Earnings Conference CallYelp Q1 202400:00 / 00:00Speed:1x1.25x1.5x2x Earnings DocumentsPress Release(8-K)Quarterly report(10-Q) Yelp Earnings HeadlinesThis Somerville cafe has the best brunch in Mass., according to Yelp ElitesMay 2 at 8:21 PM | msn.comIndia Association of Northern Nevada and Yelp Reno to host Holi Festival of ColorsMay 2 at 3:20 PM | msn.comVirtually Limitless Energy?A radical energy breakthrough could change everything. Scientists at MIT and a stealth startup may have discovered a new form of power—what some are calling “Helios” technology. It’s not solar, wind, or even nuclear fission. In fact, it could yield more energy than oil, gas, and coal combined—without harmful byproducts. This obscure company could be at the center of the next trillion-dollar energy revolution.May 5, 2025 | Stansberry Research (Ad)Popular NYC bar is one of the best local businesses in the US: YelpMay 1, 2025 | msn.comYelp ranks seven Arizona firms among best local businesses nationwideMay 1, 2025 | bizjournals.comYelp has the Top 100 Family-Friendly Restaurants. Which two in Georgia made the cut?May 1, 2025 | yahoo.comSee More Yelp Headlines Get Earnings Announcements in your inboxWant to stay updated on the latest earnings announcements and upcoming reports for companies like Yelp? Sign up for Earnings360's daily newsletter to receive timely earnings updates on Yelp and other key companies, straight to your email. Email Address About YelpYelp (NYSE:YELP) operates a platform that connects consumers with local businesses in the United States and internationally. The company's platform covers various categories, including restaurants, shopping, beauty and fitness, health, and other categories, as well as home, local, auto, professional, pets, events, real estate, and financial services. It provides free and paid advertising products to businesses, which include cost-per-click advertising and multi-location Ad products, as well as enables businesses to deliver targeted advertising to large and high-intent audience; and business listing page products. The company also offers other services comprising Yelp Guest Manager, a subscription-based suite of front-of-house management tools for restaurants, nightlife and certain other venues, which include online reservations, a waitlist management solution that allows consumers to check wait times and join waitlists remotely, as well as through hostless kiosks, and seating and server rotation management tools; Yelp Knowledge program that offers business owners local analytics and insights through access to its historical data and other proprietary content; and Yelp Fusion, which offers free access to various basic information through publicly available APIs, and paid access to content and data for consumer-facing enterprise use. In addition, it provides content licensing, as well as allows third-party data providers to update and manage business listing information on behalf of businesses. Further, the company offers its products directly through its sales force; indirectly through partners; and online through its website and business app, as well as non-advertising partner arrangements. It has partnership with Grubhub for providing consumers with a service to place food orders for pickup and delivery. The company was incorporated in 2004 and is based in San Francisco, California.View Yelp ProfileRead more More Earnings Resources from MarketBeat Earnings Tools Today's Earnings Tomorrow's Earnings Next Week's Earnings Upcoming Earnings Calls Earnings Newsletter Earnings Call Transcripts Earnings Beats & Misses Corporate Guidance Earnings Screener Earnings By Country U.S. Earnings Reports Canadian Earnings Reports U.K. Earnings Reports Latest Articles Amazon Earnings: 2 Reasons to Love It, 1 Reason to Be CautiousMeta Takes A Bow With Q1 Earnings - Watch For Tariff Impact in Q2Palantir Earnings: 1 Bullish Signal and 1 Area of ConcernVisa Q2 Earnings Top Forecasts, Adds $30B Buyback PlanMicrosoft Crushes Earnings, What’s Next for MSFT Stock?Qualcomm's Earnings: 2 Reasons to Buy, 1 to Stay AwayAMD Stock Signals Strong Buy Ahead of Earnings Upcoming Earnings Advanced Micro Devices (5/6/2025)American Electric Power (5/6/2025)Constellation Energy (5/6/2025)Marriott International (5/6/2025)Energy Transfer (5/6/2025)Mplx (5/6/2025)Brookfield Asset Management (5/6/2025)Arista Networks (5/6/2025)Duke Energy (5/6/2025)Zoetis (5/6/2025) Get 30 Days of MarketBeat All Access for Free Sign up for MarketBeat All Access to gain access to MarketBeat's full suite of research tools. 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There are 11 speakers on the call. Operator00:00:00Good afternoon. My name is Brianna, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Yelp Inc. Q1 2024 Earnings Conference Call. Please note that this call is being recorded. Operator00:00:14All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speakers' remarks, there will be a question and answer session. I will now turn today's call over to Josh Willis, Yelp Investor Relations. Please go ahead. Speaker 100:00:37Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us on Yelp's Q1 2024 earnings conference call. Joining me today are Yelp's Chief Executive Officer, Jeremy Stoppelman Chief Financial Officer, David Schwarzbach and Chief Operating Officer, Jed Nachman. We published a shareholder letter on our Investor Relations website and with the SEC and hope everyone had a chance to read it. We'll provide some brief opening comments and then turn to your questions. Now, I'll read our Safe Harbor statement. Speaker 100:01:09We'll make certain statements today that are forward looking and involve a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially. Please note that these forward looking statements reflect our opinions only as of the date of this call and we undertake no obligation to revise or publicly release the results of any revision to these forward looking statements in light of new information or future events. In addition, we are subject to a number of risks that may significantly impact our business and financial results. Please refer to our SEC filings as well as our shareholder letter for a more detailed description of the risk factors that may affect our results. During our call today, we may discuss adjusted EBITDA, adjusted EBITDA margin and free cash flow, which are non GAAP financial measures. Speaker 100:01:56These measures should not be considered in isolation from or as a substitute for financial information prepared in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles. In our shareholder letter released this afternoon and our filings with the SEC, each of which is posted on our Investor Relations website, you will find additional disclosures regarding these non GAAP financial measures as well as historical reconciliations of GAAP net income loss to both adjusted EBITDA and adjusted EBITDA margin and a historical reconciliation of GAAP cash flow from operating activities to free cash flow. And with that, I will turn the call over to Jeremy. Speaker 200:02:35Thanks, Josh, and welcome everyone. As we approach 20 years of helping people connect with great local businesses, I am proud of the impact Yelp has had on the many communities we serve. We continue to lean into our strategic focus on services categories and we have already seen momentum in our efforts to deliver the best home services experience for consumers and pros. In the Q1, net revenue increased by 7% year over year to $333,000,000 Net income was $14,000,000 reflecting a 4% margin and adjusted EBITDA increased by 19% year over year to $64,000,000 representing a 19% margin. These results reflect our efforts to improve profitability even as we continue to invest in our strategic growth initiatives. Speaker 200:03:25While businesses in our restaurant, retail and other categories continue to face a challenging operating environment in the Q1, home services was again a standout performer with approximately 15% year over year revenue growth. Advertising revenue in our services categories grew 11% year over year. Request to quote projects increased by approximately 20% year over year in the Q1, reflecting early positive results from our acquisition of services projects through search engine marketing, as well as continued strength from organic consumer demand. In key categories like movers, we have seen significant increases in request to quote projects and ad clicks as well as a meaningful decline in average CPCs. These promising results were largely driven by our paid project acquisition efforts and as a result, we plan to continue investing to capture more of the large market opportunity in services. Speaker 200:04:23As we continue to execute against our robust product roadmap, we introduced more than 15 new features and updates in April. One standout in services is our new LLM powered Yelp assistant. This conversational AI can more accurately interpret a consumer's needs, collect relevant project information in a user friendly way and deliver an even more targeted lead to service pros. We also see a broad set of opportunities to bring our trusted content to consumers in new ways. This includes our Yelp Fusion AI API, a new LLM powered solution enabling partners to tap into Yelp's trusted content. Speaker 200:05:05This tool enhances discovery on third party platforms through natural language search across our broad range of categories, including both services and RR and O, expanding Yelp's reach and utility across the web. We believe these new offerings, along with dozens of other AI powered initiatives on our roadmap, will transform how consumers and businesses connect on Yelp. In summary, Yelp's Q1 results marked a solid start to the year and I continue to be excited about the depth and breadth of our robust product roadmap, particularly in services. Overall, we remain confident in our strategy to drive long term profitable growth and shareholder value. With that, I'll turn it over to David. Speaker 300:05:48Thanks, Jeremy. In the Q1 of 2024, we saw net revenue increase by 7% year over year to $333,000,000 Our net income for the quarter was $14,000,000 or $0.20 per share, improving from a net loss of $1,000,000 in the Q1 of 2023 and reflecting a 4% margin. Adjusted EBITDA increased by 19% year over year to $64,000,000 which was $12,000,000 above the high end of our outlook range, representing a 19% margin. This growth was driven by solid performance in our services categories. Advertising revenue and services increased by 11% year over year to $203,000,000 led by strength in home services, where revenue grew by approximately 15% year over year. Speaker 300:06:35Investments in Request A Quote drove an approximately 20% year over year increase in Request A Quote projects, underscoring the effectiveness of our product led strategy and early progress in our efforts to acquire projects through paid search. Advertisers also responded positively to our improved matching services in the Q1 as reflected by a 6% year over year increase in paying advertising locations in these categories, even as our overall paying advertising locations decreased by 4% year over year. Advertising revenue from our restaurants, retail and other categories grew a modest 1% year over year to $114,000,000 in the quarter. This reflects the challenging operating environment facing businesses in these categories characterized by elevated input costs, inflationary pressures and an inability to pass along higher cost to consumers. Additionally, we may be seeing impacts from trends associated with off premise dining and delivery. Speaker 300:07:34Multi location revenue increased by approximately 5% year over year in the Q1 also attributable to softness in our R and M. We are actively working on enhancing the request a quote experience to enable more multi location services businesses to benefit from this valuable feature. For example, we are in the process of launching an API that aims to streamline the tracking of leads and enhance conversion rates for enterprise customers by connecting directly to their customer relationship software. Our ad system continued to deliver valuable clicks to advertisers in the Q1. We saw an 8% year over year increase in ad clicks across all categories, while average cost per click declined by 1% with more substantial decreases in services, reflecting the increased value we delivered to these advertisers in the quarter. Speaker 300:08:24We believe our improved ad formats and lower CPCs contributed to year over year increases in our retention rate for non term advertisers budgets in the Q1. Improvements to the ad purchase flow, along with enhancements in our advertiser marketing, drove another record quarter for customer acquisition in our self serve channel. Self serve channel revenue has increased at a compound annual growth rate of approximately 25% since the Q1 of 2021. We also continue to identify opportunities to work with other platforms like Facebook and Firefox to tap into searches with local intent that start off of Yelp with the goal of matching our advertisers with an even larger high intent audience. Turning to expenses, in our Q1, we continued to be disciplined in our allocation of resources, while focusing on opportunities that have the potential to drive incremental returns. Speaker 300:09:21This resulted in an improvement of our adjusted EBITDA margin by 2 percentage points year over year. We also reduced stock based compensation expense to 13% of revenue, a 2 percentage point decrease from last year and believe we are on track to reduce it below 8% by the end of 2025. We continue to expect the number of shares subject to employee equity awards granted in 2024 to be approximately 65% lower than in 2023. Returning capital to shareholders through share repurchases continues to be a key element of our capital allocation strategy. In the Q1, we repurchased $62,500,000 worth of shares at an average purchase price of $40.95 per share. Speaker 300:10:05As of March 31, 2024, we had $519,000,000 remaining under our existing repurchase authorization. We plan to continue repurchasing shares in 2024, subject to market and economic conditions. Turning to our outlook, as Jeremy shared, we are confident in our strong portfolio of initiatives to drive long term growth. We expect net revenue will be in the range of $350,000,000 to $355,000,000 for the Q2. For the full year, we are reaffirming our guidance and expect net revenue to be in the range of $1,420,000,000 to $1,440,000,000 as our services initiatives gain traction. Speaker 300:10:43Turning to margin, we expect 2nd quarter cash expenses to increase from the Q1, largely driven by incremental marketing investments, particularly in paid project acquisition. The early positive results from our paid search program have given us the confidence to expand our investments in this area, which we believe can drive project growth over the long term. We now expect to spend $40,000,000 or more on Services project acquisition in 2024. As a result, we anticipate 2nd quarter adjusted EBITDA will be in the range of $70,000,000 to $75,000,000 We are also narrowing our 2024 adjusted EBITDA guidance to $315,000,000 to $325,000,000 to reflect this increased investment. Prices in our cost per click model are set through an auction as compared to the cost per lead model. Speaker 300:11:34In the past, we have found that when we deliver more clicks for a given amount of advertising budget, average CPCs decline. In turn, as advertisers see more value, they generally increase spend over time. However, there is typically a significant lag between a decline in CPC and an increase in ad budget. Given the dynamics of this interaction as well as the fact that we remain at an early stage in our paid project acquisition initiative, we have not reflected any potential related revenue in our guidance for 2024. In closing, Yelp's Q1 results reflect our multiyear focus on product innovation and the application of AI across our business. Speaker 300:12:15We are proud of our team's ability to execute against our strategic initiatives, particularly the work being done to unlock even greater value for consumers and service pros. We have continuing confidence in our ability to innovate, grow and drive shareholder value over the long term. With that operator, please open up the line for questions. Operator00:12:36Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer Our first question comes from Jason Kreyer with Craig Hallum. Please go ahead. Speaker 400:13:10Thank you. This is Cal on for Jason. First question from me. I'm just wondering any learnings, anything new in Q1 that you saw as you continue to ramp that paid search budget? And what opportunities do you see for further efficiencies as you continue to ramp up? Speaker 200:13:30Hey there, Cal. This is Jeremy. I think I can take that. We were really pleased as we expanded our paid budget there. This is a moment we've been building towards over a multiyear period, really leaning into services and in particular request to quote. Speaker 200:13:49And it seems like it's paying off. Q4, we had some test budget and Q1 was really about getting that to more significant scale. And I think if you look at our project volume, you could see that the needle has been moved. And I would say a portion of that is our paid efforts. And then of course a portion of that is leading into product and engineering enhancements and features. Speaker 200:14:15And I think the results, the early results are really looking great. 20% year over year project volume, clicks, ad clicks are up, CPCs are down, especially in these categories where we've added paid budget. And I think from a headroom standpoint, we're just getting started. It's still early for us. There's a lot of optimizations that we can continue to make friction that we can take out. Speaker 200:14:40And then of course there's the amount of budget that we can put into it. So I think we're on the offense on this one and really excited to see how it plays out across the year and in the years ahead. Speaker 400:14:52Great. And then last one for me. Just wanted to touch on the Yelp assistant. Could you provide some more color on what you're seeing as far as reducing that consumer friction? I know it's early, but just curious what you're seeing in terms of reducing that friction point and increasing those conversion rates? Speaker 200:15:09Sure. I can take that one too. LOMs are really important part of what we're doing. And we've been of course incorporating AI capabilities for many, many years. I think Yelp Assistant reflects something that just frankly wasn't possible a few years ago. Speaker 200:15:26It's a really exciting way for consumers to interact with Yelp. When they have a project in mind, they can talk to a friendly assistant that guides them through the process, collects all the relevant information and then ultimately ask them if they'd like to submit that project and get multiple quotes on it. We've added it to the project tab as a first step within the app and we're seeing great results there. It does seem to resonate with consumers and we'll be evaluating and testing different entry points all over the mobile web, desktop web as well as app to make sure that we're able to leverage it to maximum. Speaker 400:16:05Perfect. Very appreciated. Thank you. Operator00:16:09Our next question comes from Eric Sheridan with Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead. Speaker 500:16:14Thanks so much for taking the questions. Maybe 2 if I could. We saw the announcement with perplexity and just kind of curious if you could give us some sense of how that relationship might evolve and grow and what the scope might be for additional type partnerships when you think about the rise of AI as consumer facing to an increasing amount in the years ahead. The secondary comment you made about competition for ad dollars in the local space with some of the delivery providers and the like. Can you go a little bit deeper on what you're seeing there in terms of teasing out either the cyclicality versus maybe some of the competitive dynamic that was putting some pressure on that business? Speaker 500:16:57Thank you. Speaker 200:17:01All right. I can take a stab at the first question there. Maybe Jed can jump in on the second one. So excited to see the Perplexity partnership happen. They're obviously early innovator trying to push search forward. Speaker 200:17:16And I think the important takeaway is that when a company trying to deliver a great search experience is in need of great local content, they turn to Yelp. And so that's exciting validation for us. Certainly, there's a lot of activity in the AI space in general and the data licensing space in general. And our door remains open. We're having lots of conversations and we do as a reminder have a pretty sizable data licensing business with a whole variety of different partners in a whole wide array of different industries. Speaker 200:17:52We do see AI licensing is a potentially new area. And in fact, we just released in our spring product release the Yelp Fusion AI API, which delivers a conversational search experience essentially. So that's new to the market. Conversations are happening and we're excited to see what innovators do with that, green yield content all over the web and into interesting new AI applications. Speaker 600:18:21This is Jed. I can take the second question on competition. Certainly in the Q1, we saw some continued pressure in the restaurant that through some of the inflationary pressures to the consumer, that those days have ended. And then a marginal impact from the broader industry shifts to off premise certainly when you look at some of the delivery platforms and kind of the pay to play that happens on those platforms. At the margin, we believe there's some of those dollars going over to those platforms. Speaker 600:19:02But largely, it's a macro impact. At some point, we do believe that R and O will come back. We don't really have the conviction as to the specific timing given the market conditions. Timing is hard to tell. We are well positioned, however, to take advantage when some of the underlying economic drivers improve. Speaker 600:19:22We're staffing against the opportunity, as well as continuing to innovate via the product side. And in the meantime, stepping back broadly, we're laser focused on the opportunity and services and believe that we're in a really strong position to take share. Specifically around the enterprise, we believe that we're somewhat under penetrated and have really started to implement initiatives and invest in services for the enterprise, including better ways to integrate with the CRM and lead management systems on the client side in order to drive more RAQ adoption and that's certainly going to be impacted by our new services project acquisition strategy as well. Speaker 300:20:06Thank you. Operator00:20:09Our next question comes from Sergio Segura with KeyBanc. Please go ahead. Speaker 700:20:16Great. Thanks for taking the questions. We had 2. So the high end of the EBITDA guide was lowered after EBITDA this quarter was above expectation and then the revenue outlook for the year was also unchanged. I guess can you just walk us through what gives you confidence in stepping up the investment for this year without seeing those revenue returns that is contemplating your outlook for 2024? Speaker 700:20:42That's the first question. And then second on R and R and O, you talked about some weakness you saw last quarter. I guess how did the softness play out versus your expectations? And then a month into this quarter, how are trends in that segment relative to what you saw in the Q1? Thank you. Speaker 300:21:02Hey, Sergio, it's David. Thanks for the question. So first, obviously, we have the increased spend in Q1. We went from $2,000,000 at the end of Q4 to $7,000,000 dollars And what we saw in the categories where we are buying projects with Movers as an example is that we saw significant increases in projects. We saw significant increases in clicks and we saw meaningful declines in cost per click. Speaker 300:21:37Now in the past, when we have been able to deliver more value in the way that we think about values, more clicks at better pricing, which is what we are seeing in movers in the Q1, In time, we see that ad budget increases, but it takes time because the mechanism for us is very much through the auction system where we're adding consumers and then those advertisers seeing higher quality leads, more valuable leads for the price that they're paying and then they adjust their budget over time. Now obviously, we want to drive good economic returns, but the timeframe between when you actually spend and when that shows up in budget has been elongated in the past. But I just want to underscore broadly when we've done this in the past, we have seen it show up in ad budget. So we'll look forward to sharing with you updates obviously when we get to the Q2 call and the Q3 call. In terms of the guidance, because of the strong early results that we saw in the Q1, we wanted to provide insight into how we were going spend through the year and the fact that we did intend to absorb some of the EBITDA into paid project acquisition. Speaker 300:22:59I do want to underscore that we think overall the broad efforts that we've made over the past several years to drive efficiency still continue. And just as a couple of important points, we obviously achieved a 25% adjusted EBITDA margin. In 2023, if you look at Q1 expenses, they're only up 1% compared to Q1 of last year. So in Q4 this year, overall expenses up just 1% compared to Q1. We think that we've given ourselves capacity to make this type of investment. Speaker 300:23:34But again, I just want to underscore that we continue to drive efficiency in order to give ourselves this type of operational flexibility. Speaker 600:23:44And this is Jed. I can take the second question. Yes, in terms of R and R, our R and O weakness in the Q1, it was a continuation from what we started to see in the Q4 and as we mentioned in the Q4 call. And in terms of moving into the Q2, our expectations are reflected in the guide. I think it's important to mention too that we're seeing the R and O impact in both local as well as on the multi look channel and obviously multi location would take the brunt of that given the revenue mix. Speaker 700:24:19Very helpful. Thank you, both. Operator00:24:22Our next question comes from John Colantoni with Jefferies. Please go ahead. Speaker 800:24:29Thanks for taking my questions. Wanted to zoom in a little bit on the SEM efforts. I think return profiles in general across SEM sort of are often dependent on repeat behavior since that initial paid click isn't profitable. For Yelp specifically, would you characterize the initial return profile and payback of SEM? Or how would you characterize the initial return profile and payback of SEM? Speaker 800:24:57And how those KPIs translate into revenue and profitability in the near and long term? Thanks. Speaker 200:25:08Hi, John. This is Jeremy. I can take that. Yes, as we're ramping projects, paid projects here, we do believe we have a unique take, a unique approach to this space. Yelp Speaker 300:25:24obviously has Speaker 200:25:24a really strong brand. We're very cross category. And so unlike other players that maybe have invested significantly in this space, we have the reason to talk to consumers for a wide variety of different use cases. And so I think that does give us a very unique advantage in continuing that conversation. And I think certainly to provide outsized economics, you're right, we're going to have to drive repeat behavior. Speaker 200:25:52Right now, it's obviously very early. We just got out of a test quarter in Q4 and we're ramping in Q1. And so what we're looking at and working with is sort of very early data. But I think we can say for sure that the early metrics are looking good with projects being up 20%, with ad clicks being up as well and CPCs being down. So that's what we wanted to see out of the gate. Speaker 200:26:17And then I guess the other thing I'd point to is that Yelp historically has been very product and engineering driven. We invest a lot in R and D. And I think that allows us to provide a consumer experience across our app, across the web, across mobile web that will be and frankly is unparalleled in the space. I think Yelp Assistant is a fantastic example of that. No one else has anything like that in the space period. Speaker 200:26:42We are the innovator there. And I think you can expect to see more goodness just like that in the future. Speaker 900:26:49Thank you. Operator00:26:52Our next question comes from Josh Beck with Raymond James. Please go ahead. Speaker 900:26:59Hi. This is Geeshan Patel on for Josh Beck. Thanks for taking our question. Any color you can share around consumer engagement and the impact around monetization of services? And what metrics are you tracking or managing towards in terms of improving lead gen results? Speaker 200:27:22This is Jeremy. From a on the services side, we've obviously been investing significantly in our product. I think a great example of that as I just talked about is Yelp Assistant, where we're trying to be really innovative there. And the response we're seeing from consumers is positive. It's within the project tab in the app. Speaker 200:27:46We continue to invest in streamlining our request to quote functionality, making that easier for folks to use. I also think it's important to reflect on the business owner side of the equation. I think there's a lot of opportunity there as well, Thinking about making it even easier for businesses to reply and provide good correspondence back to consumers, whether it's quotes or improving the responses, I think is going to be a really great opportunity for us and one that also lends itself to AI improvements as well. So we'll keep you posted as we continue to make improvements. But we've come a long way and I think that's reflected in the excellent project performance, request quote projects being up 20%, shows we're doing some things right. Speaker 200:28:33And again, part of that is the paid projects that we're driving and part of that is the continued innovation and streamlining of our services, features and functionality. Speaker 300:28:44And I can add, this is David. On the monetized connections front, there are 2 things happening. 1 is we continue to make improvements and drive increased monetization of connections and we continue to make progress on that in the Q1. And as we acquire leads through paid search from Off Yelp traffic, you are going to see that metric move because you're adding obviously, when we bring someone in, we want to see clicks to make the economics work. So you're going to see both the numerator and the denominator increasing and that's going to increase the percentage there. Speaker 300:29:25But we are seeing strength in both. And just to say the obvious, if we get better and better at monetizing connections, that makes it all the more valuable to bring additional projects onto Yelp. So there's a positive loop there. So we'll provide more updates as we go through the year on the progress that we're making. And then, of course, we give the monetized connection number annually. Speaker 300:29:54So when we get to the Q4 call in 2025, we'll give you the numbers there, but both saw strength in the Q1 driven by those product improvements and through the projects that we were purchasing. Speaker 100:30:10Got it. Thank you very much. Operator00:30:19Our next question comes from Jan Lee with Evercore. Please go ahead. Speaker 1000:30:25Great. Thanks for taking the question. First, I want to just double click on your comment on the CPC. You're leaning into investment. You're seeing conversion, but the CPC is pretty muted. Speaker 1000:30:37Is it just the nature of kind of the current ad market condition? Or is there anything you're doing on your ad tech side that's really improving targeting? And maybe you can kind of talk about what you're seeing in the competitive intensity of this ad bidding in the services sector specifically outside of the day to day volatility? Thanks. Speaker 300:30:59Yes. Thanks for the question. This is David. So one thing one dynamic at play here is obviously we report the blended change in CPCs. Now obviously that consists broadly of services and restaurant, retail and other and then obviously there are sub categories to each of those. Speaker 300:31:24And what we have seen, I just want to start with the paid project acquisition piece. What we have seen is meaningful reductions in the subcategories where we are purchasing projects and we're very encouraged by that. But we also saw declines in CPCs greater than the minus 1% in services broadly. That's really coming from the continuous improvement in the ad matching technology, which itself is a combination of better information from the consumer as well as continued improvement in the algorithm, plus obviously having those service pros available to us. So we've made progress on that front as well and we're very pleased. Speaker 300:32:16I'd just point out overall we went from CPCs growing 4% in the Q4 to -one percent in the Q1. That's still a very meaningful move in aggregate and that is being very much driven on the services side where you have much smaller number of clicks. So super happy with that. In terms of like bidding intensity for these types of projects, obviously, we are targeting a return on those projects and we've been so far pleased by the price that we are able to acquire projects at. And to the point where we're willing to increase spend in 2024 obviously to the $40,000,000 or more. Speaker 300:33:07So very pleased overall with that. And I think just maybe to as a final comment, when we make improvements as Jeremy has talked about with something like Yelp Assistant and we really get better and better at engaging the consumer, creating a great experience for them. We obviously want to see them come back, but we're also getting more information about the specific job they have that really helps us with the matching. And that increased information translates quite directly into improved CPCs, which in turn results in better cost per lead economics for service pros. So we're happy overall with the progress that we're making. Speaker 300:33:56And I just underscore there's actually lots and lots of projects underway and a lot of room yet to go on continuing to improve that. Speaker 1000:34:04Great. That's super helpful. And maybe just a follow-up. You shared your general like share buyback expectations. That's really helpful. Speaker 1000:34:14But given you're leaning into investment and it sounds like there's still a lot of like buyback? Is there anything that we should consider in the near term cadence of share buybacks? Any, I guess, near term changes to our capital allocation? Speaker 300:34:33Thanks for that question. So in the Q1, we did buy back $62,500,000 of stock. We had been quite consistently buying in prior quarters $50,000,000 So we saw an opportunity to in the Q1 return additional capital. And we also in the Q1 generated $66,000,000 in free cash flow and we ended the quarter with $421,000,000 in cash. As you know, we're committed to returning capital in excess of our target cash balance. Speaker 300:35:10Our perspective on that has not changed and we remain committed to doing that. So I think the I just go back to a comment I made earlier. We think that we have continued to drive real efficiency at Yelp over the past several years. And again, I just point out overall expenses being only up 1% in the Q1 of 2024 compared to 2023 as a reflection of that. So we are creating the capacity to invest at the same time that we're still driving what we think are strong economics for the business. Speaker 1000:35:49Awesome. Thanks a ton. Operator00:35:53There are no further questions in the queue. This will conclude today's conference call. Thank you all for your participation and you may now disconnect.Read morePowered by